Some ides I will toss ae around..and these ideas have come from other sports jobs Im involved in

• It should be mandatory as part of your memebership requires you to complete 5 hours a year of volunteer work to help the club in anyway

• Its also mandatory to caddie for junoirs atleast once a year on a sunday morning…we often have 15 -20 junoirs rock up and 2 or 3 parents…this would help yungsters learn the rules and improve thier golf and respect older people also

mt gripe is too many people think about themsleves and not the club/community aspect of golf

say you had 300 members….times that by 5 hours…thats 1500 hours of volunteering youll get….imagine how many improvements you could make with that amount of time to your course and club house….

any other ideas throw them this way

Nice ideas Dave, having been involved in club committees over the years, I wish you luck. Just remember these changes have to go through the AGM, which means the people you are targetting are going to be voting on them. Proving it’s good for them as well as the club is going to be your sticking point. Change is hard for golf clubs, they hate it, they fight against it and rail at every opportunity with reasons to NOT do it. One of the reasons why golf is dying. This doesn’t apply to just golf in Australia, look at Cricket, we invented 20/20 cricket and the only people who saw anything in it were the Indians… and golfers in this country are a lot more conservative than cricketers.

There are people in this forum who can’t see any reason to change, and this is where the push for change (IMO) is the natural place to come from. These forums are at the cutting edge of change, it’s where Ideas are born, go for it mate and best of British, keep us informed as to the clubs reaction, I’d love to hear it.

If I can think of any ideas to help yo out I’ll post them here…

Hi Dave – just my thoughts mate, take out the mandatory and you may get a few starters… may I suggest a face to face (clip board in hand) on a comp day and approach the members (ladies included) and ask them.. would you mind becoming involved in assisting the juniors by…..whatever….once you have a load of names, work out a roster and send them a letter of thanks with the roster and a golf ball or pack of tees. Tell them, you never know you may be caddying for the next Adam scott, Aaron Baddely or Karrie Webb…
As Cliff stated golf is dying…well not so much is golf dying but golf memberships to particular clubs are dwindling – golfers just don’t like being mandated. Goodluck!

well yes, maybe dying is too strong a term. But it certainly isn’t growing…

totally agree Cliff – many are turning to “out of club” groups.

yeah might need to be a bit tactful in my approach but people need to learn that the club is a community facility and its memebers are getting older and older…and we want young people to fell welcome and we also want the club to improve…

some nice garden boxes areound the tee boxes…makes the place improve rapidly…decent sineage…...better paths….

often materials isnt the problem its getting the people to o it

I have coorportae governance experience and training and want to put it too good use. They are asking for commitee nominations so i though I’d become involved…the key point top our club which I mention for fear of incrimination is people think of themsleves and nothing else

Well the facts are you can get a footy/workers club membership for $5 a year, they have social golf clubs, with no hang ups that play maybe once or twice a month, at different courses, for a nominal fee and they have a good time, win a golf ball or three, and maybe a nice umbrella or t-shirt and make good life long friends. Why would you play the same course all the time, and pay through the nose for the privilege…

I’m not talking about me, I love the club community that comes with a golf club, but a lot of people believe they have found much better options. And more and more golf clubs are being sold to Football clubs because they know how to get the most out of the environment.

I have sometimes wondered whether you could reward golf club members with a lesser membership fee if they all undertook some volunteer hours.

I mean lesser fee, not a reduced fee. My scheme would actually increase the membership fee, then allow those who volunteer to reduce it back to what it was. You could value their time at “y” dollars per hour, and if they worked, say, 10 hours, their membership would reduce by 10”y”.

However, I tend to think the logistics and management of such a scheme would be too difficult and time consuming to be of real value and there’d be too many arguments over what constituted volunteer work and how it was valued.

Was told last night that club membership in NSW has dropped from 102313 in 1999 to 81884 in 2007, roughly 20%. Women membership dropped 15% in same period. I would think that because of the economic situation prevailing now, that there will be a lot more, and most will go and play socially when they can afford it, and at different courses as referenced by previous posts.

I have sometimes wondered whether you could reward golf club members with a lesser membership fee if they all undertook some volunteer hours.

I mean lesser fee, not a reduced fee. My scheme would actually increase the membership fee, then allow those who volunteer to reduce it back to what it was. You could value their time at “y” dollars per hour, and if they worked, say, 10 hours, their membership would reduce by 10”y”.

now theres a good idea…..if your essentially paying an honoraruim to your members…I like that idea

Dave wrote
Its also mandatory to caddie for junoirs atleast once a year on a sunday morning…we often have 15 -20 junoirs rock up and 2 or 3 parents…this would help yungsters learn the rules and improve thier golf and respect older people also

Where are the parents ?
.If they can’t be bothered why should the members who have their own families to consider.

Developing Junior talent is what so many clubs should be doing and many do but there are also many clubs who are set in their ways and “a change” is not coming. Of all of the clubs I have been associated with over the years both in Australia and overseas, junior golf is paramount but tough at times.
Joining the board of directors….....good luck.

Being a Director of a Golf Club can be a tough experience. Good work is taken for granted by almost all the membership without feedback. On the other hand griping about things they don’t like is the norm.
The volunteer move is important. However I don’t see that forcing it is a good move.
It is surprising how many people will participate given a chance.
The best way I know is to have sub-committees for different functions under the leadership of individual directors.
For example the Captain might have in his portfolio Junior membership. He asks for a few volunteers to assist with ideas and in practical ways in a team approach. He may also call for assistance in developing next years program or in detail planning for a big event.
Asking for expressions of interest, followed by selecting individuals for team activities seems a good way to go.
Some Boards are disfunctional and some Board members are not particularly competent. This makes it hard. It is not like private enterprise in a organisation where people are mostly working for a living, striving to do better and get selected for management on ability to do the job.
Some Board people are there because they like the kudos, have little to offer and get elected because they are “good blokes/sheilas”.

The vast majority of members ( present company excepted ) are lazy, disinterested and above all critical of the work of the normally small number of people that volunteer to help run most golf clubs. I’m sure there must be exceptions…yet to meet them.
We can’t get the members of our club just to read the notice board which is kept up to date daily by staff and volunteers like myself. Boy do they kick up a fuss if they miss something though.
Even the pennant players need to be spoon fed and none volunteer to help with anything.
Most clubs in the district have the same problems.
Board or Committee..only thick skins need apply.

It’s always been my opinion that good committees are good at getting the Members to do the work. Good committees should never be about doing the work themselves. I was kicked off the last committee I was involved with for expressing this opinion….

I agree with you totally, unfortunately you are the exception to the rule, no offence intended.
Baz
ps “pleased to meet you”

Cliffmanley…..

I have never been on a committee, never will be as well. I sort of cannot as I work at a golf course. Great job and I love it by the way. In a way, I have to step kindly all the time, each day, every week and if a packet of tee’s is missing one tee…..well…all hell breaks out. There are letters of complaints from members, and the list goes on. It is comical but only from a select few….One would think that golfers having their weekend game would be happy to just be in the sun and having some fun?...BUT…there are your anal dudes who just like to well, be anal and complain that the 1st tee was cut to the north instead of the west.
I personally think that there are so many smackers out there who think and believe they have a god given right to be a prick?

Hey, I am not having a dummy spit….One has to laugh all the time.. I just find it funny all the time. Gota love it!!!

The vast majority of members ( present company excepted ) are lazy, disinterested and above all critical of the work of the normally small number of people that volunteer to help run most golf clubs. I’m sure there must be exceptions…yet to meet them.

I think you get the members your club organises for.

If you have an ethic of service to members, one that runs on an ethic of totally paid help, then you’ll get members whose only feedback is complaints.

If you have an ethic of service by members, one that runs on the value of volunteerism, then you’ll build a community of interest, because they know personal action by everyone keeps the membership fees low, and that giving is part of a larger benefit.

There are all sorts of people on committees. There are some with forward vision who can see where a club is going and are concerned with investigating initiatives, development, improvement and managing future scenarios.

Then there are those who see it as more important to raise trivial issues like a ball washer that needs replacement or a smoke detector that goes off.

It has been my experience that the smaller country golf clubs normally have a friendly membership base with a reasonable level of volounteers prepared to do thier bit for club & community.
Unfortunately the same can not be said for most golf clubs in the cities. These clube tend to have a large membership base & conversely a small group of ppeople prepared to give of thgier time for the betterment of the club. There also seems to be a small number of members that are never satisfied with the benefits they recieve for thier membership dues & constantly complain but rarely offer any suggestions on how to improve things.This is probably some sort of reflection of modern city life, Unfortunately!