Membership Soars Past 61,000!!!

[coudano]

My reply was specifically about retention.

Two questions:

1.  Are you seeing a lot of specifically senior members joining specifically to run cadet programs?  Because i'm not.

2.  Who are your quitters?
Mine are folks who joined to do ops, and after a year or two of not doing any, gave up.

[meganite]

Yeah, I can see myself getting bored after I finish all the training stuff... because after a certain point, it just becomes the same monotonous nothing to do. We should keep training! For... something.

Of course, the theory is that you never stop training. But the problem is if no further challenges are being provided, people will get bored and leave. Challenges should increase at the same rate an individual's abilities increase.

I think if I get bored training on SAR stuff, I will probably switch over to Aerospace Education if I can. I'm pretty interested in that, and it's always fun to teach new and enthusiastic faces.

[FW]

My reply was specifically about retention.

2.  Who are your quitters?
Mine are folks who joined to do ops, and after a year or two of not doing any, gave up.

When it comes to the "quitters";  most who leave say they have nothing productive to do.  The second reason many leave is because of a feeling of exclusion. 

Most who join wish to serve in some capacity.  Membership "outreach" is important.  Mentorship is important.  Making the new member feel as a part of the team is integral in retaining the member.  Ops?  I don't really know what that means anymore.  Do you mean flying?  Pilots can fly any number of missions; supporting cadet programs, aerospace education and emergency services.  Scanners and Observers should be in couraged to fill other needs in a squadron which though "not as exciting" are important in the ongoing success of the unit.  Same for ground team members.

CAP is not a full time job.  It is a benevolent service organization dedicated to its chartered missions and serving the public.  We've pretty much stayed the course since 1948 and, unless congress decides to change our charter, we will keep on performing this way for years to come. 

IMHO, the hard work is not in finding a "full time operational mission".  The hard work is in recruiting members who understand CAP and are willing to serve.  The other hard part is for the "veteran" members to be willing to bring in new members and, spend the time with "recurits" to make them feel as full and productive members of CAP.

[RickFranz]

Yeah, I can see myself getting bored after I finish all the training stuff... because after a certain point, it just becomes the same monotonous nothing to do. We should keep training! For... something.

Of course, the theory is that you never stop training. But the problem is if no further challenges are being provided, people will get bored and leave. Challenges should increase at the same rate an individual's abilities increase.

I think if I get bored training on SAR stuff, I will probably switch over to Aerospace Education if I can. I'm pretty interested in that, and it's always fun to teach new and enthusiastic faces.

Ma'am
I've been around a long time and there has always been something new to learn or get interested in. 

P.S. Nice artwork!

[coudano]

Ops?  I don't really know what that means anymore.  Do you mean flying?  Pilots can fly any number of missions; supporting cadet programs, aerospace education and emergency services.  Scanners and Observers should be in couraged to fill other needs in a squadron which though "not as exciting" are important in the ongoing success of the unit.  Same for ground team members.

When I say "ops" I mean actual "emergency services" missions. (not mere flying around, there's plenty of that to do, particularly if you have the money)
Sure, there are people around who get the chance to get involved in these (i've been one of them).
But the vast majority of those 63,000 members never do.
You hook at least some of those in the door with the (possibly misunderstood) promise that they will be doing actual emergency services operations (making a real difference).  After a year or two, many of them figure out that isn't the case, and vamoose.  Of course it's possible that they may find another angle of the program during that time, but now CAP is baiting and switching, which is awfully used car salesmanish, don't you think?

At least in my area, not many senior members join just to "be affiliated" or to do "benevolent service" in general...  and just letting the specifics of how when where and why work themselves out.  They usually have a specific motivation for coming on board.  If/when that specific motivation turns out to be a non-starter, so does their membership renewal.

Fix THAT, and you'll see retention numbers go through the roof...  so much that you might actually have to start limiting how many people you are willing to recruit, so as to not overpopulate the organization.

Especially at $70.00+ per year...  I have prospective senior members who want to get involved specifically to work cadet programs, but are turned off by or simply can't afford the time commitment and/or the dues+uniforms+etc.

IMHO, the hard work is not in finding a "full time operational mission".  The hard work is in recruiting members who understand CAP and are willing to serve.

Yah, that's exactly my point.  Many of your "soaring membership numbers" don't understand CAP.
When they gain that understanding, see ya later.

If you want to only recruit people in the door who understand CAP up front, and still want to be here anyway, your 63k is going to take a pretty severe nosedive.

[JC004]

In terms of setting members' expectations and its impact on retention, a huge part of the problem is that the marketing strategy (or lack thereof) is wrong.  CAP sets expectations high with the first explanation often being the percentage of AFRCC-tasked inland SAR.  It gets pounded in with subsequent things like introductory materials.  Hearing stuff like "95%" leads people to think that they'll be out doing SAR like all the time.  Then reality hits.  As mentioned, if there is another hook that got them in the meantime, they'll probably stay but if they were counting on the impression that they were given, they go poof.

[RiverAux]

If you're honest up front about the local operational tempo and make people come to a couple of meetings before giving them an application and run a good local program, then senior member retention isn't an issue. 

[FW]

^I think that is absolutely true.  We must be totally honest with who and what we are.  Prospective members must fully understand the basic premise of CAP before they join. It is a waste of their precious time and resources to come into it and, it is wrong for us to recruit those who will not be willing to add anything to CAP.

That being said, it would be nice to know why our numbers have jumped almost 8.000 members since 2006.

[RADIOMAN015]

That being said, it would be nice to know why our numbers have jumped almost 8.000 members since 2006.

Lots of good historical membership and other stats in the "Reports to Congresss" posted at
http://www.capmembers.com/cap_national_hq/cap_reports/
What is very unfortunate is CAP's decision over the last 2 to 3 years to not publish these stats, instead relying only on the Audited Financial Statements which don't have as much statistical information.
Perhaps we would be better off having all memberships expire on the lst of the Month rather than the last day of the month?  This would give the member 30 days to send in their check and might reduce the wide swings in monthly totals.

Also it would be interesting at least from the regular senior member stats to get a breakdown of number of years of service, e.g. under <1, greater than 1 to 2, 2-5, 6-10, 10-19, 20+, or something like that. 

Additionally I think it's reasonable to expect that all the member categories would be addressed with statistics for each.   

RM   

[Major Carrales]

Remember, there are lots of things to consider about membership.

There was one period of my service where I maintained membership for about 2 years due to having to concentrate on some schooling mandated by my school district.  During that time, I was not what you would call active.  Also, there are many people I know, who were cadets, that go off to college and cannot participate but also maintain their membership.

Some people, join with full intentions of being active, but life gets in the way.

There is much merit to those that call for an active program to retain members.  I call this "squadron maintenance," the idea that a unit require direction, building and an active program.  This comes from having three things 1) Structure, 2) Activities and 3) a sense of purpose.

Structure need not be a strict military one, but one where leadership (defined as a Commander and the Staff) provide direction and maintain procedures that promote productive meetings.  "Hanging out" with no agenda, goal nor checklist can be boring.  Boring is the death knell of CAP.

Activities include the usual training, active meetings (to roll reason one into the second) and what some might call "fellowship" activities.  Squadron dinners, airshows (to mingle more than to "work"), provide a fostered "General Aviation Community" and just to get to know one another and, to some degree, the families of one another.

A sense of Purpose is KEY! People don't want to "serve" in an organization where these is no "service."  Never forget that we are all "paying dues for this."  Negative meetings (where yelling and the like are done out loud before all, fighting, power mongering  et al.) destroy the purpose for being there.

[meganite]

When I say "ops" I mean actual "emergency services" missions. (not mere flying around, there's plenty of that to do, particularly if you have the money)
Sure, there are people around who get the chance to get involved in these (i've been one of them).
But the vast majority of those 63,000 members never do.
You hook at least some of those in the door with the (possibly misunderstood) promise that they will be doing actual emergency services operations (making a real difference).  After a year or two, many of them figure out that isn't the case, and vamoose.  Of course it's possible that they may find another angle of the program during that time, but now CAP is baiting and switching, which is awfully used car salesmanish, don't you think?

At least in my area, not many senior members join just to "be affiliated" or to do "benevolent service" in general...  and just letting the specifics of how when where and why work themselves out.  They usually have a specific motivation for coming on board.  If/when that specific motivation turns out to be a non-starter, so does their membership renewal.

Fix THAT, and you'll see retention numbers go through the roof...  so much that you might actually have to start limiting how many people you are willing to recruit, so as to not overpopulate the organization.

Yeah, this is kind of what I meant when I said "get bored"... I had some false impressions at the beginning about the frequency of the emergency service missions, but then I asked and found out how often people actually get to participate in those... and of course it varies from region to region based on need. (Typically less SAR near cities because people tend to SEE airplanes going down, or so they say.) But I found all this out before I joined and still joined. To me, training and being prepared for unexpected events has some value in and of itself. Then there's value of joining to learn a bit more personal discipline....etc. There are many reasons. If we're up front about what actually goes on in CAP (not cynical, but realistic) then I think actually more people might stay vs. finding out later that it wasn't what they thought it was, getting a bad attitude, and leaving.

But yeah, more often than not people seem to just drop off the map when other things happen in life. But that happens with every organization. Retention = give people a purpose.

[Sgt.Pain]

Wow that's amazing. If only every one of those where active... that'll be the day!

[SunDog]

We need to not waste member's time, and we do a lot of that - we have a growing list of semi-silly saftey blocks to fill; the bureacratic burdens have expanded, and senior members become annoyed with such things.

My squadron had five mission pilots 18 months ago, and about the same number of Form 5 pilots. The squadron has one MP now. Such things ebb and flow, but he ebbing is increasing.

All the pilots ARE still on the rolls. They all know it's easier to come back later if you maintain membership; but they aren't participating.

The common denomiators seem to be the hassles associated with CAP flying, the dis-jointed training events/efforts, and the lack of mission clarity.

I'm an MP, and I renewed, but I'm not form 5 current, and will go non-current for MP in early spring. The one big advantage CAP has is low cost C17  flying - without that, the pilot population would probably tank.

[BillB]

I would like to see MGen Courter set up several committees of members, former members and/or inactive members to take a look at various programs in CAP. You hear that in cadet programs we are molly-coddling the cadets, or that mush of the cadet program is of no interest to cadets. A committee of former DCPs or cadets from the 70's or 80's might take a look at the program
Pilots both current and inactive might look at the flight operations of the organization. Consider that at one time when CAP flew USAF L-4s and L-5s all that was needed was a private license and a check out by an Air Force check pilot. The only paperwork was filling out the Form 1 at the end of each flight.
The safety program could be argued pro or con, but needs to be looked at from the members standpoint, not the "save the corporation" attitude that exists in much of CAP.
In this age of Skype, emails, and electronic information transfer these committees could come up with answers from the members or even local Squadron concerns. Granted many of the ideas to modify the current programs, might not be posible, but some might improve the members perception or operations to better the organization. 

[FW]

Under Gen Courter's leadership, we developed some great Long Term Objectives for the next 5 years.  We are now in "year 3".  Where we are in reaching these "LTO's" is anyones guess.  And, with only about 9 months to go in her term, I don't see any new committees being formed to evaluate our current programs and training modalities.
However, your proposal is a good one.  Maybe the next commander and leadership team will consider it.

[Ned]

It is worth considering that the safety items, and most of the other things mentioned were products of CAP committees.

Without exageration, I spend most of my CAP time in committee meetings or doing work in preparation for such things.  Conference calls, conferences, etc.

I think we could make a pretty good argument that we might already have too many committees that make it difficult for senior leaders to create a vision, develop the appropriate strategy, and implement it.

Perhaps we should send the idea about forming more committees to a committee for study.   

[bosshawk]

Ned: as I am sure that you are painfully aware, this mimics the way that our Congress does things.  If you don't want to make a hard decision, refer it to a committee.

Unfortunately, I see folks in leadership positions in CAP constantly demur from making decisions and the membership suffers.