From: Diva Las Vegas organizers (dlvorg@geekbabe.com)
Date: Wed Nov 03 2010 - 06:52:33 CDT
In this mailing:
Org List
JoAnn's Notes
Introducing the Activity Ground Rules
Hospitality strategy
Abstain
Dates
Administrivia
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Org List:
This is the DLV 2011 Organizational Mailing List (dlvorg@geekbabe.com)
Replies to this message will be forwarded to the DLVORG list and not
the DLV-Announce or DLV-Discuss list.
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JoAnn's Notes:
Finally!!! We get to now move forward to the programming!!!
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Introducing the Activity Ground Rules:
Joann writes:
To One & All--
I like the spirit that comes with the spirit of "herding cats" ... that
is who I am, and I believe that is who most all of you are. In that
vain, I would not wish to minimize anyone's individualistic spirit.
However, there can be a fine line between individualism and confusion.
Thus, I would like to make sure that we do not have confusion about: (i)
how we do our programming, (ii) the role of the activity coordinators,
and (iii) the need to respect others feelings as we arrange all of our
activities.
So this leads to a concept of "Programming Ground Rules" which Annie and
I would like to introduce for Diva 2011. There are six(6) Ground Rules
we would like to have as the "talisman for planning" and will refer to
them as the "GR-6". So here goes ---
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Activity Guidelines:
(1) All DLV activities which appear on the final schedule must
have a Diva Las Vegas attendee-volunteer listed as the primary
responsible Coordinator.
(1a) The primary Coordinator or a named designee needs to be
physically present at the activity venue or rendezvous location
at or before the posted start time.
(1b) The primary listed Coordinator of each DLV activity shall
be a DLV attendee-volunteer who is not employed by or closely
connected to the venue hosting or sponsoring the activity.
(1c) The primary listed Coordinator, or a named assistant or
designee, shall be responsible for the activity's arrangements,
greeting people at the commencement of the activity, attending
the activity, being the lead interface with the venue staff
and/or those third parties who will be assisting with the
activity, and being available for any troubleshooting and
follow-up issues.
. . . . .
(2) The Project Manager has the "initial say" as to which
activities are placed on the DLV schedule and in which
timeslots, and the Org Group as a whole has the "final say",
if necessary, following a motion and a vote to place on the
schedule, remove from the schedule, or to adjust the timeslot.
(2a) The Project Manager may designate a reasonable number of
large-attendance activities as "Single Track", whose timeslots
will be closed to additional activities.
. . . . .
(3) The DLV volunteer Coordinators of record are responsible
for the financial aspects of their activities, subject to the
approval of the ORG Group. The payment method and explicit
instructions for payment must be clearly stated by the
Coordinator and included in the sign-up information for that
activity.
. . . . .
(4) The specific timeslot for each activity shall be stated
by the primary Coordinator, but may be adjusted by the Project
Manager for a "best fit" in the schedule as a whole.
. . . . .
(5) The Coordinators of a successful DLV activity in the
most recent year have "first refusal rights" to coordinate
the same or a similar activity in the current year, subject
to the approval of the ORG Group and Project Manager.
. . . . .
(6) In the event that no named primary Coordinator, named
assistant, or named designee are present at the activity
location or rendezvous point within a reasonable duration
after the posted start time, all DLV volunteers present
shall briefly convene and decide amongst themselves whether
to continue with the activity as best they can or to cancel
the activity due to coordinator non-participation.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Hospitality strategy:
Annie writes:
A few thoughts about hospitality for DLV 2011 ...
Overall, I think we did well with hospitality in 2010, much
better than in several previous years in many respects. We
paid attention to the need for greeters at our big opener
and we had a few unique activities to build the sense of
community among our attendees.
I don't think we have any major ongoing issues with
hospitality, but I do think we need to pay particular
attention to a few areas.
I'm particularly concerned about a couple of comments on the
survey, such as ...
+Again the ladies who have been doing this {the} longest were
+very cliqueish. And even when we approached them they were
+cool and not interesting in new people.
This is contrary to what I observed, but if a rank and file
attendee felt this way, we need to take notice and do what
we can to help with this situation, or at least the perception
of such.
Yes, there is a tendency within the TG community to be cliquish,
and a propensity for a (faux?) sense of exclusivity. We need to
be aware of this, and deal with it, in order to encourage mixing
and inclusion!
Another comment concerns me as well:
+We saw at a lot of venues ladies come in and leave {because}
+they did not know what to do and I feel like the hostess's
+of the events should have been more aware of this. We
+had lots of people at this DLV and I would hate ot lose
+new comers
If we have attendees take the effort to come to an activity,
only to look around, find nobody to greet them, see their
shadow, and dive back into their hole, something is wrong! :(
I think we need to do all we can to prevent a come-in-look-
around-and-walk-out situation! :(
As an example of what I think we should see ...
I was very impressed recently at the degree of inclusiveness
and hospitality shown to the Pinkfest attendees by the Island
Girls. I do think it was more of a mindset and not driven by
anything such as a written policy.
There were no designated greeters. EVERYONE was a greeter!
If you don't know what the Island Girls is/are, it's a
semi-organized TG group in Blue Island, IL. The focus
appears to be mostly social, as opposed to the support
type groups.
I think we need to impress upon all, particularly volunteers,
that hospitality is everyone's job.
I would even go as far as to say that it's the duty of any
attendee, particularly a volunteer, who observes a walk-away
about to happen to take action, then, in real time, and prevent
it!
If those who witness a walk-away are uncomfortable intervening
and doing some welcoming, then the situation needs to be
escalated to the coordinator of record immediately, before
the walk-away gets out of the door.
This is another clear case where it's very important to raise
the issue in real time, so something can be done about it!
We've stated that the overall responsibility for any activity,
including hospitality, is that of the named coordinators, but
they are often times busy and distracted and can't keep a close
watch for those entering. We need to establish the mindset that
if there's someone entering with that "deer in the headlights"
look, everyone and anyone should immediately greet the individual
and welcome him/her on behalf of DLV.
. . . . .
Hospitality activities:
I would like to open a line of conversation regarding some of
the things we tried in 2010 along the line of hospitality,
both in terms of follow-up and evaluation, and in terms of
looking forward toward DLV 2011.
We had two particular sets of activities in 2010 aimed at
improving hospitality, comfort, and inclusion:
1. The daily hotel gatherings.
2. The Beginner Open House sessions.
Let's discuss each.
The survey showed that the hotel gatherings had a good level
of enjoyment and a very good level of comfort. This is a Good
Thing, and warrants consideration of doing a repeat for 2011.
However, since Holly has stated that she will not be with us
in 2011, someone will need to step forward to coordinate the
Hotel Hostess program, if it is to happen this coming year.
My big concern regarding the Hotel Hostess program is the load
it places on the volunteer force. Even after casting aside the
mistaken impressions of such things as duty hours and required
watchstanding, the job of the Hotel Hostess is still significant.
Although the Hotel Hostess program is beneficial, I don't think
it is fair to the DLV attendees as a whole if volunteers forego
coordinating the main-line DLV activities in order to act as
a Hotel Hostess.
Another concern of mine is that of scheduling and passing the
word regarding the hotel get-togethers. We have no effective
means of spreading the word on anything once DLV gets underway.
When the word is passed only by word of mouth, somebody ends up
getting left out, and that's a Bad Thing<tm>! :(
Since we only placed the first session of the hotel get-togethers
on the schedule this past year, it was only by informal means
that the details of subsequent gatherings were made known, and
the downward trend of the number of responses as the week
progressed indicates that we had some fall-out.
I would like to suggest that if we repeat this program, we
lock down the time and location of each of the daily sessions
in order that we can put them on the schedule and get the
word out about when and where they will be happening.
I'll also suggest that we look into a more effective means
of sharing the hotel hospitality load. Perhaps have one who
is the designated "lead hostess" at each hotel, and then
encourage this person to recruit or delegate the day to
day responsibility of the actual gatherings. This was eluded
to last year, and is actually covered in the motion on the
hotel hostess program.
Thoughts on the Hotel Hostess program, gang? Any volunteers
to take the lead on this?
. . . . . . . . . .
We had three Beginner Open House sessions last year. These
were for the purpose of helping our inexperienced and new
attendees attain more of a comfort level.
The Beginner Open House sessions did not score as highly for
enjoyment, although they did score highly for comfort. I
would like to hear from anyone who attended as to what your
thoughts and feelings are regarding these functions. I'm very
surprised that they scored as "out of cluster" as they did. I
heard nothing negative about them whatsoever. I'm just a bit
perplexed as to why they scored lower than average on the
enjoyment scale.
I would also like to hear thoughts from Sarona regarding the
Beginner Open House sessions, generally and specifically. Is
this something we want to consider repeating for 2011?
These are some of my general thoughts regarding our overall
hospitality situation. Comments?
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Abstain:
Mary Beth writes:
>I have a question, why would you abstain from the vote? Is it
>that you have no pressing opinion, or can or can't go regardless
>what the date is?
I abstained from voting because due to my current financial
situation I will be unable to attend, so I felt I should not
influence the outcome for those who will be attending.
. . . . .
Norma writes:
I simply have no opinion on the issue. Thus, any vote for a
date I might cast would introduce a fake element into the
statistics.
I would have therefore skipped voting entirely, but the
"abstain" choice was included. So I used it.
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Dates:
Marcia writes:
I know votes are cast.
Just wanted to let you know that such a early date may cause
lower participation due to spring break.
I dont know how many people have kids but this could cause a
problem.
Also I know that hotels and events are cheaper during the week,
but a lot of people want to make it a long weekend taking 2 or
3 days off work and adding it to the weekend.
Just wanted to keep you informed.
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Administrivia:
This is the Diva Las Vegas 2011 organizational list.
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Diva Las Vegas 2011
April 3 - 8, 2011
Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
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