10 Qualities of a Great Club Member
You’re a member of an RC, Social or Non-profit Club. You want to be a good club member, so what do you do? Here are ten qualities of a great club member.
Contribute Your Unique Skills – You all came together with a common interest or passion. But each of you also has unique skills and backgrounds. Are you a finance person? Have excellent webmaster skills? An awesome fundraiser? Carpentry skills? Use your skills to enhance the Club. Utilizing your skills can also significantly reduce the Club’s operating costs, leaving more funds for the core mission.
Be Positive – Always have the betterment of the Club in mind. When you question something, do it towards improvement or change. Nobody likes a complainer. Remember, if members push collectively in a positive direction, others will gladly join in; offer positive feedback. Question positively.
Respect - Respect the mission of the Club. Respect the officers (remember they are probably volunteers contributing their talents and unique skills). Everyone joined the Club for a reason, so don’t stray too far from that collective mission.
Communicate with Confidence - Great team players communicate their ideas honestly and clearly and respect others’ views and opinions on the team. Clear, effective communication done constructively and respectfully is the key to getting heard.
Trust by Verify – We continuously see the news on the latest club fraud. As a club member, you do have a responsibility to understand and question the finances. Pay attention during the Treasurer’s report! Everyone has a responsibility to make sure the Club’s finances are appropriately controlled and spent. If you happen to be the club treasurer, see my post on being a good Club Treasurer.
Positively Build your Club’s Community – Create a welcoming club. Members are typically on different journeys with their skills or desires. Help these club members grow and advance in the Club. Be a bridging vs. an exclusive Community. This post is written during the global COVID pandemic, so community needs have never been greater.
Teach - Grow the members’ skills. Maybe within your RC Club, flying is your passion, or perhaps you understand the technical side of the tools, whatever your unique talent, actively helping the membership.
Embrace all your Stakeholders – Understand how your Club can mutually benefit and contributes to your stakeholders, be they your local community, close neighbors, or a broader group or organization. Be a good citizen, and things will be much easier.
Consistent and Reliable – Displaying genuine commitment and reliability is a great way to drive your Club forward. Create positive relationships within your Club and do this consistently.
Reliable Volunteer – Don’t be the volunteer that never volunteers! They volunteer in name but never show up. When you volunteer, do more than asked, adapt quickly and easily, come with a 110% commitment to getting things done. Remember, you are either part of the problem or the solution, don’t be a problem.
Embrace these attributes, and there is no doubt that your Club will move forward. Maybe incorporate these operating principles into your charter or bylaws. That may be a subtle way of building these attributes into your Club’s culture.
10 Qualities of a Great Club Treasurer
So, you volunteered to become the treasurer for your RC club or other organization? Being a financial person in your “day-job” helps but isn’t necessary to be a great club treasurer.
Other than being willing to do it, here are ten characteristics that make an excellent treasurer:
1. Good custodian – you have the aptitude and temperament to take care of things. You are the custodian of the Club’s finances. This includes expenditures, revenue, and in most cases, any tax reporting. Being a good custodian means respecting the importance of the Club’s finances and take care to manage them properly.
2. Transparency – Transparency builds trust and proper internal controls. It would help if you were comfortable putting your work out for all to see. Only through independent review and scrutiny can everyone trust what you are doing. It would be best if you had the self-confidence to display your work. Comfort with reporting, explaining, and documenting what you are doing is key to transparency.
3. Detail-oriented – Money and expenses require a detailed focus to be adequately managed. Are you a detail-oriented person, or do you like the big picture? You will most likely be doing all the work, so you need to be comfortable. Remember, a club is not a big for-profit organization; there is probably no PeopleSoft, Oracle, or Workday! It is just you and either Excel, Numbers, or a rudimentary product.
The detail-oriented focus extends to understanding the Club’s bylaws and rules. You are probably an executive officer of the Club, so this will go beyond accounting and finances.
4. Good communicator – Along with transparency – you need to explain financial concepts to non-finance people. There will be skeptical club members that either don’t understand the finances or don’t have complete trust in you. Being an effective communicator is a required skill.
5. Able to Support the Club’s leadership – you are an executive member of the Club, so you need to be able to advise and consult the Club’s leadership on what can be afforded, what can’t, what you are spending money on, and how fundraising is going. That’s probably obvious even to brand-new treasurers. But there is a second treasurer duty that’s almost as important as the first: You must provide financial information to support decision making.
6. Understand cash flow statement – There is typically no accrual accounting – it is all about what came into the bank account and what went out. Club accounting is all about cash flow reporting.
7. Trust but verify – you are friends with the club members, but you need to ensure that basic fiducial rules are followed – basic receipt/documentation requirements for everyone – consistency will help build trust and take the friendship card out of it.
8. Honest - Critical as club members know you and probably already trust you – see #7 above – this is a fine line.
9. Ideally, a finance or accounting background – not needed but helps. Even effectively managing your own personal or family finances will be beneficial.
10. Flexible – This is not a major corporation, so you need to be flexible with the membership – Clubs are organized around a common interest, and accounting and finances are not the main focus of the Club. There are typically no stockholders, strict forecasts, so when the Club membership wants to do something, you need to pivot and move into #5 above.
You should feel good about serving the Club. Many clubs’ successes result from the diverse members contributing their varied talents.
Be mindful of these ten key attributes, and you are on the way to being a great club treasurer.