David Danner wrote:
General Desruisseaux, sir I read with great interest your Club activities of the past and current association. However you gave no clue revealing how, as President, you might conduct Cabinet Meetings and discourse with Club-wide attitude and general philosophy as an executive for both sides. Thanks General.
Thank you General Danner. Those are great questions.
Cabinet meeting will be conducted as per club rules. Members have the opportunity to provide ideas and suggestions for meeting topics. Since we are using the forum it will be easy to setup threads to open the discussion of multiple ideas. Within a reasonable time, as per club rules, discussions will be held and a proposal would be generated by the person who brought the idea forward. Once the proposal is received there would a vote, as per club rules.
I will ensure that all correspondence be done within a respectful atmosphere. I will also propose that a more formal approach be used in meetings. The use of proper titles such as President, Secretary and General when addressing Cabinet members will be suggested during meetings and correspondence.
I have to tell you that before I joined the Cabinet I heard rumors. It was confirmed when I approached a talented individual to join the Cabinet. He said he was not interested because, in his own words, ‘it can be a Vipers nest’. I was shocked when I heard that. I decided I would join the Cabinet, un-seating an incumbent, which I would not normally do, to see what was going on. It was true, from individuals on the Cabinet; antagonistic, rude, insulting behavior was directed at other members of the Cabinet. Once I joined and asked that this be stopped, I was attacked with rude and insulting messages. I can only now imagine what was going on before I joined and this is a major problem in my view. One of the primary reasons why I wanted the meetings to move to a forum based system was to have a record of what is going on. People would naturally be careful of their responses in a forum.
My goal will be to create a respectful atmosphere where everyone can be heard in and out of the Cabinet. All ideas and discourses are welcome without antagonistic behavior from anyone in the Cabinet or Club. This has always been my personal philosophy. This was a personal philosophy when I created the club forums way back when. Rude and antagonistic posts would not be tolerated. That is my club wide philosophy.
I cannot understand antagonistic behavior from anyone in the club. All members are volunteers. If you dislike an individual that is one thing but to throw insults at everything they say is not acceptable. We do NOT tolerate that kind of behavior at the Forums why would it be OK during Cabinet meetings.
Is there a solution?
To really solve any future problems I would like that the Cabinet discussion be more visible to the general membership. Our Parliament is televised as well as the US congress. I don't understand why the Club Cabinet would need to be so secret. You should be able to read most topics, perhaps not all, to learn the interactions of the various members and know their opinions. The Cabinet forum would be locked to prevent any one to make comments. However the Cabinet question forum is always available. Some would need to remain private such as disciplinary actions against individuals and other sensitive topics. I think it would be very important that the Cabinet be a place where nasty individuals would have no place. It is a shame that excellent potential Cabinet members would hesitate to join the Cabinet because of that. I don’t think the ACWGC can afford or survive that.
All members from the Brigade commander to the President of the club must comport themselves in a respectful manner at all times. This is a club where like minded people come together to play war games, we may not agree in what we consider fun or interesting in a game but we must treat each other with respect. If you cannot do that then this may not be the club for you. There are moments when things may get heated and we may succumb to a lapse but after smoke clears we must continue to respect each other.