One of the most used and mis -used clichés that is heard around Rotary is “It’s a volunteer organization”. This is normally used as an excuse when a job is not done, done improperly or done incompletely. The inference is that since we are an organization of volunteer members, we cannot expect a person to meet their obligations and commitments. It should be the other way round. Because it is a volunteer group and you cannot force anyone to take on a job there is a higher level of expectation. A person, of their own free will, stepped up and said they would do a job or accomplish a task. No one forced them to accept. No one forced them to “volunteer”.

All Rotarians are capable. Each is an owner, manager, director or at some level of management in their professions that indicates success and capability. When a Rotarian accepts a task, they should be able to know if they can accomplish it or not. As you give a task, you should provide an acceptable level of guidance and instruction so that it can be completed and provide an offer of further assistance if needed. It therefore follows that if the task is not completed it is probably due to the Rotarian not wanting to finish the task.

(Well, it’s a volunteer organization you can’t expect someone to honor his or her commitments.)

Another cliché is “If you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime.” This can be related to our situation. If you won’t complete the job, don’t volunteer for it – just say no. Your voluntary “yes” has set a level of commitment and expectation in the person asking. They should be able to expect that the job will be completed. A club president should not have to do every job in the club, they should not have to follow everyone to see that each individual task is completed, they should be able to expect that their “volunteers” will complete what tasks they have accepted. One of the reasons that we have difficulty getting members to accept the obligation of club leadership is that in many cases we are dumping everything on to the leader. They are the only one expected to live up to their “voluntary” commitment. A member sees the lack of support and the heavy workload placed on club leadership and they are unwilling to be dumped on in the same way.