Our road map

Yesterday we met with our Delegate Assembly for our quarterly meeting.  This meeting was accompanied by an all day planning session.
The goal was to draft AFT Connecticut’s strategic plan for the next year.

We started with a mission statement and goals, and 6 areas of concentration; political, membership engagement, external organizing, community engagement, communications, and professional development.
The idea was to incorporate the delegates experience and knowledge into a strategic plan for the State Federation as a whole and to assist individual Locals to establish like plans on the Local level, to better collaborate with Locals and members, and to effectively use resources, so that we can accomplish our goal of a robust, member driven union.

The participation among our delegates was truly amazing, and I think our plan will reflect this.

Facilitators moved about the large room, spending 30 minutes with each table, discussing one of the six areas of concentration with the group, building on the discussion from the previous group.
When the facilitators moved on to the next table, the next set of facilitators would replace them, and the group at that table would shift gears and discuss the next area of concentration.  In this way, each delegate had input into each area of concentration.

I was privileged to work with our Communications Director, Matt O’Connor.
We were appropriately tasked with Communications as our focus area.
Obviously, this is an area we both spend a lot of time thinking of.
Still, ideas came from the discussions that could only come from the people working at the Local level, who face challenges of time, resources, and energy that are unique to them.  It was beneficial to hear what they had to contribute, but I think it was also beneficial for them to hear the challenges of their sisters and brothers from other Locals and other professional divisions.
Several people spoke about wanting to stay connected with other Locals to share experiences, resources, and strength.

That was great to hear.

At the end of the day, each group of facilitators reported out to the entire group what they had heard when we moved from table to table.
We will now take this information and summarize it into a draft strategic plan that the Delegates will review, modify, and adopt.
The next step after that will be to implement the plan, help Locals to establish their own strategic plans if they are so inclined, and perhaps most important, to regularly review our progress and adjust as needed.

Someone once said that you cannot get to were you want to be if you do not know where you are going.
This is our road map.