Executive meetings are arranged by the President. We have one every year in August to discuss the following year. Usually by August, the Programs director has made some tentative plans for the year ahead, and reveals them to the rest of the executive committee.
At this meeting I ask the executive members if there are any parts of the guidelines that they would like to see revised. I would take notes on how they would like it to be changed. After the meeting, I would revise the guidelines and send it out to the executive members within a week for review and approval. Once the meetings start in September the guidelines are ready to be distributed amongst the rest of the members.
We do a round circle, and every executive member gets a chance to talk about their role. People raise any concerns they may have. If necessary, we vote on things that need to be decided.
At times there were differing opinions on things. As President, I tried not to sway people one way or another. I would listen to both sides, giving everyone who wanted to voice their opinion a chance to say their bit. If what the person was saying was not clear, I would ask questions that would give more clarity. I then directed the voting process and let the majority of voices win. That's just my style of leadership, you can bring your own style. That is what worked for me. Fortunately, there never seemed to be any differences that were damaging to the relationships that we had within the group.
We would have a second meeting in January. It seemed like a good time to review how the first part of the year went, and to make any necessary revisions to the program plan for the rest of the year. I sometimes did this as a dinner meeting. We met at Barcelos restaurant a couple of times. It was quiet enough that we could discuss business over dinner. I would arrange this by sending out an email to the Executive committee and give them 2-3 options of possible dates. I would then pick the date that most people could make it. I phoned the restaurant a week ahead to reserve a table. Each person paid for their own meal. We don't have to do it there, but people seemed to enjoy it.
Some years we also held another meeting if needed in the spring. It depended on if it seemed necessary. If people were raising concerns and several emails were going back and forth about a topic, I would say "Let's have a meeting to discuss further". Once time I arranged for a meeting at the end of a Brookswood day. People that were there sewing for the day stayed for the meeting. A couple of others that were not sewing, came to join us at the time of the meeting. This worked out well. It was at a mid- spring meeting that we once decided to make some changes to the guidelines. There is no rule against changing the guidelines more than once per year.