What would you like CAP to get for Christmas?

[OldGuy]

Money for a better:

Recruiting and retention program?
Advertising and mass-market marketing?
Better ES Equipment and training?

[THRAWN]

Money for a better:

Recruiting and retention program?
Advertising and mass-market marketing?
Better ES Equipment and training?

You can have all the money in the world and the coolest toys, but if the phone isn't ringing, it's useless. CAP should have it's stockings stuffed with viable, realistic, and legitimate state MOUs.

[Eclipse]

CAP should have it's stockings stuffed with viable, realistic, and legitimate state MOUs.

Boom.

Those alone, along with the requisite realistic expectations for response, and ramifications when there is none, would
provide the downforce on the leadership to get serious about CAP's operational missions.

MOUs without expectations and ramifications are meaningless - that's what CAP has today.

With that said, it needs to be understood that probably, maybe, n a third of the active membership are involved in ES
in a meaningful way - the majority are involved with cadets or "other", and you can't turn the whole organization's focus
to one of the missions without ramifications on the others.

[Holding Pattern]

All I want for Christmas is good leadership and an adherence to regulations by Wing and higher.

[etodd]

More CFIs to join, with a desire to teach primary to Cadets.

[Shawn W.]

Money for a better:

Recruiting and retention program?
Advertising and mass-market marketing?
Better ES Equipment and training?

You can have all the money in the world and the coolest toys, but if the phone isn't ringing, it's useless. CAP should have it's stockings stuffed with viable, realistic, and legitimate state MOUs.

Click.... LOL  :clap:

[NIN]

Money for a better:

Recruiting and retention program?
Advertising and mass-market marketing?
Better ES Equipment and training?

You can have all the money in the world and the coolest toys, but if the phone isn't ringing, it's useless. CAP should have it's stockings stuffed with viable, realistic, and legitimate state MOUs.

Correct. And by "phone ringing," both in terms of "interested prospective members" and "missions." More on that first phone ringing in a minute.

To OP's points:

Define "a recruiting and retention program." No, no, seriously.

Because honestly, people in organizations (like CAP, not just CAP) seem to expect prospective members to rain from the skies with zero effort on the part of the local unit.  And I'm here to tell you that just doesn't work that way.  Zero-effort recruiting doesn't exist, no matter how much we wish it would.

Much like politics, "All recruiting is local."  Recruiting has a maximum effective range. That maximum effective range is about 1 meter. I kid, a little, about this, but "recruiting," broadly, a personal and one-on-one kind of thing.  Everything beyond 1m more or less is "advertising" or "marketing."  You can tell a room full of people all about CAP until you're blue in the face, but the actual "recruiting" is communicating on a person-to-person, situation-to-situation basis the value proposition they will derive from Civil Air Patrol, and what CAP will derive from their participation.  And if that's not clear, then you need to be honest about whether or not there is "fit."  Only after this comes the "recruiting-onboarding" part, when they say "Hey, I think I might be a good fit for CAP and I'm interested in membership. What are my next steps?"

As for retention: at the end of the day, retention is all about leadership. 90+% of retention (or more, some may argue) happens at the local unit, and more than 90% of that happens in the first 30-90 days. And that's not wing, region, or NHQ, generally. No, thats people being satisfied and engaged with their local unit, with enlightened local leadership who inspires their people, employes them appropriately, and mentors them with guidance and leadership.  I can't do anything specific from the NHQ level about retention. I can give you tools, I can make suggestions and I can recommend courses of action, but whether Cadet T

Very few people who join CAP and then quit in the first year report they left because "of National leadership issues," or really anything above the unit. So for a "retention program," I say "Yep, I'd like one too. I'd like the 1,150 or so local unit commanders to do a better job of retention in the recruiting process. Do things like recruit for fit not for numbers, live up to the promise of training & mentoring that we 'sell', and run an active, diverse and by-the-book local program."  Thats a "retention" program. 

And if you can find a way to jam all of that into a box that will fit down the chimney, then yes, I want that for Christmas too.

As far as advertising and marketing goes: I will agree we need that, but we have to temper that with some work, as well.

"Why?" you ask. "If people just knew about CAP, our recruiting problems would be over."

Well, not exactly.

In the last year, to test out the "is the phone ringing?" idea (so to speak), I've conducted an interesting "Secret Shopper" experiment.

I took a list of all the squadrons in the country, randomized them, and went thru and attempted to reach out to those units as if I was someone interested in membership.  Knowing the general area of a unit on my list, like lets say Attumwa, Iowa, (I don't think there's actually a unit there, its just an example town name), I'd google up "Civil Air Patrol Attumwa, Iowa" or, failing in that, "Iowa Civil Air Patrol" or something similar.  Occasionally, if warranted, I'd actually go to the unit locator at gocivilairpatrol.com and see what I could get.

Then, following links I'd find via Google, or the locator, I'd reach out to the local unit via either their website contact forms or published email addresses  (didn't have any secret shopper Facebook accounts) requesting information, wanting to visit a unit, etc, as a prospective member would. I did that for 100 CAP units.

There were 2-4 units where I "re-attacked," looping around to the unit via a second or third method, especially if I got a bounce message via email, or a web error when submitting a contact form. I think most folks would understand that your average prospective members won't go to those additional lengths, but I did anyway.  There were also a lot of bad URLs and outright "link rot" even in the unit locator.

The results?  Out of over 100 contact attempts with 100 CAP units, the success rate was only slightly higher than 50%.

Let me restate that: approximately one-half of CAP units contacted by a "prospective member" never even responded to the inquiry.

After a couple of weeks of silence, I followed up directly with the commander, recruiting officer, and either the group or wing recruiting officer for any unit that didn't respond to let them know they potentially had a hole in their contact means. Mostly, I got back all manner of excuses why an inquiry fell on deaf ears:

"Our recruiting officer quit."
"There's something wrong with our website."
And  my all-time favorite "You emailed the wrong address."
(it was either the address on your website, your wing's website, or in the unit locator... How can a prospective member be expected to know they're reaching out to the wrong address?)

Bottom line: Until we fix the abysmal response rate by local units to something as simple as a prospective member inquiry, a major fraction of any effort, paid or otherwise, to get prospective members in contact with local units will essentially be wasted.

oh, and:

All I want for Christmas is good leadership and an adherence to regulations by Wing and higher.

See my aforementioned retention issue WRT to leadership. 

And speaking as a wing commander selectee and a guy watching the awards nomination process unfold (in advance of our wing conference in January), I'd like to see an adherence to the regulations by squadrons, too.  Its not just "Wing or higher" my friend. 

When I send out an email requesting something or reminding units of impending suspenses (pick a topic: annual CAC appointments, annual inventory, real property survey, annual awards and decorations, etc), I include references to the national publications, any regional supplements or policies, and any wing supplements or policies.  Usually, those come in the form of a hyperlink to the pub, and a reference to the specific paragraph that pertains to the request or suspense. Click the link, read the paragraph, now we're all on the same page.

However, nobody actually does that.

OK, OK, I said "nobody." That's not accurate. The majority don't do that. 

Its easy to see by award nominations or emails I get (instead of an eServices assignment) that commanders and staff officers are not even taking the 30 seconds to click the link, read the paragraph, and act accordingly.

So lets look at adherance to the regulations at all echelons, shall we?

That'd be my Christmas miracle.

[etodd]

Much like politics, "All recruiting is local."  Recruiting has a maximum effective range. That maximum effective range is about 1 meter. I kid, a little, about this, but "recruiting," broadly, a personal and one-on-one kind of thing.  Everything beyond 1m more or less is "advertising" or "marketing."  You can tell a room full of people all about CAP until you're blue in the face, but the actual "recruiting" is communicating on a person-to-person, situation-to-situation basis the value proposition they will derive from Civil Air Patrol, and what CAP will derive from their participation.

Well thats what I was trying to say in the other thread about elevator speeches, that its personal one on one, but you didn't like me saying that, so now I'm confused on which way you think?   

[JohhnyD]

OK NIN (And Merry Christmas!) what are specific, actionable goals for the NH Wing in this regards?

[NIN]

Well thats what I was trying to say in the other thread about elevator speeches, that its personal one on one, but you didn't like me saying that, so now I'm confused on which way you think?   

Elevator pitches are one thing. Doing them in an appropriate fashion are another.

Pitching the lady behind you in line at the supermarket is probably "more appropriate" if she's wearing a Cessna t-shirt or an EAA hat. However, if she's wearing her "Attack Iraq? NO!" hoodie or carrying a "Citizens for Quiet Skies!" tote bag, well, your little Betty in your ear should be going "WARN! WARN! WAVE OFF! WAVE OFF!"

I've met some folks who truly seem to have weapons-grade autism when it comes to "not reading the situation" at all. They launch into their pre-canned, pre-memorized, zero-deviation-from-the-script elevator pitch at exactly the wrong time.  They're talking about the wrong thing to the wrong people in the wrong setting, and its almost like waiting for the poor kid selling magazine subscriptions door-to-door to finish :"Good evening Sir, my name is Steve, I come from a rough area, I used to be addicted to crack but now I am off it and trying to stay clean, that is why I am selling magazine subscriptions."

Talking up the cadet program with high school seniors is likely a fool's errand, for example. They're all way too close to the end of the age range and less likely to be good recruits for the cadet program. (they might actually fall in to that whole "Not old enough to be a senior, but kind of too old to be successful in the cadet program".  Remember what I said about "recruiting for fit?" Yeah, this is an example. Sure, you can recruit that 18 year old high school senior, but should you? Thats the bigger question.

General Phelka talks about how to frame the "pitch" and its not just ONE pitch, but a couple of different directions or threads in your back pocket that you're comfortable enough with so you can change gears on the fly.  You can likely expect to talk airplanes and flying at a fly-in, sure, but when you're chatting up a fellow in an elevator, you might have to ask "You have kids interested in STEM or airplanes?" and now you can talk Cadet Programs. Of if he says "I'm actually a CFI.." now you have a completely different thread to follow.

And you have to know when you're skilled or well-versed enough in the subject to "press the attack," and when you need to say "I'm not exactly the person who knows all the ins-and-outs of this particular aspect, do you have a card or something?  I can get one of our ops folks to shoot you and email." or "Cadet Programs isn't my thing, precisely, so let me get you connected with the cadet experts. This is my card, drop me a line and I can make some arrangements to get down to the local unit for a visit.."

People who are good at recruiting are usually (not always, I'm kind of a primo example of someone who sometimes isn't) good at reading the room and sizing up the person you're talking to for "the right pitch."  And if things change mid-pitch, you've got the wherewithal to pivot.

[NIN]

OK NIN (And Merry Christmas!) what are specific, actionable goals for the NH Wing in this regards?

Gosh, Mickey. Where do I start?  (I'm off to watch my 3rd favorite Christmas movie, Lethal Weapon, with my wife. She's never seen it and actually _wants_ to watch it... So I gotta close this deal quick. More later!)

[etodd]

Well thats what I was trying to say in the other thread about elevator speeches, that its personal one on one, but you didn't like me saying that, so now I'm confused on which way you think?   

Elevator pitches are one thing. Doing them in an appropriate fashion are another.

Pitching the lady behind you in line at the supermarket is probably "more appropriate" if she's wearing a Cessna t-shirt or an EAA hat.

Ahhh.  Now I see what you meant.  Oh geez yes, I never just startup an "elevator speech" with a stranger. It would be with someone I know, who I realize has skills CAP might could use, and who has interests that align, and they might would enjoy learning new things, etc., etc.

The personal one on one.

For sure, just talking it up with "anyone" would be a shot in the dark for sure. LOL

[JohhnyD]

OK NIN (And Merry Christmas!) what are specific, actionable goals for the NH Wing in this regards?

Gosh, Mickey. Where do I start?  (I'm off to watch my 3rd favorite Christmas movie, Lethal Weapon, with my wife. She's never seen it and actually _wants_ to watch it... So I gotta close this deal quick. More later!)

Enjoy Christmas, looking forward to your time as Wing CC, you get it. Just hoping you will share.

And to answer the question you asked,  'Begin at the beginning, the King said, very gravely, and go on till you come to the end: then stop.'