The club is not well.

In 2019, we had an average of 93 members, and nearly all of them were actively posting. However, just this past March we reached an all-time low of 75 members, and we have been seeing the number of people posting once every two weeks drop even lower than that. On top of that, we have been seeing many ships struggle to meet the criteria outlined in FCOMM to be considered active.

We can feel it even without the numbers. The past two years have been very difficult for us all. Life seems to be conspiring to grind us down; some of us more than others. Everything feels like it takes more effort. It is a struggle just to go to work and to take care of our families every day; there is less energy available for our fantasy lives in outer space on the Internet. Everyone seems to feel this way, or some version of it, so we just kind of let that go on.

This is where all of our recent problems have started. Due to our noble but ultimately misplaced sense of consideration for other people, we have stopped taking the actions that correct unhealthy situations in the club before they turn into big problems. The club’s leadership is supposed to have stepped in and corrected things, but that has not happened because our leadership has been absent or weak for at least the last 16 months. The lack of accountability from the top has not gone unnoticed. People don’t know what they can actually expect of each other anymore, so they expect nothing. We should be expecting that we can have fun here, but we don’t actually trust each other enough to just show up.

I don’t want the club to be this way anymore.

I have invested too much of my time and effort into the club to let it wither away like this. It’s simply too important to me. I think it’s important to the rest of you too, and to the people out there who we haven’t met yet but whose lives will be improved by finding it. Steve does not want the club to be this way anymore either. Steve and I have had notable disagreements in the past, but we completely agree that these are the most urgent problems facing the club, and that we need to take action on them now. I asked Steve to be my running mate because we share this understanding of our current situation. He has extensive experience in the Academy and the Personnel Department, which gives him unique insight into the dynamics of these problems and how we can solve them.

The good news is, that there is no problem facing the club today that cannot be solved if we work together. Steve and I are going to work together with you to fix the current state of affairs by doing three basic things:

1. Realign the membership - We all need to get back on the same page as to what we are doing here and what we can reasonably expect of each other. Then we need to agree to hold ourselves to those expectations.
2. Restructure the organization - The club’s organization needs to be adjusted to expect an average membership of around 80 people instead of 120, so that we don’t burn ourselves out like we are right now. We also need to make sure we’re creating opportunities for people to do the things they want to do, and are not asking people to do things they do not want to do.
3. Reassess the situation - As we make changes, we need to continuously check to make sure that the changes are working as we expect. If they aren’t working, we need to make further changes. If they are working, we need to learn from that success and replicate it further.

Steve and I will be happy to go into further detail on what those things actually mean in future campaign posts. Until then, we hope you’ll consider voting for us, and will be happy to answer any questions you ask.

Joe