Tanya - resignation from the committee

[Tanya]

I have decided to resign from the M&MOC committee, and below are the two reason as to why I have come to my decision. I will remain a member of the club

1. While the idea of the committee/membership structure is to give everyone a voice and an input, the reality is that ends up with power struggles and being dominated by the loudest voices. Consequently, it slows down the necessary business, aims and objects of the club and trying to get anywhere is like swimming in treacle. This makes moving forward time consuming, difficult and slow. This is a well known problem with this traditional club set up and why so many clubs have difficulties from time to time. While the theory is that there is an elected committee that is voted in to manage the business for a year, the reality is that they are voted in and then the first decision that they take that some members disagree with, there are calls for an EGM. In short, the some of the membership do not give the committee a chance to serve the year out without making their lives difficult.

2. The M&MOC comes with about 10 years of baggage of committee difficulties which are continuing to disrupt the club's business. Given that the club is set up with the structure as above, I see no realistic prospect of any improvement and I feel the club will at best stagnate while the committee deal with various disagreements with a few members or even itself at times, more so when the working committee has more than five members.

I feel that the current committee have a poisoned chalice and an impossible task, given the points that I have raised for my resignation. They were voted in only a month a go and should be given the opportunity to make the decisions as they see fit. That doesn't mean members can't raise concerns and ask the committee to reconsider, but that is quite different to some of what has been going on. I am a member of the club, and will continue to be so and will not be the EGM paper waving type! All the events that I have committed to run/put on for the club I will honour and do so with my usual enthusiasm, which for those of you who know me is pretty full on! I am happy to help the club as a regular member, but I am not prepared to invest any more of my time and energy into running this club, as there are better ways for me to achieve more effectively what I want, which is the preservation and promotion of Cowley cars, especially Maestros & Montegos.

I am aware that many very reasonable questions have been asked and points raise for the committee to consider, particularly last Tuesday. A number of these are still to be answered. Given that I am no longer on the committee, I will not be addressing these on behalf of the committee. I am also aware that I said that I would come back within a few days with the committee's decision on the proposed forum closure. I hope that the committee will let the membership know what is happening with that shortly, but that is now not a matter for me.

I will remain very active within the BLARG scene and hope to see many of you next year.

[Richard H]

That's a real shame Tanya, and if it's any consolation I thought the call for an EGM was farcical as well. I didn't agree with that specific decision admittedly, but I can see that you were taking all the flack for a decision that by the sound of it, had been proposed long before you even joined the committee.
I was an area representative for one club and attended two committee meetings, that was enough for me! Club politics and committee meetings are really tiring. So thank you from me for giving it a go, and I hope the club still gets reformed.

[David3500]

I am really sorry to hear you have felt the need to make this decision, Tanya, as you clearly bring with you a lot of enthusiasm and experience that could have potentially helped raised the profile of the Maestro and Montego Owners Club. However, I fully understand the reasons behind your decision and know the committee has lost an important advantage (no pun intended) in its need to have a higher profile in order to generate new members and income opportunities.

However, I am glad you will still be honouring the events you have compiled to help to raise the appeal of these M models at various gatherings.

[David3500]

I was an area representative for one club and attended two committee meetings, that was enough for me! Club politics and committee meetings are really tiring.

Tell me about it! I have been there with another local area club, taken the flack and come away with burnt fingers and a very badly bruised ego. And that was almost seven years ago (and the occasional twinge of discomfort is still felt). Apart from a major event held in the westcountry where I am a publicity officer and also a co-organiser of a particular section, I steer well clear of vehicle club committees these days.

[normanmg2000]

tanya

That's a shame Tanya, thought you were ideal for it, hope youll get over this in time. To everyone involved it is an emotive situation ,I personally think this particular issue was a step too far, i paid for membership because I wanted the club to have my contribution to help it survive, and have attended the last 3 AGM s to show support to those who are much better at it than me. Perhaps you will think again, I hope so, you seem to me a natural.

[BIGDAVE]

hello tanya i am so sorry to read you have resigned from the commitee.
you seemed very keen to take the club forward to the next stage of the club survival. as the amount of maestro and montigos become more rearer because you hear of ower cars still being scraped on a weekly basis. we need to keep as many of the maestros and montigos on the road and generate new owners and members of ower cars.i hope you can make sence of this. dave

[macca666]

I don't know whether I'm being naive our not but I joined the MMOC thinking that I was helping save our cars. Unfortunately I don't have the time to dedicate to taking an active part in the running of the club however felt the membership fee was reasonable and I was willing to pay thinking it helped. I enjoy Monstro and have no issues paying the yearly fee recently renewing my memembership on the two year deal. From what I can see Tanya you were trying to help with increased enthusiasm which I feel the club needs. It now appears aa if this had fallen on deaf ears and the issues which appear to plague this club continues. My obvious wish is that no. 108 gets back on the road and that as many Maestros and Montys are saved from the graveyard in the sky. From that end I feel we all should be doing what we can to support this whether it is through a fee or not but let's not alieanate those who are still willing to help in whatever way they can. I see the changes and improvements you were trying to make Tanya and I personally think It is a shame you feel this is the only option for you and feel that you will be a loss to the MMOC and its future...

[E_T_V]

I'm genuinely sorry to hear about your decision to step down, as I think your dose of enthusiasm and impulse are just what is needed to move the club on.

It is clearly obvious that I strongly objected to one of the decisions made as I believe it was wrong for the club, its members and the wider M&M community, and I don't think I was in the minority with that view. I assume the enactment of that decision was postponed due to the objections I and many others raised and hopefully some of the statistics I presented will help make an informed decision going forward.

However my disagreement with one decision doesn't mean that I don't support the other things that you have been involved with and the events certainly seem to have improved of late, and I hope they continue to improve hopefully with your involvement.

As for comments about EGM's, well you have to remember you are (were) elected to serve in the memberships best interest. The EGM process is one to safeguard that to allow the committee (or individual members of it if necessary) to be held to account by a reasonable proportion of the membership if required. If I was on the committee and decided to spend the clubs entire budget on sending part of a maestro into space, I'd hope I'd be held to account too (by both the committee and the membership!). It really is a last resort, but thankfully one which it seems doesn't need to be used this time.

All committees are usually painfully slow but are a necessary evil to ensure things are done properly and with input from a variety of people/viewpoints, and as you say all have their difficulties at some points. However this is the first time ever in the clubs history that I can recall someone having to propose an EGM to get the committee to see sense.

Yes the committee comes with baggage, they all do. Some people might prefer to look at it as experience instead!

Is it a poisoned challice? Well possibly, but then I guess only history will reflect that.
Looking back at my historic involvement I recall lots of disagreements, lots of challenges, and the committee wasn't always a harmonoius bunch, but also lots of fun and probably the biggest expansion in club members to date so I guess history looks kindly on us. Did we always make the right decisions, no of course not, but we did listen to the club membership or at least try to.

And lastly this one issue of closing the club forum to non-members isn't just your action. You may have proposed the idea (I'm guessing you did, and no doubt sold it well), but the committee members that voted to sanction it are also complicit in the decision.

I really do hope you carry on bringing enthusiasm and motivation to the club as that is certainly what the club needs, and who knows you may find (like I did) that it is less stressful not being on the committee!

[Guest]

Sorry to hear that,

But happy in the knowledge that you will stay around, and continue to "infuse" us all with your seemingly endless Enthusiasm and Drive.

[seacow]

Tanya - thats a real loss in my opinion but I appreciate your position. Personally I think that the opposition and challenge on this particular issue was not handled well and that if we are honest we all went a little bit overboard. The Committee has agreed to revist the decision which is to be lauded but some of the negativity should not have been present and I think the club is worse off because of it.

It does show that there is a passion for the forum and the club as well but it is a passion that rarely shows itself of late - so perhaps there is a silver lining!

[Beaker]

Not sure if aimed at me as I called for an EGM. It was the right decision at the time as the committee seemed to be out of touch with the membership. It was not aimed at anyone in particular. The process is there for these instances. However seeing as the decision has been reversed it is not needed.

[countrydude]

I think calling for a meeting of the committee is totally justified, when someone is calling for major changes like that, also the plan was to spend a heap of money on a stand for our cars (to blow the competition out of the water or words to that effect) With a car that even when new didn't have mass appeal amongst Rover owners?

I'd say neither of those ideas were on the money. More blue cheese thinking required!

[BIGDAVE]

i agree with the last post
seems a waste of money spending loads of money on a stand.
most of the members/non members will not see

[mgt16]

In fairness Tanya did follow this up with an explanation that it would be done on a tight budget. To be honest I didn't agree with the whole forum idea and voiced my concerns, however nothing was aimed at Tanya and her breath of fresh air was tempting me to join. I do have to question why 8 people came to the decision and then left one person to deal with all the flack!

[Jeff Turbo]

I think calling for a meeting of the committee is totally justified, when someone is calling for major changes like that, also the plan was to spend a heap of money on a stand for our cars (to blow the competition out of the water or words to that effect) With a car that even when new didn't have mass appeal amongst Rover owners?

I'd say neither of those ideas were on the money. More blue cheese thinking required!

News to me that we are spending loads of money on a stand?
No idea where this came from but simply not happening
The committee do not go around spending the clubs money on frivolous things and are careful with it full stop.
The accounts are always open and get audited every year and at anytime any club member can look at them so incase anyone thinks we waste money have a look at them.
I'm the tresurer of this club I resent any post says says we waste money or in deed will do.
Waste heaps of money?? Oh please find me some and I will, if more non members of this forum actually joined the club we would have more funds to plough back into it.
Fed up with all non members knocking the committee without even being a ruddy member, this isn't a personal thing or rant against you dude, ive had to say something as all the knocking is coming our way and i'm bored with it