Rotary Member Engagement Survey - District 5050 Results
Presenter: Mike Reddington

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A report on the 2014 Rotary District 5050 Member Engagement Survey was released recently and it shows that Rotarians from Hope, BC, to Everett, Washington are very engaged in their service work in the 62 respective Rotary Clubs across the District.  Some 1310 individual Rotarians took part in the survey, a participation rate of just under 50%.

 

“We are extremely pleased with our very first membership survey and the results show a satisfaction (engagement) average score of 81.2%, which is extremely high compared to workplace surveys but reflects the very high commitment of Rotarians to service in their communities and around the world,” said Linda Murray, District Membership Director.

One of the major benefits of the survey is that each Rotary Club participating in the survey receives their own results summary analysis. “Clubs need this information for their own management and continuous improvement processes”, said Mike Reddington, survey administrator, “because this gives members an opportunity to make their opinions known about what the Club does well and also where improvements are needed.”

“Some of the results will cause members to smile,” said Reddington, “such as comparing the main reason for joining Rotary – giving back to the community – with the main reason for staying in Rotary – the friendship and fun that members get out of being part of a Club. We call this the conversion factor, moving from personal altruism to group service and realizing that a whole lot more gets accomplished as part of a group of like-minded people”.

A key finding of the survey was that Clubs are facing an aging membership and need to recruit younger members to build Clubs and maintain high service levels. “The survey found that a number of factors are contributing to a lack of membership growth as member numbers across the District are stable but static”, said Reddington, “chief among these are what we call retention factors like creating a learning community and other personal growth measures within Clubs.” “We see that Rotarians give an average of almost 5 hours per week to Rotary”, he said, “but we have to remember that just giving leads to burn-out, so we need to look at recognizing and nurturing our members to boost their personal experience in Clubs.”   For further information, please contact Mike Reddington at mikered@shaw.ca