Advisory Board and Human Resources

More than twenty years ago Beverly and I bought a place in the Palm Springs area where we intended to live part time while many of my business enterprises began to wind down.

But, you can only play so much golf, and bridge, then you feel the urge to get involved in your adopted community affairs, and to reach out to those less fortunate in life.

We had only minimal involvement with the Salvation Army during our earlier years living in the Bay Area, but we soon noticed a storefront operation in Cathedral City, which had the Salvation Army shield in front, and a lot of activity within.

Offers to lend a hand were immediately met with great enthusiasm, and soon I was asked to help form an advisory board and assist in making plans for the future.

We built that board from scratch. . . first just five of us and two of them were gone in a couple of months.  My wife Beverly joined, then National Advisory Board member Dick Tucker discovered our little operation and he, too, joined up.

We were off and running!

In the years that followed we helped plan and finance a new community corps center.  We bought the land, then helped out with the corps complex and in 2005 the “Dick and Beverly Davis Corps Community Center” was completed.

While it was never our intention to see our name in lights, we are so very proud of the accomplishments that we have seen grow in this desert community.  In spite of its reputation for an opulent life style, much of the desert population is desperately poor, and the work we helped to found has made huge changes in the lives of these less fortunate folks.

So, I suppose the point of this whole story is simply this:

First, I firmly believe that The Salvation Army delivers “the most bang for the buck!”

Second, that The Salvation Army truly changes lives of those in greatest need.

And finally, no one should simply retire and think that one’s life work is done, no matter what your circumstance, there is always just a little more that can be accomplished through our great Army effort.

The “Others” award is an important way to give special recognition to those that give important service and assistance to your local Salvation Army.

It is important that your board develop specific criteria for determining worthy recipients, and you will be required to write up the application for ultimate approval at division and territory levels.

While you should carefully consider giving this award annually, there is no mandate to make this on a yearly basis, and in many cases you will want to only give it, as appropriate, and not simply because another year has passed since last awarded.

Suggested criteria might include:

*   Given in recognition of unique and meritorious local service to the Army

*   Create a committee of past award recipients to make recommendation

*   Ideally alternate between internal (board) and external (community)

*   Keep careful records as to past recipients  (never give it twice to the same person!)

*   Only one per year, and consider skipping years, as appropriate

Remember, this is a very significant award, and it should be determined with great care and thought.  Also, be sure to award this, if possible, at an event where the community is in attendance, to give the greatest exposure and recognition to the recipient and the services performed.

We also give lesser awards to deserving individuals which we call “Community Service Awards.”  We have special plaques engraved with suitable Salvation Army logos and identification of the award.  Thus we are able to give wider recognition to deserving community members than otherwise afforded by the once a year “Others” recognition.

It is of course a vitally important first step for new Advisory Board members to be taken on a tour of all of your local facilities and programs — the only way to really get a grasp on the incredible myriad ways your local Salvation Army Does the Most Good! But it’s an equally good idea to take your entire Advisory Board on a “refresher” tour every year or so, to keep the members up to date and in touch with what’s going on in your community and corps.

Our San Francisco Metro Advisory Board chartered a bus, and a good majority of our board members devoted an entire day for a fun and enlightening tour: from the ARC to the Chinatown corps, it’s great to see first-hand all the wonderful work being done. At each stop, officers and staff can also let the board know about their particular triumphs, accomplishments, and challenges. Your officers and troops on the ground will appreciate knowing the board is there to help, and this helps plant fresh ideas for ways the board can better provide support and move the mission. And, of course, it wouldn’t be the Army without a good lunch stop! Our former chairman even brought along his guitar, and as the tour wound down led the whole bus in a rousing rendition of “Kumbala” (pretty good for an investment banker)!

It’s a great way to build board solidarity, help your board remain in touch with the needs and opportunities at the corps level, and show support to your clients, officers, soldiers and employees. So, get on the bus!

Advisory Board members as a group are overwhelmingly men and women who themselves have full and demanding lives, careers, and families, yet consistently give graciously and seemingly tirelessly of their time, talent and treasure. When people ask us why, we generally tend to respond by saying something like “Oh, the Salvation Army does such good work.” But there are lots of organizations whose purported purposes are the same or similar to the Salvation Army’s. But we’re not all down volunteering at the Dept. of Health and Human Services for hours every week — so it must be something else. And I suspect it’s the way the Salvation Army does what it does – its people, embued by the Holy Spirit, Doing the Most Good:

Its ministry is motivated by the love of God. Its mission is to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ and to meet human needs in His name without discrimination.

From my first contact with the Salvation Army, I have been hooked by the Love in action emanating from its soldiers and officers, and inspired to do all that I can to help. And for the past three years we’ve been especially blessed at the national level by the inspiring leadership of Commissioners Israel and Eva Gaither. The Gaithers had served a succession of positions in the Eastern Territory for much of their career, before being appointed as Territorial Leaders of South Africa in 1999, followed by a very brief (103 day) stint as Eastern Territorial Leaders before Izzy’s appointment as second-in-command as Chief of Staff at International Headquarters in London. Upon returning to the U.S. after this seven year absence to take up the appointment as National Commander, Commissioner Gaither delivered an unforgettable address to the NAB at his first meeting with us, describing his feelings that he and Eva had returned to a country far different from that they had left: an America locked in a culture war, calling for compromise of principle and an abandonment of Truth. Izzy told us he and Eva thus viewed their new appointment as a Mission to America, which he later expanded into the Mission to America Vision Statement now guiding the NAB’s Strategic Planning process:

We see things as they are, and we have a vision of what can be.  We will tirelessly work for a better America and a better world for every one.

I have sponsored our Divisional Commander in our Rotary Club which consists of over 500 members, the 5th largest Club in the world.  I take every opportunity to sit with her and introduce her to other Club members.  Most of the business and community leaders in our city belong to this Club so it is excellent exposure and a good way to develop relationships.  It is also good to include your Officer in any community events you are attending. 

Go through your rolodex and see who you might be able to set up an appointment with to make introductions.  We just had one last week with a person we had never before met with.  We sat around the table just to talk.  I told this philanthropist we wanted to get to know her, we wanted her to know us and also to know what we were doing.  She was shocked to learn that we administer 26 programs with an annual budget of $35 million.  We had agreed to a one hour appointment so at the end of the hour I thanked her for her time and she willingly agreed to a second visit. 

Try it, you’ll like it!  And you may even make a new friend for the Army.

I’ve been very blessed in being able to serve on the San Francisco Advisory Board for the past 12 years, including 5 as chair; and on the National Advisory Board for the past 7 years, where I chair the Advisory Board Development and Human Resources Committee and serve on the Executive Committee.

Local service provides the opportunity to plan and achieve goals for programs best fitting your own community: working on a capital campaign to expand facilities; ringing bells at Christmas; helping gather and distribute toys and food during holidays; supporting back-to-school and camping program assistance; and of course representing your community to the Army and the Army to your community to bring them into closer alignment.

Nationally, we have the chance to look at the “big picture” across communities, to strategize on ways to help the Army as whole Do the Most Good everywhere. Our Advisory Board Development and Human Resources Committee looks at Best Practices across the country to help different locales learn about and replicate ideas that have been demonstrated to work well. Currently, for example, we’re looking at how the Army and other organizations are getting youth involved, to help make sure that these new generations look to the Army to fulfill their desire to serve others. Other committees help the Army communicate its message efficiently and effectively across the country, in such efforts as the adoption of “Doing the Most Good;” work on helping the Army make the best use of technology; oversee the Army’s finances and tangible resources; and, probably most familiar to Advisory Board members nationally, produce the quadrennial National Advisory Organizations Conference (NAOC).

The one constant across both levels of boards is the incredible importance and effectiveness of Strategic Planning. Having a strong strategic planning process in place in San Francisco enabled us to respond to the opportunity to open the first of the new Kroc Centers built from Joan Kroc’s generous bequest. Nationally, we’re currently in the midst of an extremely far-reaching Strategic Planning process that we hope will help the National Board support the Army in continuing to serve as “the most effective organization in the United States” well into the 21st century.

Perhaps the most personally satisfying aspect of service on the National Advisory Board is the opportunity afforded by each of our three annual meetings being held in a different community — being able to see first-hand the incredible diversity and adaptability of the Army’s service in each site we visit. The ability of Army corps to be able to provide the services best meeting their own communities highlights the genius of the Army’s structure: with decisions on services devolved to the Officers on-the-ground, all clearly and strongly united in Mission.