[23920] in APO-L
Re: [APO-L] Agreements with other organizations
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Michael Gallagher)
Sat Sep 13 23:54:19 2003
Date: Sat, 13 Sep 2003 23:54:08 -0400
Reply-To: Michael Gallagher <famtree@UDel.Edu>
From: Michael Gallagher <famtree@UDel.Edu>
To: APO-L@LISTSERV.IUPUI.EDU
First, I'm making this public because I would like to apologize for singling
Packy out & thank him for making it clear to me that "In volunteer
organizations, people like proof of ability." I think the root of the
problem is that I look at things top-down & fail to see the influence I can
have on a local level. That & that I join organizations on an idealist
basis, trying to do what the purpose at large is & make a BIG difference.
The rest of my response I'll send just to Packy.----- Original Message -----
From: "Packy Anderson" <packy@dardan.com>
To: "Michael Gallagher" <famtree@UDel.Edu>
Sent: Saturday, September 13, 2003 11:34 PM
Subject: Re: [APO-L] Agreements with other organizations
> On Sat, 13 Sep 2003, Michael Gallagher wrote:
> > Thoughts? Ideas on whether this is feasible? I knw Packy will say I
will
> > have time to do this kind of thing as an alum & that with a chapter of 6
I
> > should put priority on it & that if my chapter folds shortly after I
> > graduate (or before, which I'd vowed not to let happen) (which I don't
want
> > to happen) no one in APO will take me seriously on a sectional level or
> > higher (ie I read it as trust me/allow me to do anything).
>
> Just FYI, that's not the kind of thing you're supposed to tell the world
at
> large. You've just advertised, "Hi, I'm small fry and I know it, but I
> want to jump into the big stuff right now."
>
> In volunteer organizations, people like proof of ability. If I were still
> a staffer, and I needed someone to take responsibility for something, I've
> got two choices: I can either take someone whom I know nothing about, and
> give them the task on blind faith, ***OR*** I could give it to someone I
> know who's done good work in the past. They may not have done something
> this big before, but what they have done, they've done well. I don't have
> to know about it personally, because someone else I know who's opinion I
> trust can vouch for that person's ability and past performance.
>
> All I've been telling you is that you have an opportunity to prove
yourself
> on the chapter level, and your chapter SORELY needs your attention. You
> have the ability to help your chapter NOW, which you won't as an alum.
> Your chapter is small, so they really can't spare the people. It is
> completely my opinion, but I think you're going to hurt your reputation by
> trying to take on too grandiose a task when a more mundane, yet more
> important, task is staring you in the face. Show people that you're up to
> the task of pulling your chapter's buns out of the fire, and you'll gain
> the _respect_ of other people in the organization who are in the position
> to assign you to bigger and grander tasks.
>
> YiLFS,
> -packy
> "just a random alum"
>
> --
> Packy Anderson
packy@dardan.com
>
> "Anyone who slaps a 'this page is best viewed with Browser X' on a Web
page
> appears to be yearning for the bad old days, before the Web, when you had
> very little chance of reading a document written on another computer,
> another word processor, or another network." -WWW creator Tim Berners-Lee
>
>
