Canberra Dance News Micro-Survey Results

We received 10 responses to our micro-survey in Canberra Dance News. They are shown in full and unexpurgated below. Because the survey was anonymous we cannot contact respondents for more details, but we have shown our comments and calls for more details in square brackets below. Maybe you could leave further comments against the points, on this blog?

If you have not responded to the micro-survey then it is not too late, just surf along to:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/BMZFLGR

and let us know what you think about the subject "How can we help you to help us to increase bush dance participation?".

That's all - you won't be asked any other questions or for identifying information. Please have all your household ideas ready for one response, or you can email your response or afterthoughts to dance@pcug.org.au.

Here are the responses so far, with [comments]

1. Provide me with vouchers for first-timer free entry for my friends.

[First-timers are offered free entry to the classes starting next Monday 7 February at All Saints Ainslie. First-timers will have more confidence that they have understood the offer if they have a voucher to present, so we will have some vouchers printed.]

2. Offer 2 for one entry price on their first night or bring a friend along for free

[There is also the thought that if you can get a new person along for a second time then they will be "hooked" and keep coming back after that]

3. Reduce thse prices

[The Monaro Folk Society is a non-profit organisation and prices are set to break even, with a small surplus to cover contingencies. Sometimes events run at a profit and sometimes at a loss, indicating that on average the prices are about right. We are very fortunate to have excellent musicians who are willing to perform for our dances even though entry fees and band remuneration has not kept pace with inflation. There has been a marked increase in the cost of the Albert Hall, Woolshed and St John's, but we have been able to keep costs down by using All Saints Ainslie and the Cook Hall.]

4. More couples dances perhaps, but it's readily available and very well organised as it is.

5. Dancers be more inclusive with newcomers. There's a definite sense of the incrowd at some dances. No use going to a dance to sit watching others having fun.

Also, SOME men need to be advised about hygiene. SOME are very smelly. Don't want to dance with them. Women make an effort to look and smell good - how about it men? This is what puts me off coming to dances.

6. Run a regular session in Goulburn!! Yay!! That would be Wonderful!!!

7. Have one bush dance per month only.

8. Simple Firstly, Get the word "Music" back into the societies' title. "Monaro Folk Music and Dance Society" for instance. Secondly, Do not use the word "Bush Dancing" or "Bush Dancers". What you are talking about is either "Australian Folk Dancers" or Austrailian Heritage Music and Dance". Just because the venue for many of these traditional dances was a woolshed in the Bush does not mean that those involved should be called "Bush Dancers" which seems to infer some sort of rough group of would-be dancers. They were in fact just "Dancers" who were performing all the latest dances of the period to just as high, if not a better standard than the good sophisticated folk in the cities, and with all the grace and style of the well dressed city folk. Lift your sights, The words Traditional, Heritage, Original, Pioneering, Historical, Australian Folk Music, all have some meaning to the wider English-Speaking Community out there. (to many of whom, English is not their mother tongue) Perhaps "Bush Dancers" to many of those good people conjures up an image of some Red Necks having a good time. So lift your sights, use the right wording, try to appeal to a much larger section of the great Australian Populace, you might get more people through the door.

[Bush Dancing is a fairly well recognised name for the dancing that we do, see for example http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bush_dance. It's a short word and comes out near the top in alphabetic newspaper listings etc. The essence of bush dancing in 2011 is the social nature of the dances, the accessibility to all, and the variety of formations and traditions that are included in a "bush dance" evening. We couldn't think of a better label so we decided to go all-out promoting "Bush Dancing for fun & fitness". It has had a lot of media exposure and so to re-badge would be to start again to build public awareness.]

9. Discourage the FIGJAM inf dancers, callers and musos. Discourage bad musicians and weak out of town bands, callers, bands from a long way to drive and their callers.

Support and build on the local product. Nothing is a bigger turn off when we get a flustered caller holding up good dancers and musicians. Encourage the local musicians and callers by remuneration levels covering more than costs. Make sure there is a core of dancers there to mix in and assist new recruits. Encourage a culture that does not scare away timid new comers. The ethos should be the dance. It is not a lonely hearts club.

[In case the acronym has you stumped, we think it stands for something like "Figjam I'm Good, Just Ask Me". We are accepting and tolerant of all and want to encourage diversity and a wide mix of folk participating and sharing their unique talents. Big crowds and development and growth for as many as will. We try to remunerate the musicians as well as we can, but it is in no one's interest to have dances closed down because they are not financially sustainable. Dancers want to dance, musicians want to play, and volunteers want to volunteer.]

10. better layout for the canberra dance news 

[We have total control over this one. We chose a plain text format to minimise bandwidth and compatibility and security issues. But we would love to know, how can we improve the layout?]

Public Accusations

It is beneath our dignity to respond in kind to the wild accusations published on MFS-Announce.


As far as we know the MFS Committee has not been meeting. How can there be obstructionism when there is no MFS Committee request under consideration by Bush Dance Group or End Of Month Dance Committee, and only the most minor of outstanding matters of MFS Committee consideration involving us personally, being a request to disclose a third-party publicity password.

All correspondence from us has been prompt, polite and business-like.

We are astonished at the public outburst and Barbara and I wish the ex-president well in her future endeavours.

Loose Ends

I received a "leaked" email blaming the previous committee for some problem or other, even though this is January and the previous committee handed over last September, and reporting verbal abuse.

For the record, all of my conversations with the incoming committee members have been friendly and polite, with no abuse either way.

The handover to the incoming committee was thorough and time-consuming, but I did receive a suggestion that in the interests of fairness, the outgoing president and treasurer should have continued work on the books until they were ready for the auditor.

I don't think it would have been fair to have a past-president dabbling in committee business from outside the committee. Nor would it be constitutional, as I had no power to request an ex-Treasurer to do further work on consolidating the accounts.

The previous committee made decisions about improved financial reporting, and the Treasurer and I implemented those policies to the best of our abilities. The Treasurer and I reported on our progress with implementing those policies at the Annual General Meeting, and answered all questions. I reported on the overall slow progress in implementing new financial reporting standards, and the outgoing treasurer reported on the outstanding matters preventing us from providing the consolidated accounts for audit. My understanding is that these matters were not related to the accounts kept by the Treasurer, but rather were related to obtaining information from activities that keep their own books. This information had not previously been included in the MFS Accounts.

The rules and usual practice are clear. Everything that was in progress on 23 September 2010, all books, records, partly-completed reports, and so forth, were handed over to the incoming committee on that date and the incoming committee then took responsibility for further work. The immediate past president has no powers or responsibilities under our rules.

As far as I could see, what the Treasurer handed over was fair and reasonable, with more information than in previous years, but a few loose ends to be tied up to meet our new higher standards.

The activities that I have been involved with since 23 September have responded promptly and efficiently to many requests concerning the books, even though in many cases the information requested was already included in the documents.

I guess there is bound to be a bit of a learning curve during a handover, as the new folk become familiar with the work-to-date, but by now the new committee should have everything in hand.

Wrapping It Up

Thanks to those who responded privately to the post below, and even greater thanks to those who posted their comments below.


The responses that I have received confirm that, by and large, the members who decided not to attend the Monaro Folk Society AGM had no idea that there would be a second presidential candidate, and that the result was not representative of their views.

Allowing for family memberships each having two voting members, there were about 300 folk eligible to vote. Needless to say, only a fraction of this number attended the AGM.

However the response also suggests a lack of interest in the subject. If someone is willing to do the work then does anything else matter?

I can see this point and I think we should all be appreciative of the significant role that has been undertaken.

The response has not shown strong support for changing the rules, so best not to worry about it I reckon. Let's Dance!

Cheers
Lance

An Unrepresentative Election

I thought I would write because a number have people have asked me why I stepped down as MFS President. The answer is that I didn't.

I would like to make it clear that I had no idea that there would be another candidate for the Monaro Folk Society president position.

In my opinion the attendance at the AGM did not reflect the membership at large, and appeared to me and to others that I have spoken to, to be largely made up of people associated with two groups within the society. The election results reflected this.

Just for the record, I would have been happy to continue in the role.

The unrepresentative election process should cause concern about our rules.

I feel that members have the right to know before the meeting (when they are deciding whether or not to attend) who the candidates are, what their background is, and what they stand for. Just the same as members know what motions will be put, at least 14 days before the meeting.

In other organisations that I have been in, candidates declare their intention to stand, provide a photograph and short statement about their background and what they stand for, and voting takes place over a few weeks with all members having the opportunity to vote.

As a minimum, I think that nominations should close say two weeks before the meeting with candidates' names published, with further nominations on the night only if there were vacancies left by the formal nomination and election process.

Do you agree? If there is a lot of positive response I will draft an amendment to the rules.

Please add your comment below. If you see a link marked "x comments" you can click it to add your comment.

Regards
Lance

Price Points

We will have decide on our membership fees at the annual general meeting on 23 September 2010, and so I thought I might share with you some generally accepted ideas on price-points.


I have studied marketing for years when working towards Fellowship of the Australian Insurance Institute and in Executive Development Programs, and have a degree in Economics and diploma in Business Studies. That doesn't mean I have the only right answer any more than anyone else, but it does mean I have come to many conclusions that I think are soundly based and that I hold firmly.

I think I can reasonably expect fellow members to consider those views, not in a one-minute discussion at the AGM, but carefully and with time to think things through.

Price is not a major problem for us, and our activities represent excellent value-for-money. However we would all have noticed that the folk community is at the price-sensitive end of the spectrum, a long way from Yves Saint Laurent buyers who will buy more if the price is higher.

For us, there is always "elasticity of demand"; higher price = lower demand. People fall along a spectrum, and some will be on the margin between paying and not paying. More of them will drop out at price points like $30, which is why you hardly ever see anything priced at $30 at Woden shops (they would go to $29.99 but that's a bit too contrived a price for us to use).

There will be unengaged folk who don't think about it, they just see the price that they perceive as in the next $10 price bracket and we're gone. Buying decisions are initially based on a quick emotional reaction to our price and whether we are speaking to the customer's needs.

People then rationalise their decisions but we and our product have to achieve that initial interest before they will go on to think about our offer.

So, the bottom line is that I think our prices should be figures like $29, not $30. I am more concerned about the extra members that we are likely to get at $29 than at $30, than I am about giving change, and when you go from prices like $29 to $30 you are likely to lose more from lost "sales" than you gain from those who remain.

I have these firmly held convictions that I would like you to consider, but in the end I will of course go with the majority opinion.

Regards
Lance

A Friendly and Inclusive Future

Bob Hodgson has placed a discussion paper on the MFS Members web site. You can find it under "Discussions" in the index at http://www.mfs.org.au/members/


I won't try to summarise Bob's point of view; you can see the full paper by following the link above. However I do agree wholeheartedly with the thrust of the paper, and its arguments.

In particular, I agree that the future success of the MFS depends on us being friendly and inclusive. We are a not-for-profit community organisation, and our main objective is to promote all aspects of folk lore.

To pick up on one example from the discussion paper, like Bob I am dismayed at the MFS Committee decision to exclude all non-MFS events from our printed dance calendar. You may wonder how a President can be dismayed at a decision made by his own committee? Let me explain.

As chair my role is to tap into the collective wisdom of the committee. The President does not have any decision-making or veto power over committee decisions, but instead has the executive role of carrying out decisions made by the committee.

I am guided by the decisions of the committee at our face-to-face meetings, and focus on determining the "will of the meeting" during our necessarily limited time. This has worked well in general, but in this case it has allowed a decision that appears to me to be ill-considered.

I am a "friendly expansion and growth" person and you cannot put an unfriendly contractionary head on the shoulders of a volunteer who is otherwise inclined, so I will try to find someone to do the calendar, but I am withdrawing my labour and it won't be me working on the printed dance calendar under those conditions.

The decision was made at a Christmas meeting which was supposed to have a minimum of essential business, and because of low attendance a vote of three in favour was enough to pass the motion.

I realise my mistake in allowing such an important motion to be moved without any notice and in such a setting, and it won't happen again while I am in the chair. I will now only accept motions that have been put on notice with adequate supporting documentation and input from the volunteer(s) responsible and other stakeholders. We live and learn.

To return to Bob's discussion paper, I cannot do it justice by summarising it here, but it refers to the important subject of welcoming new activities into the society. New activities mean more members and more mutual support for all. I can see no negatives whatsoever to welcoming new activities.

From my point of view, if the activity owners

- wish to be a part of the society,

- comply with the financial reporting responsibilities that are needed under the incorporations act for a non-profit organisation and are in place for the responsible governance of the society, and

- encourage membership of the society and help promote our objectives

then it is a win-win decision to welcome them into our organisation with all the benefits to the activity that being part of a larger organisation brings.

I commend the discussion paper (under "Discussions" in the index at http://www.mfs.org.au/members/) and invite discussion either on the members-only discussion tab of the paper, or by clicking on the public "comments" link below. If you have any problems getting into the paper on the members' web site, or anything else, please get in touch.

Cheers
Lance