Want to offer more flexibility but not sure where to start?

Select one of these options that describes the most pressing challenge your club faces, and find solutions and resources to help.

Start a new type of club

Rotary clubs are autonomous and all have their own culture. You can create a club that offers a club experience that works for you and others with similar needs. For example, you could start a satellite club for your less traditional members and your traditional members can remain in the sponsor club.

Benefits:

  • Creates new opportunity for prospective members in your area
  • Allows disengaged members to try new practices and ideas
  • Creates opportunity for new leadership
  • Allows members in traditional clubs to continue if they enjoy their club experience

Resources:

Offer alternative membership types

Your club could offer family memberships, junior memberships to young professionals, or corporate memberships to business leaders and their employees. Each type of membership can have its own policies on dues, attendance, and service expectations, provided these policies are documented in your club bylaws. Rotary will count these people in your club membership and will consider them active members if they pay RI dues.

Benefits:

  • Presents options for prospective members with different pricing structures and levels of time commitment
  • Presents an opportunity to partner with a local corporation
  • Diversifies club by attracting businesses, prospective members with young families, and other groups who aren’t able to join as traditional members

Resources:

Change meeting format

Change your meeting format and engage your members in fun, productive ways! You can meet in person, online, or a combination, including letting some members attend in-person meetings through the Internet. Or you can change the format of your in-person meetings to include service projects, leadership development, committee reporting, social gatherings, member professional talks, and educational talks on diversity, club vision, and other topics your club determines.

Benefits:

  • Makes club meetings more interesting, which engages members and guests
  • Creates culture where agility and creativity are valued and demonstrated
  • Members can gain professional development skills

Resources:

Relax attendance expectations / reduce meeting frequency

Change your meeting schedule to make it easier for your members to attend.

Ease attendance requirements and encourage members to participate in other ways, such as taking a leadership role, updating the club website regularly, running a meeting a few times a year, or planning an event. Remember your members are volunteers. If your club is dynamic and offers a good experience for members, attendance won't be a problem.

Benefits:

  • Accommodates members who have busy schedules
  • Encourages participation outside of in-person meetings
  • Better captures member engagement
  • Makes club more appealing to prospective members (research tells us that rigid rules keep non-members from joining)
  • Diversifies club if other nontraditional groups are motivated to join
  • Compels clubs to make good use of meeting time (so members come because they want to not because they have to)

Resources:

Resources & reference