District 105D Questionnaire Analysis
Please see below, a summary of the results of the District Questionnaire presented to members of the District at the special Open Forum at Alton on the 20th of October 2013.
The DG Team have reviewed the overall results and will be formulating and implementing short, medium and long term plans to address some of the issues raised. Shortly, once personal data has been cleansed from the database where members could possibly be recognised by club, name or position, the total response data will be available on the website for all to see.
Again thanks to all those who took part.
Mike Hendy
1st Vice District Governor, District 105D
Acknowledgements
Tom Sayers, District Webmaster & IT Chairman
Owen Sayers, database developer
Godwin Micallef, District Secretary
All of you who took the time to fill it in
Results
Please see synopsis below or download the complete results PDF
Members, Clubs, Length of Service
388 members out of 1296 completed the survey - 29.94%
61 out of 63 clubs were represented in the survey - 96.8%
Length of service ranged from 0 years to 49 years - average length of service 15.5 years
Club Officers/Cabinet Officers
Club positions*:
President - 44
Secretary - 53
Treasurer - 29
Committee Chair - 59
Club Lions - 213
*Some responders filled positions held in the past
Current cabinet officers - 43
Non cabinet officers - 341
Event Attendance
District Convention - 166
District Handover - 70
District Service - 84
Cabinet meetings (as observer) - 44
Zone meetings - 261
MD Convention - 53
Europa Forum - 15
International Convention - 22
Your views of events attended
Total comments - 223
Not exactly motivating!
Europa forum is a very expensive talk shop which does not actually achieve a great deal
Very poor, Zone meetings have lost their way
District Convention needs to be re-formatted, bit too stuffy and old fashioned, especially business days
Cabinet meetings are as dry as eating sawdust
Basically all talk and little meaningful action, cut out the ceremony and business should be conducted in an afternoon. Cabinet seems estranged from club Lions
Having attended cabinet on a regular basis as Zone Chair, I found that the cabinet was made up of the old guard who desperately hang on to their jobs year after year
Not so much convention per se more the extremely old fashioned way we refer to members as DG, PDG, PID etc. Drop this nonsense and move into the 21st century
Nowhere near enough is made of the skills, opinions and knowledge of individual members; at one recent convention the floor mikes were not use. A workshop means participation - not just listening
Cabinet size and DO visits
District Cabinet size
Just about right - 44
No opinion - 190
Too big - 137
Has a DO visited your club in the last:
Year - 321
3 years - 33
5 years - 7
Never - 1
Can't remember - 18
Which DOs visited (838 responses)?
DG - 300
IPDG - 29
1st VDG - 101
2nd VDG - 36
Region Chair - 130
Zone Chair - 215
Others - 27
DO visit comments
92 comments made
DO visits from Youth Programme Officers, MIAB, LCIF, Diabetes, Medic Alert, Speech and Hearing
Did these people?
Receive an invitation from the club - 79
Invite themselves - 196
Don't know - 97
Value of the visits?
Number of comments - 269
Awareness of programmes/opportunities, clarification of an issue regarding licencing
Given newer members a better insight into the wider Lions family
Having seen some presentations, they do not add any value to the information that has been sent in the mailing or is on the website
District Officers have attended zone meetings. Very poor knowledge of their subject and displayed very poor presentation skills. No value given or received
Depended on the charisma of the officer, generally no effect. One so bad the club refused further visits
Very little - a pat on the back. Not always able to answer questions asked
Very useful, its good for us to have the fact we are part of a bigger organisation reinforced
To ask questions of the officer, and get his opinion on things that have been discussed in the club
Most of the information that is needed from DO's can be obtained by a phone call or from the web - do Officers need to visit the clubs in this electronic age?
Interesting to see the DG and wife in person - value the encouragement for the clubs work
District projects
District projects, are there:
Too many - 104
Too few - 15
Just about right - 82
No opinion - 177
Participation in District Projects: 230 comments
Peace Poster, website, Scrapbook, Travelling Lion, Youth Award, Spectrek, Environment, International sight, Wateraid, MIAB
Comments on District Projects
Some of the projects like Spectrek are really good. I think we should concentrate on less projects but make the ones we do bigger, better and attract more publicity
Our club is struggling for numbers, unable to find officers to look after the various projects as there are far too many
District is light years away from what a club does or should do or even wants to do - the machinery for generating interest is not effective
Club supports all 105D projects needing financial assistance, only active support youth
Peace poster, poetry are useless - no media coverage at District level and schools inundated with other work
Lions competing with other Lions clubs on projects is inappropriate
District and MD projects really of little interest to me as a club member, as I prefer to concentrate on works and projects within our own local area
District Competitions
District Competitions - are there:
Too many - 121
Too few - 12
Just about right - 57
No opinion - 184
Should awards for District Competitions be presented at District Convention?
Yes - 191
No - 125
(note only 316 responses)
Comments on projects/competitions
178 comments received
Clubs like to see awards at District conventions, it is public recognition of what they have achieved
They are devalued due to the low number entering, should be a minimum number before event goes ahead
No particular interest, prefer to work locally
I think clubs should be left to concentrate on service rather than entering competitions
I would be keen to enter Peace Poster but don't want to spend club funds on an entrance fee, we found it obscene when a bill came through
Competitions should be reviewed every x years to assess if worthwhile continuing and either revamp or cease
Personally I think that all competitions are irrelevant and do nothing to motivate people in our club
Awards could be made by DGT or RC/ZC on club visits
Other than Young Ambassador which I do believe should be made at convention, all others should be made at handover
It is right there are a number of competitions so that clubs can ‘pick and mix'
While District Convention is the right forum for presentations, they do drag on for a long time
Don't allow DGs to keep starting competitions at the end of their year
District Convention
Is the content of DC:
Interesting & useful - 46
Boring and waste of time/money - 50
Varies from year to year - 120
No opinion - 159
Is the DC:
Too expensive - 139
Too cheap - 1
Just right - 74
No opinion - 163
Add/Subtract at Convention?
169 comments
Out with the flags and loud music, in with hands on workshops
I wouldn't take away the pomp and ceremony
If you can wrap up admin and protocol in a nice comfortable package for those that love it and create a new folder of amazing projects achieved by real Lions
Take away the speakers that are invited every year and talk about the projects we all know about already
Too formal, too many speeches, you only have to look around especially in the afternoon and see people nodding off
Subtract the formalities and add something more useful
The ceremony of flags should be scrapped
Forget the opening ceremony, add more open debates including an open forum from the floor
Add more workshops, subtract competitions
Continue to improve the quality of the business session - make it more focussed with fewer unnecessary reports. Bring in speakers who can hold an audience
Add more workshops, subtract protocol especially at the beginning
Debate on membership led in a contentious fashion
Cut down presentations and childrens choirs and concentrate on speakers
Remove pomp and DG/PDG back slapping
Low key event for the Friday night for those that want it in an environment where people can chat without shouting
What would persuade you to attend convention?
168 comments
I will only attend out of duty when I am President of my club
Need to be assured that individual members are welcome
It is unlikely I could be persuaded
Nothing.....it occurs to me that those individuals in our club who do have a wider involvement have made Lions their main social outlet
Less bureaucracy
Being able to afford to stay over, more information about cheaper hotels in the area
I would have to feel it was useful to the club and money well spent. I often feel that I am a junior member of a highly complex Civil Service department when my intention was to do good locally
A change to a swift purposeful AGM which is what it should be. I doubt whether this questionnaire will make any difference as most problems in Lions arise from a structure which is designed to resist change
An understanding that we are going to need a complete rethink if we are going to turn this organisation around
A much smaller and more dynamic Cabinet looking forward not congratulating themselves on past glories. Get some fresh blood in and stop the ritual of shuffling the posts around the table
Make it cheaper, one day is enough, do we need themes etc and dances? It would appear these events are not popular any more
A simple change from the old fashioned ‘badge laden old boy network', to a simple informative style of new data and tools to do the job
And the way forward?
I would consider the data obtained from this questionnaire to be a truly representative sample from our membership as the response is far greater than I anticipated - or dreamed
This and future DG Teams and cabinets must tackle aspects highlighted relating to:
- Convention - cost, venue, format, order of business
- Cabinet - its size and efficiency
- Projects/competitions - their value in motivating Lions and the sheer number of them
- Presentation skills training for those District Officers visiting clubs/zones
- More frequent, direct, meaningful, regular communication with Lions Clubs members by District Leaders
WE IGNORE THESE RESULTS AT OUR PERIL!
Thank you for your participation.
