Clubs sharing best practice over tea and cake

The Club Networking Day held on 14th September together with an Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) to elect a new Chair of the Board and two new directors.  

The day started briefly with the EGM which saw those present vote to amend the Articles of Association as follows:-

• To remove the restriction on a maximum of two directors from one club and replace it with a statement encouraging the Board to encompass representation from as many clubs as possible.
• to provide that in the event that there are no candidates for the post of Chair or President the membership may by special resolution appoint a candidate to the post of Chair until the next AGM a candidate who would not otherwise be eligible. 

There was discussion about whether a maximum limit on the percentage of the SOA Board should be included in the articles but it was felt that practically this was unlikely and the additional statement obliged the Board to be as diverse as practical.

Following the amendment of the articles Richard Oxlade was elected as Chair until the next Annual General Meeting.  Pat Bartlett was then elected as Finance Director and Katherine Ivory as Marketing and Communications Director.  Welcome to Pat and Katherine and our thanks to Keith Dawson and Ben Hartman for all their efforts, especially related to WOC 2024 and ensuring its sensible delivery, as Chair and Finance Director respectively.

After completion of the EGM those present then got to the main business of the day – the Club Networking Event.  The new Scottish Orienteering Strategy, which will be launched in November, was briefly outlined to those present and the members from 11 clubs got down to the important business of the day discussing current issues and swapping information which all tied into the Scottish Orienteering.  The topics of discussion were

• how to simplify events
• welcoming newcomers
• the benefits of club development officers
• marketing and social media
• volunteer training and
• whether we are doing too many events. 

All those there felt they gained useful points to take back to clubs and especially from Nic Crossley, the coordinator for the Scottish 6 Day in Deeside 2025 who was able to provide social media/ marketing guidance from the experience she has gained through putting on ultra/ trail events over the years.

We will look to hold another Club Networking Day next year to provide the opportunity for clubs to come together and exchange ideas.  Thanks go to the efforts of Suzanne Robins Bird, our Coaching and Volunteer Officer, for organising the event and Clive Masson for providing the lunchtime orienteering activity which tested everyone with false control descriptions and blanked off areas of the map.