Nov
10
RSA trustee blogging
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I’ve been nominated by 10 of my peers – fellows of the Royal Society for the encouragement of the Arts, Manufactures and Commerce – to be a trustee. I tried to draw my nominations from a range of different people and each were kind enough to go through the process and even write nice things about my candidacy. It’s exciting because it’s an organisation with dynamic leadership under Luke Johnson and Matthew Taylor with clear aims and values. In my experience, there are a large group of trustees who are high-flyers committed to using the fellowship as a means of achieving more for society although at the recent AGM there were clearly tensions around the organisation’s direction of travel.
I expect there will now be an election which will conclude at the end of January. Inevitably for many – if not the majority of fellows – the importance of the ballot will get lost in Christmas cards. In contrast, I will be doing everything I can to convince people that humble little me, with 30 years experience, can make a valuable contribution to an organisation that boasts Benjamin Franklin as a former fellow. I’ve written a statement in support which will be accompanied with my CV.
I’d like to use social media in three respects:
- talking about my experiences of the RSA and with its fellows – events I’ve attended, projects that I’ve been involved with and fellows who are making a difference
- making transparent the role of a trustee
- relating the role of trustees to the roles of fellows, particularly outside London
I’m assuming that in an election of this sort, there’s no need to set out a campaign approach / principles per se.
However, in each of the three areas I’m sure I’ll learn more by doing it than by thinking about it. And in each there will be tensions: how do I do the first to best complement and support the RSA’s excellent existing channels; how do I make the role of a trustee transparent without breaking confidential conversations or undermining collective decisions? To what extent do fellows want to deal with trustees and how is that bests done within the constraints and formal processes of the RSA?
I’ve written previously about why membership organisations are so compelling. I’ve given a lot of thought to how to use social media to promote campaigns and organisations. Now is the chance to do some of it myself. Hopefully, without sounding pompous.
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