Team Dragon's Laire!

.....I find being the Seneschal of Dragon's Laire to be an interesting case study in group dynamics at times. :-)

.....The other night I posted a note to the Baronial e-list concerning the potential loss of our Fight Practice Meeting Hall. At first there was the usual blaming of people and finger pointing (some valid and some not so much so) but after a while people settled down and started coming up with ideas, brainstorming on both ways to get children involved and potential new sites at which to hold Business Meetings and Fight Practices.

.....I was encouraged by that conversation. What it does is gets people thinking about the state of the Barony and its future. It gets people interacting with each other towards common solutions. It makes people think of themselves as members of the family group rather than 'us and them'.

.....Right now everyone is just brainstorming. I'm sure that there will be ideas that will not work. Ideas that have been tried in the past and haven't worked well. But that is O.K. Some ideas that are suggested may lead people to thinking of other ideas that could lead to other places and more good ideas.

.....I'm encouraged for another reason as well. There have been a couple of instances over the past handful of months where I've talked to people about getting involved in something and the response has been rather non-committal. People have been reluctant to get involved in solving issues because of the perception that there are others in the Barony who can solve the issues faster and more efficiently than they can. We really need to empower more people to get involved in the inner workings of Baronial operations.

.....When a problem or issue or situation comes up, there are a group of 'problem solvers' who immediately jump into action and solve that problem. Oftentimes this happens before others are even aware of it. On some levels this is a very good thing. But I think that we need to take a step back and think about this some. There are issues that need immediate solutions and then there are issues where we need to step back and let others take the lead on solving them. This builds strength and encourages others to learn and grow. We end up with a stronger group.

.....It also builds the Team by encouraging more people to get more involved. Dragon's Laire has a good group of people living within its borders. We have over 200 paid members residing in the branch. Of that group I'd say we had a core of maybe a dozen or so real 'problem solvers'. I'd like to see that number grow to maybe close to a hundred or so people who can swoop in an autocrat an event on a moments notice, respond to a crisis at gate, take up an office that was vacated without warning, etc. Wouldn't that be cool?

.....I'm excited today. Can you tell? I love my Dragon's Laire family today. I may not tomorrow, so I'll soak in as much as I can at the moment so I have it in reserve for those other times. :-)

.....Yeah, it's FRIDAY!!!

.....Aaron / Arontius.