The Membership Chair has one of the most important jobs within a Region.

An effective chair can grow a Region and lead to recruitment of new leadership and volunteers. Good candidates for this position are your outstanding volunteers and active enthusiasts. Preferably a member who participates in most of the activities your Region sponsors so they can accurately respond to members questions, or direct them to other members who can encourage them to join in on the fun.

The membership chair is responsible for obtaining and welcoming new members as well as working to retain existing members. Depending on how your Region delegates the membership application process, the Membership Chair may be involved in the processing of new membership applications. See Applications Sent Directly to National (page 22) and New Member Applications Processed by a Region (page 22).

1. Process membership information and data on new members, dropped members and transfers as follows: • Additions, changes and drops sent to the Region data processing chair by the selected day of the month. • Additions and deletions are sent to the newsletter editor or distribution manager by the selected day of each month.
2. Ensure all Region members have updated email addresses so they can receive PCA emails.
3. Record members’ renewal dates and drop members who have not renewed after a two-month grace period. Coordinate notices to renewing members with eMailer program.
4. Prepare a monthly report on monies due from National for new members and member renewals. Send a copy to the Region President.
5. Maintain a running account of membership gains and losses and report monthly to the Region Board . 
6. Maintain file copies of all membership data and reports. 
7. On a monthly basis, service PCA Information Boards located at various shops in the area, replenishing membership forms and posting the calendar of events.

 Region Procedures Manual

Responsible for hosting or appointing specific event chairs to host all of the social events of the Region including dinners (installation, progressive, etc.) brunches, picnics, and parties.

1. Coordinate scheduling of all social events with the Activities Coordinator and the Board of Directors.
2. Work with Region officers to host New Member Social, see Region New Member Social Subsidy (page 34). Ensure all social events are conducted in accordance with the General Event Guidelines (page 37).
3. Select a mix of social events that are responsive to the needs and interests of the Region’s membership.
4. Be available to the general Region membership to answer questions and provide information regarding social events, such as cost, location, and annual events

Region Procedures Manual 

We want to thank all of you that took the time to complete our 2017 survey. Your feedback really helps us understand where we need to focus our efforts. As some of you will remember, we last did a member survey in March of 2014. This year we repeated most of the topics so now we have some indication of the member preferences over time.

Before diving into the numbers, we should note that the survey results published in the March 2017 Northlander show only the first page of the survey. Both pages will be available in the April issue. Apologies for any confusion.

There were 116 of you that completed this year's survey. In 2014 we had 93 members complete the survey. We now have the ability to send emails to NCR members as opposed anyone that has registered at the web site so we sent the survey intiially to our list of 537 email addresses. Approximately 40 percent of you read the email and there was a 25 percent increase in completed responses.

You can peruse the numbers yourself at this link, and we will summarize them below:

1. Over 75 percent of you marked your primary benefit as Driving Events or Publications. This is good news and bad news that we will expand on in a future communication;
2. Over 50 percent of you attended less than five events last year and plan to attend that amount this year;
3. Over 70 percent of you use online resources to find out about events;
4. Calendar date, Family Obligations, Travel Distance, and Work Schedule get in the way of you attending events;
5. Over 20 percent of you think that we have enough events; and
6. Many of you are will to help at the events.

When we compare these numbers to the responses in 2014 at this link, we can see that the majority of the responses to the questions are similar with one exception.

Changes make a difference.

What do we mean by changes. One of the frustrating facts of running a volunteer organization is that you must focus on only what you can control. A good example of what we can't control is represented by the responses to What limits your ability to attend events? (item 4 above).  What we can control is using the resources available to the club to provide events that members will attend. The best example of this type of change is the 50 percent increase in interest in Rallies from 2014 to 2017.  The other change is that the majority of you affirmed your support for NCR Events Emails. In 2014 this method wasn't mentioned; while in 2017, it was the top response for your primary source of event information.

Going forward, we will focus less on holding more events and more on improving the experience and execution of each event. One of our challenges is to find an effective means to leverage your willingness to help, so we will continue to emphasize communications to and from members. Beginning this month we will be replacing the first of the bi-weekly event notification emails with the First Friday update. The First Friday update will briefly describe the any changes in the club and the current month's activities. 

Thanks again for taking the time and staying involved in your club.