Booking a great guest speaker can result in a well-attended association meeting. You likely will book the speaker well in advance of your meeting, so it’s important to confirm the details of the event with your guest speaker the week of the meeting to make sure he or she has the needed directions and information. Even when you book and confirm the speaker, there are times when you’ll have to deal with a no-show.
Even though it is not your fault if a speaker doesn’t come, you need to have a back-up plan and individuals who are willing to step up and fill in on short notice.
Step 1 — Determine a back-up plan. Anticipate the worst and have a secondary program ready to go in case the speaker does not appear. You should prepare a list of alternate program ideas in advance of the first meeting of the year. In addition, you should have a list of fill-in speakers. Those are individuals in the association who know that they might have to lead a meeting with little notice. Having association members ready and willing to step up whether the guest speaker or even an association leader can’t make it is important.
Step 2 — Inform your membership. When you’ve been advertising the speaker for months and he or she doesn’t come, you’ve got to break the news to your association members. Be honest about the circumstance without throwing the speaker under the bus. You don’t know what kind of emergency may have come up. If the guest speaker has not been touted, it’s OK to make a seamless transition to your back-up plan without telling your members. What they don’t know won’t hurt them. It also helps the guest speaker save face.
Step 3 — Implement Plan B. Present Plan B like it was Plan A. Role-playing is one Plan B solution. Officials can learn the skills they’ll need when they encounter angry coaches, players and spectators by practicing those techniques with other officials. Ask members to relate their previous experiences or come up with some of your own. You could also use the new-found meeting time to share information about area teams. Ask officials who have worked games involving local teams if those teams are doing anything new or unusual. Information regarding bad blood between teams that played earlier in the season or the previous season can be shared. Finally, have a few video-related presentations ready as well. Officials can never get enough video.
Step 4 — Contact the no-show. If you can’t reach the guest speaker before a meeting, contact him or her afterward to find out why he or she didn’t come. May sure your anger has eased before reaching out. Often, the speaker will have a good reason for not showing up or having to cancel at the last minute. Give the speaker another chance. Often he or she will feel so bad about leaving you in a lurch, the speaker will offer his services at a discounted rate or free. The speaker may also agree to do some extra training following the meeting. Take advantage of any offers and turn a negative into a positive.
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