Paper, Paper Everywhere

Having some time at home this weekend has given me a chance to start getting organized. I admit that I am probably a bit more paper intensive and get ahead of the curve than many people. Sometimes this is a good thing and sometimes it is probably not so good. But it seems like the pile of information that comes in to a Grand Line officer that has to be processed back out into something recognizable can be a bit daunting. Enter the Binder! (Well, actually four binders at the moment.) I have them labeled Issues, for keeping track of issues that have come up and which may last a while, generating much paper, Session, for stuff on the 2013 Grand Chapter session, Calendar and Budget, for calendar items and things I learn about the Grand Chapter budget process as I go through these learning years, and one labeled Committees, which I really should re-label Appointments, for keeping track of appointments I am supposed to make in the years to come. Some of this stuff may seem early, like the Appointments, and mostly I made up the binder because I was making binders. I don't really need that one until next year, but I do have some paper for it so I thought, what the heck, let's get organized. While most of my appointments will be asked after and accepted only after I am Associate Grand Matron, there are a few appointments that are supposed to be chosen next year, when I am Grand Conductress. Those are for the committees where there is a Chair and a Co-Chair. I am supposed to pick who I want for a Chair in my year and then ask my predecessor to appoint that person as Co-Chair for her year so that my pick gets a year's experience in the duties of the committee and job before they have to be in charge. But again, I don't ask anyone to do anything until after being installed in the appropriate office. I also needed the Appointments binder because I am starting to get member resumes. These are a form that members can fill out to let the Grand Line Officers know what their skills are and if they are interested in serving on a committee. I wanted a place to put those and voila, le binder is ready. I have the feeling that there are a lot of differing opinions on the member resume thing. On the one hand, we do not encourage our members to put themselves forward, so some people feel that if a person asks to be a Deputy or Grand Representative, they should not get picked. On the other hand, especially with committee appointments, I don't know how you find out who wants to serve or who can serve without getting a member resume because some committees need specific skills and you need to know what skills our members have to appoint them, like finding legally trained people for Jurisprudence or those who can sew and do needle arts for Courtesies to Dignitaries. Perhaps we need to work on balancing these conflicting views, maybe with a resume that asks for the member to list their skills and experience that they feel would be helpful to the Grand Chapter without asking them to specifically recommend themselves for a particular position. Maybe that is something that deserves some thought and attention. I thought the Calendar binder was early too, but then I found out that Chapters with anniversaries sometimes want to start getting dates two or three years early so they can look for halls and such, so there is already some stuff to go in there. Issues was actually the first binder I made and that one wasn't early at all because, of course, there seems to always be at least one issue sitting around somewhere. In my experience, four people can't decide what to have for dinner quickly or easily, so it should be expected that in an order of 30,000, someone is having an issue somewhere. But hopefully those can be resolved quickly and with mutual satisfaction to the parties, so I hope to have a fast turnover in that binder. I am learning all about our Grand Chapter Session this year and am attending some meetings for that because I have never been involved with that before and I hope that going to a year's worth of meetings will give me the overview to understand my part in choosing Chairmen for my session activities and fine tuning what we will do when it is my turn to decide. Since I have never served on any Grand Chapter Week Committees, the groups that make everything at the session happen, going to the meetings and exchanging long e-mails with my awesome session chairs has been a great learning process. I don't say anything at the meetings, because I am just there to learn, but I am very happy that I put these on my calendar because I am finding out so much I never knew before. All my notes and the hand outs I have gotten are in that binder. Of course, I also have one more binder, bigger than all the others, which is my binder for my girls, the 2013 Worthy Matrons. That binder has dividers labeled by District and a sheet of all the ladies who have been elected to serve as Associate Conductress in that district. As I hand out my packets at the Instructionals and Transitionals, I have been handing out an information sheet and asking each of the ladies to send it back to me. I have already gotten some and they are tucked into that binder. That one will keep growing, and changing a bit, each year, but it is really the most important one of all because it is how I learn about the people who will serve with me and start gathering information on what they would like to see in the future, so I hope I get all the questionnaires back. I have also started an e-mail list, to which I add each person as I get their information sheet back. I hope that most of my girls will have e-mail because it is a great way to communicate with a large group of people over a very large distance. Next week I am still at home before we set out for four full weekends of lots of events and travel.