Writing Challenge #10

Call to Arms by Sasha Dichter

The secret of fortune is joy in our hands. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

What if today, right now, no jokes at all, you were actually in charge, the boss, the Head Honcho. Write the “call to arms” note you’re sending to everyone (staff, customers, suppliers, Board) charting the path ahead for the next 12 months and the next 5 years. Now take this manifesto, print it out somewhere you can see, preferably in big letters you can read from your chair.

You’re just written your own job description. You know what you have to do. Go!

(bonus: send it to the CEO with the title “The things we absolutely have to get right – nothing else matters.”)

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Well, if I get the job that I interviewed for, I will be the Head Honcho =)

- Get the finances in order. Recover all files and start a ledger for 2011-2012. Get the real balance and set up for the next year.

- Organize all physical items. Create an inventory of materials. Organize where and how we order all materials.

- Create a budget for material purchases and contracted design work.

- Make a list of the top 10 teachers in GA that I need to meet. Set up meetings and travel to each school to meet their chapters and introduce myself. Get feedback and advice about the organization. Figure out what people want to keep and what they want to change.

- Create the calendar for next year's conferences.

- Assess the conferences and lay out the schedule and organization of each one.

- Set up board meetings and clarify everyone's role at each conference.

That would just be the short term things. With the organization in such an upheaval, I have a lot of organizing and refocusing to do. Long term?

- Meet with businesses and strengthen connections for sponsorship.

- Align the roles of the Foundation and DOE for TSA. Work out a plan for improved collaboration.

- Set up 2012's calendar of conferences and book all event spaces.

- Organize tax information to make it smooth and automatic every year.

- Research schools that do not have TSA and set up meetings with the technical education teachers to discuss how we could make it possible for them to have a chapter.

That ought about do it. The organization should be self-sustaining and keep rolling once the major hurdles of relocation, finances, and the calendar are taken care of.

New motto?
"I thrive on task lists, not time clocks."