THE NUMBERS GAME

In my last blog I commented on the leasons learned from GM, although the issues facing GM are different than the problems facing our fraternity there is a common theme, the numbers game. In GM's case through the years they slowly lost market share and hence the volume necessary to maintain the size of their organization. In our case we have far fewer members than we did decades ago and time seems less available, so lets do the numbers game.......


Let's say I join the fraternity and fall in love with the organization therefore I attend all the meetings, twice a month. The next thing I do is join the officers line which leads to practice nights so lets say one extra night a month so we are up to three nights. Now we decide we want further light in masonry so we join one of the rites, lets say the York Rite. Wow this great, I love every aspect they have to offer so now I attend a night of Chapter, a night of Council, a night of Commandery every month therefore three more nights a month. So now we are up to six nights a month but wait I hear the Shrine has a lot to offer and supports a great cause so we join that, great, wonderful, we join a unit so now we do two nights a month for the Shrine. So lets see now we are up to eight nights a month. Realistic maybe for some but for most not really so what happens we spend our time where we can or devote all our time to the part of the fraternity we enjoy the most and become simply a dues paying member of the others.