Pointers
Five Stages Community Involvement Pointers
Frequently Asked Questions Tips Tools Member Kits
Successfully recruiting your new member:
- Initiate conversation based on some common interest if known
- Establish the prospect’s desired outcome/expectations
- Tell the prospect about CAP’s mission areas and how your squadron participates
- Share your membership experience with prospect
- Seek the commitment
- Overcome objections if they arise
- Provide potential member with application, fingerprint card if senior, Great Start booklet and amount of dues they will need to submit
- Go over new member checklist with them and prepare them for the process ahead of them
- Assign their mentor to them and ensure that the mentor will follow through with new member
Remember:
- Do wear a neat uniform and follow all uniform standards
- Don’t oversell CAP by promising activities or missions not available at your squadron
- Do stress CAP as civilian, volunteer auxiliary rather than as a military group
- Do stress the benefits of membership
- Do practice your presentation so that you will be more comfortable and confident
- Don’t make your presentation too complicated or lengthy- keep it simple and straight-forward!
Be prepared to explain in detail to prospects what will be involved in joining and getting involved.
- Don’t overwhelm new volunteers – if possible, save big jobs for more experienced volunteers
- Ask new members to help with specific activities or events as soon as possible
- Pair new volunteers with experienced volunteers
- Ensure new volunteers are trained and prepared to successfully accomplish their assigned jobs in the squadron – don’t set them up for failure.
- Be prepared to explain in detail what you want prospective volunteers to do before you begin recruiting them. Be accurate, realistic and encouraging.
- Recruiting volunteers is a continuous process. Attrition is a fact of life in any volunteer organization. Even the most dedicated volunteers will leave due to a variety of reasons.
- Include something on reasons why people volunteer and why they leave.
- Fear may be more common with older volunteers, it is not exclusive to any age group.
- Adolescents, who can be exceptional volunteers, are often terrified at the thought of doing something outside the mainstream. There is the fear of trying anything new and potentially failing added to the fear of being in a new place with no friends. Get those with these objections to join a friend or in groups of 2 or more similar individuals (i.e. two teen-agers of same gender or from same school or neighborhood)
- We have to remember to not make it overly difficult to join and get involved.
- No job is self-explanatory, regardless of how easy it may seem to management (there must be some training for every job)
- Some leaders cannot accept input from their “staff” or feel they must control every step of the process. They may feel frustrated by working with volunteers. With the exception of highly intimidated volunteers, high control does not work with volunteers. The volunteer will simply say “I don’t need this” and leave. Coaching is critical for both leadership as well as staff. It is best to make objectives clear and, as needed, praise publicly but criticize privately.
Establish goals that can be measured. Reaching goals keeps members motivated! Some goals include:
- Increase monthly recruitment
- Get new members involved quicker
- Increase retention rates
- Increase and improve responsiveness to needs of current and future members
- Targeted recruiting (set a goal for more outreach with diverse groups in the community)
Common objections and how to overcome them – prepare responses to objections you receive often.
Dealing with objections:
- It costs too much
- Benefits don’t justify cost
- I am not a pilot
- Financial difficulty
- Don’t have time
- Don’t know anyone who is in CAP
- Didn’t feel welcome when I visited squadron
- Don’t know what CAP does
- Just a good ‘ole boys flying club
