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Growing together – charting a path to victory

By DERMOD TRAVIS – communications consultant

John Ogilvie, over at Report on Greens, proposes that for the good of the Green party it’s time to scrap the $1.95 per vote subsidy from Elections Canada. He makes an interesting argument, but misses the mark. It isn’t the subsidy that’s the problem – party processes and governance are the problem.

And left unaddressed these problems will continue to hamper the party’s growth whether the party’s budget is $25,000 or $25 million – from private or public sources.

Party members like to point to the supposed grassroots nature of decision making in the party. I use the term ‘supposed’ purposely and also toss out the thought that the definition of grassroots decision making may lie in the eye of the beholder.

In other words: great concept, but what does it really mean and does it mean the same thing to a sufficient number of party members to be a practical governance model?

Which helps segue into another buzz term: best practices.

Personally, I despise buzz terms. Through overuse they quickly lose any true literary sense and instead lead to office games like ‘Buzzword Bingo’ and generally cause an audience to tune out fast.

So bear with me as I write an article on ‘best practices’ because every now and then one of these terms fits and, in this case, it’s one that desperately needs to be applied to the Green party across the board from EDAs to the central office, if the end game is truly about winning seats and defining what grassroots democracy might actually mean.

The party must debate not only how it manages its resources, but also how to do it more effectively to win seats and achieve policy goals.

For instance, ‘best practices’ for a political party doesn’t mean an aimless work environment where goals – and staff – change on a whim. It doesn’t mean being left hanging in the wind when something goes wrong. Things go wrong in politics. It’s a fact of life.

It means supporting staff and key volunteers through skills development such as the campaign training sessions that are regularly held in Washington, D.C. and Toronto, and the media training that the party did in November 2004 for key spokespeople.

It means that the number of staff who have more than two years of seniority should out number those that don’t. And I’m being kind with the benchmark.

It means that permanent staff are employees, not self-employed sub-contractors. You don’t build a team with two classes of teammates.

And staff need to be insulated from a work environment that might be described by some as Canada’s worst place of employment.

Best practices mean supporting Council members through governance training.

New MPs are trained; new Council members need to be trained as well – by experts – such as the 2005 training session that was given to Council by STRIVE! Long-term Council members will appreciate the refresher.

It means identifying and repeating the techniques and processes that have consistently shown superior results to other methods.

As an example, some members like to point to polling results as the barometer of the party’s success, but pundits also use other benchmarks like the number of members, registered and active EDAs, fundraising results, etc.

But does the party even know the respective cost of generating a new member through face-to-face volunteer contact, direct mail or utilizing a call centre?

Is there a significant difference in cost if the same tactic is repeated twice on the same prospective member or if specific demographic groups are targeted by postal walk?

And once determined how often will the technique be repeated by the party in other geographic areas to maximize party membership?

You can bet your bottom dollar that the Conservative party knows these costs to the cent. And they know the projected revenue for one of these new members over three years.

While most members relish in debating policy, much of the debate remains focused on reinforcing existing beliefs rather than challenging those assumptions again and again and again.

That’s why this site asked Éric Duhaime to write an article on a green initiative of the Quebec government. Party policy needs to be put to the test, members need to hear and respond to critiques in its policy perspective and development.

It’s why the party should reach out to think tanks, universities and sectorial experts to add vital flesh to its ideas and, when the validity of those ideas is questioned, be ready to take the criticisms to heart.

Outreach should not be limited to those we respect and agree with, but also to those we adamantly disagree with but whose arguments remain intellectually honest.

The party can also look to Quebec for an excellent model in developing policy. Provincial parties hold regional assemblies to debate policy resolutions before they move forward to a full fledged party conference.

It allows bad ideas to die a natural death in Abitibi-Temiskaming and not Montreal, poorly expressed ideas to be refined, and genuinely wise resolutions to proceed efficiently.

Resolutions move forward with broad-based support from EDAs and members, and not simply as another item on a member’s liste d’épicerie.

And it does something else that is incredibly important in a political party. It pries party members away from their computer screens and into physical rooms where they can actually meet face-to-face, talk, socialize and bond as they swap war stories. Yes, war stories.

Going back to that first rule of this series: “don’t diss fellow party members”, well it’s a lot tougher to diss someone you’ve actually met and broken bread with.

For the nuts and bolts folk in the party, regional assemblies can also offer sessions for members who are less interested in policy development than in selling the party’s message or organizing an EDA.

Best practices means qualitative and quantitative strategic analysis that guides party operations and is not discarded at the first opportunity because it contradicts pre-established presumptions, prejudices or the whim of the day.

And it means setting overall benchmarks for the party’s success and meeting them year in and year out or – as the expression goes – heads roll, because a political party that aspires to govern Canada can not be run, as was once said of the party, by a “merry bunch of amateurs” and be taken seriously by either its members or Canadians.

Sorry for the shot, but would you seriously consider banking with a financial institution run by a “merry bunch of amateurs,” let alone entrust your government to the bunch?

Dermod Travis is former Director of Communications for the Green Party of Canada and organized the Green Party's 2006 National Convention