Moving forward - JCI UK Presidents Day and the Impact Plan

Last weekend, chambers from all across the United Kingdom met in Belfast for JCI UK's second national event of 2010, the Presidents & Deputies day. It was excellent, JCI Belfast did a great job organising the event, and in addition to the formal parts of the program, we also got to see lots and lots of Belfast.

I was very excited, because this was the day I was to present the Impact Plan to all of the local Presidents in the UK. I knew from before that not everyone was as excited about the plan as I was, and that not everyone was as accepting of my role in it all. That's ok, I'm a new player on the stage of JCI UK, and I have maybe not been as good in communicating the purpose with it all as I should have been.

In the end I think it went quite well. I gave a quick overview over the plan, then we all decided on four topics we think are the most important for JCI UK at the moment. After some discussions we agreed on continuity, communication, profile and engagement. We then had a world-cafe style brainstorm with 4 groups rotating between tables discussing and mapping the different problems connected to the 4 topics. We focused on the problems and not the solutions mainly for two reasons. I felt we needed to get the problems aired, the problems we are facing needed to be recognised and put on the table, but also - now that the problems have been aired, we're done talking about them and from now on we will only be focusing on solutions. Basta.

After the brainstorm, I asked all the participants to look at the 4 papers and mark the problems they thought was most important, both long term and short term, this was then used to kick-start four volunteer task groups that will work on each issue up until the national convention in November. I was very happy to see that people took up the challenge and both volunteered to be part of and leaders of the various task forces, I'm also very happy to see that the groups have a variety of members from all across the UK, including Northern Ireland.

You can find the JCI UK Impact Plan on the slideshare link below.

Jci uk impact plan 2010 2012

View more presentations from JCI London.

Next week I'm off to Singapore for the JCI Asia Pacific conference 2010 and I'm very very excited! I've never been to Singapore, I'll get to fly the A380 plane over there, and in addition I'll get to go to another (I'm sure excellent) JCI conference where I'll meet up with old friends, make new friends and learn new things.  Now I only have to make sure I finish my Union Jack dress in time, I'm leaving on Monday, today is Thursday, and the dress is not yet started...(not to forget all the other things I have on this weekend, Saturday is JCI's day at the Art of Engagement, and I'm really really looking forward to that. Almost 60 UK Jaycees coming together for a whole day exploring leadership, management and engagement)