CT Cafe

In our last meeting, we discussed briefly the importance of relationship in recruiting team members for our project(s). I like doing recruiting, and in most cases I find a good match between the needs of my project and my friends, colleagues and contacts. When you think about how many people you know from work, the neighborhood, the community, and civic organizations, the possibilities for garnering appropriate expertise - not to mention diversity - are limitless!


If you need to develop the infrastructure for your team, you might find the following suggestions helpful:

• Know your "elevator pitch." Keep it factual and accurate, and talk to people in everyday parlance (they don't have months of CT discussions under their belts like we do!)


• Share your passion for the project. Tell them why you are involved, and what "grabs" you about the content, the goals it has, or working with the rest of the team.


• Give them some references to check out, including the BLOG, NSF information, Wing's material, or anything else you find interesting.


• Invite people to the AdCom meetings so they can see what it is like to work with this group. Offer to go to the meeting together, if that helps!


• Give a clear vision for the work of your team, the time commitment involved, and what role you think they could play. Make this a discussion of what interests THEM about the topic.


• Be sure to mention the contributions they could make to this effort, both in the short and long term. Let them know their value to our efforts!

In my experience, people will get involved if they think there is a long term goal that is worthy, and if they know others are enthusiastic about it and will value their input. So, start making your list! Here is a tool that will help...