So what is an “Active Club”?

Malcolm Lockey, my predecessor, has been talking about active membership for some time now and it has become a big debate at Council and in Forward Planning. The question for many clubs is ‘What is Active?’ In our view active means a combination of the following

• An active and varied programme sufficient to attract membership predominantly from Ex-Round Tablers
• True support to the Associated Round Table where there is one, and helping them to grow and develop but without suffocating them
• Encouraging Round Tablers to join and help to develop the club when they leave Table.
• Building or helping to build a profile of the Round Table family in the community by developing community or fund raising activities
• Continuing the fun and fellowship gained from membership and experience of the Round Table family.

These are our views. What are yours? Let me know at membership@41club.org.

Assistance to Round Table with membership

Round Table is the primary organisation of the Round Table family and one of the clear duties of our Association is to support them wherever we can. We are looking at initiatives designed to assist them in developing their membership.

Firstly the question of honoraries hanging on in Round Table. In many instances this works fine where there are 1 or 2 honoraries. Examples could be the Chairman of 41 Club or a member being given an extra year in Table as a thanks for sterling work as a member. The problem arises for those that hang on for years believing they are helping the table with their numbers. In many cases the reverse is true. Tables are finding difficulty in recruiting new younger members when they find the group of 55+ “Tablers” attending every meeting. Additional work done by Round Table shows evidence of people not only not joining but resigning as a result. Our job must be to encourage those people to join our organisation but they must have something attractive to join.

Over 40 but under 45. Our current rules state that membership is open to men over 40 as this hasn’t changed since Table changed their age rule in 1998. In the past we have encouraged joint membership and whilst this may be useful to create a seamless link into our association we really should be encouraging those people to put all their energies into the continued development of Round Table. In a lot of instances their experience is vital to the future success of Table.

Sons, Daughters and close family members. Many of us have shied away from encouraging our families to join either Round Table or Circle considering that “It is not the organisation it was” or “My son/daughter is far too busy”. One of the key problems we have is that for many of us we don’t really know or understand what Round Table or Circle is right now. The only way they can get that information is from the horse’s mouth, i.e. current members. We are going to run a pilot in South Wales to try to obtain as many names and e-mail contacts for close family members of Table/Circle age to pass on to Round Table so that they can make that first contact. Clearly we have to be mindful of Data Protection and permissions will be sought before any names, addresses and telephone numbers  etc are disclosed.

Round and About
Richard enjoys the moment as Radlett Area 41 Chairman Mike and Vice-Chairman Jez “enjoy” the hospitable welcome from recently formed Royston	Richard presents the new Charter to Mike Landau chairman of Radlett Area 41 Club

A couple of success stories. Radlett Area 41 Club was formally chartered in October. President Richard and Membership Officer Jim were present at an excellent evening of good old fun and fellowship organised by the new club Vice Chairman Jez Pepper. Richard presented the new charter to Chairman Mike Landau along with the new chain of office. This is a new club for those people who wanted to be more active in their location and support a strong Round Table in Radlett. New members are up to 20 and whilst they all have association with Radlett they are interested in hearing from any others from the old Round Table Area 28. In the same vein and following 1741 (a club made up of ex-members of clubs in Table Area 17) there are other clubs being set up across the country. Active Black Country has now been open for a year (Some clubs in Table Area 5) and we are just waiting for 1441 (Table Area 14) to complete their formation. Are there any more to come?

Harrow & Wembley celebrate their 3rd re-union meeting

I visited Harrow & Wembley club recently for their 3rd re-union night. 2 years ago they had a membership of 10 and regular attendance from 7/8. Following some brilliant work done by Secretary Ian Smith he has traced around 80 other ex-members of Harrow and Wembley Tables and invited them to re-union evenings. As a result of that and altering their programme to 5 good meetings a year membership has grown to 22 and is likely to grow again this year. I also visited Grays for their 50th Charter and as a result of similar work done by their Secretary, Clive Banbury and Chairman Adrian Alsop they have seen their small numbers nearly double in the past 12 months. It can be done but it does need someone to put in the hard work.

Good luck to all members of clubs and if you want to write to me about anything membership related contact me on the e-mail membership@41club.org.