by Royal Lady » 13 Aug 2012 11:59
by Big Foot » 13 Aug 2012 13:16
by Big Foot » 13 Aug 2012 13:17
by Dirk Gently » 13 Aug 2012 13:20
Big Foot £5 on Dirkers being involved somewhere along the route
by Green » 13 Aug 2012 13:22
by Big Foot » 13 Aug 2012 13:49
Wasn't necessarily the STAR link m8 but the maths equation in my head went something like...Dirk GentlyBig Foot £5 on Dirkers being involved somewhere along the route
You owe me £5.
Absolutely nothing to do with this. Didn't know anything about it and wouldn't have wanted to have anything to do with it if I had.
And resigned as a STAR Board member the best part of two years ago ... do keep up!
by Dirk Gently » 13 Aug 2012 13:54
Green Why did you resign, Dirk
by Dirk Gently » 13 Aug 2012 13:59
Big FootWasn't necessarily the STAR link m8 but the maths equation in my head went something like...Dirk GentlyBig Foot £5 on Dirkers being involved somewhere along the route
You owe me £5.
Absolutely nothing to do with this. Didn't know anything about it and wouldn't have wanted to have anything to do with it if I had.
And resigned as a STAR Board member the best part of two years ago ... do keep up!
"RFC" + "Media" = Dirkers
£5 to a charity of your choice?
by Green » 13 Aug 2012 14:10
Dirk GentlyGreen Why did you resign, Dirk
Three main reasons, which I outlined in a long (and probably highly tedious) resignation letter. I'll précis below :
1. STAR was, in my opinion, far too risk-averse and far too resistant to change. Some decisions had recently been made at the time that I was deeply unhappy about.
2. STAR's way of internal decision-making was far too collective - with everyone involved in decision making and minimal delegation of authority to portfolio holders. I felt this was counter-productive.
3. I believed that STAR was slowly dying as an organisation through lack of new-blood coming through. STAR had never had an election and didn't have a membership which was properly representative of all Reading supporters. That's not down to STAR, as it represented its members, but that was a by-product of the fact that STAR's members primarily join to travel by coach (*). I felt STAR had never found a way to answer the question “I don’t travel by coach, why should I pay a tenner to join STAR?” - and that was damaging them as an organisation and shaping their policies in the wrong direction. I believe STAR needs to open its membership wider and cheaper (possibly via a zero-cost, e-membership, or maybe a very low-cost membership with "top-up" for "Travel membership") so that it will be more attractive to *all* Reading supporters. With a larger membership, it'll be more effective, more representative and it'll have a much larger talent-pool of people who will, hopefully, participate more.
Don't get me wrong, I put a lot of effort into helping found STAR and helping run it for 8 years, and I don't want to damage it or get into a slanging match with anyone. But I want STAR to be a dynamic, representative and inclusive mass-membership campaigning organisation, as I believe that Reading supporters need and deserve an organisation like that. I could see STAR getting less and less effective and moving further and further away from being the type of organisation I believe it needs to be, and got to the point where what I felt I could achieve through STAR wasn't worth the time I was putting into it.
(*) Just in case I get accused of lying, the source for this is the STAR membership survey performed the previous year, in which 57.6% of STAR members gave their "most important" reason for joining STAR was to travel on STAR coaches.
by Dirk Gently » 13 Aug 2012 14:27
Green .....
I guess noone (least of all me) would argue against the desire to increase the reach and membership of STAR, but I guess the challenge would be that the increase in numbers would not necessarily lead to an increase in engagement with the organisation.
by Green » 13 Aug 2012 14:29
by Dirk Gently » 13 Aug 2012 14:41
by Royal Lady » 13 Aug 2012 16:29
by STAR Liaison » 13 Aug 2012 16:53
Royal Lady I note, with a touch of sadness, that STAR didn't bother to mention this event on here - as there may have been one or two nobbers who were not members of STAR who would have liked to attend (not talking about me here btw). I was told STAR were having a meeting on 9 Aug - but starliaison didn't get back to me since, so can only assume they vetoed the idea of me acting as a go-between for HNA and STAR. I do note, however, that the AGM is at the end of the month, so maybe that's when it is going to be mentioned?
by Royal Lady » 13 Aug 2012 16:56
by Royal Lady » 13 Aug 2012 17:00
by STAR Liaison » 13 Aug 2012 17:03
Dirk Gently 3. I believed that STAR was slowly dying as an organisation through lack of new-blood coming through. STAR had never had an election and didn't have a membership which was properly representative of all Reading supporters. That's not down to STAR, as it represented its members, but that was a by-product of the fact that STAR's members primarily join to travel by coach (*). I felt STAR had never found a way to answer the question “I don’t travel by coach, why should I pay a tenner to join STAR?” - and that was damaging them as an organisation and shaping their policies in the wrong direction. I believe STAR needs to open its membership wider and cheaper (possibly via a zero-cost, e-membership, or maybe a very low-cost membership with "top-up" for "Travel membership") so that it will be more attractive to *all* Reading supporters. With a larger membership, it'll be more effective, more representative and it'll have a much larger talent-pool of people who will, hopefully, participate more.
Don't get me wrong, I put a lot of effort into helping found STAR and helping run it for 8 years, and I don't want to damage it or get into a slanging match with anyone. But I want STAR to be a dynamic, representative and inclusive mass-membership campaigning organisation, as I believe that Reading supporters need and deserve an organisation like that. I could see STAR getting less and less effective and moving further and further away from being the type of organisation I believe it needs to be, and got to the point where what I felt I could achieve through STAR wasn't worth the time I was putting into it.
by STAR Liaison » 13 Aug 2012 17:51
Dirk Gently
(*) Just in case I get accused of lying, the source for this is the STAR membership survey performed the previous year, in which 57.6% of STAR members gave their "most important" reason for joining STAR was to travel on STAR coaches.
by Compo's Hat » 13 Aug 2012 20:17
by Dare to Dr£am » 13 Aug 2012 20:23
Dirk GentlyBig Foot £5 on Dirkers being involved somewhere along the route
You owe me £5.
Absolutely nothing to do with this. Didn't know anything about it and wouldn't have wanted to have anything to do with it if I had.
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