The New Pathways -- Leading in Any Situation

8 February 2018 was an opportune time to share about the work for Rotary Eclub 3310's Public Relations Committee where I have been Chair since 1 July 2017. It also meant the completion of my Pathways' Team Collaboration path.


Leading in a voluntary organisation is certainly different from leading in a paid environment. The motivation factors are different. Basically, these can be classified into three categories, namely, affiliation (the need to belong), authority (the knowledge/resource person) and experience (the desire to learn something new/different).

Very often, people tend to think that Public Relations is about social media and press releases. This is a myth. People watch you and decide "I can trust him" and want to get to know you better. Many people are not aware that we are our own best PR agent!

My talk, "Getting Connected", highlighted the importance of effective Public Relations as a strategy for membership recruitment and retention. Specifically, I highlighted these two PR events which gave us a higher profile.

For Gift of Sight Nepal 2017, we initiated a 3-month PR Campaign to 1) create awareness on blindness prevention, 2) help raise funds of S$120K for cataract eye surgeries, 3) solicit donations of sunglasses for beneficiaries and 4) look for volunteers who would like to join our Medical Outreach.

As for World Speech Day 2018, our PR Campaign targets those who have a cause and would like to use this global platform to share with the world.  This is the third successive year we are organizing the event. In the first two years, through one of our members, RINGS.TV was our 'live streaming' sponsor. For this year, 'live streaming' will be done via YouTube.

Such high profile projects helped us to engage and motivate our members; resulting in closer bonding. We also attracted new members into Rotary Eclub 3310. Based on a membership survey, we found that the new generation wants to do volunteering. However, understanding their profile and makeup can help us in Rotary to engage them even more.

Part of this Level 5 project includes a 360° evaluation from others. Basically, the  360° evaluations provide performance feedback from all directions. It can be a humbling experience. Often it is not what is said... but what that is not said that may be more important.


Chew Ban Seng DTM
Past District Governor


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