Salsa Charity Night - Assessing Teamwork - Case Study Example

INDIVIDUAL REPORT ON SALSA FUNDRAISING NIGHT INDIVIDUAL REPORT ON SALSA CHARITY NIGHT Sexual exploitation of the young children has been a common trend in our town. In fact, stories exist of children being exploited sexually for very little amounts. Similarly, stories have emerged of women who are the masterminds of human trafficking, where children are bought and sold for a price. To this effect, we decided to hold a salsa charity night. As much as some collection was to be done in the course of the salsa night, the main purpose of us holding the event was to ensure that we made the student population aware of the Barnardo’s Secos’ project. In like manner, we were driven by the urge to provide insight to the students on what went on within campus. For starters, it is far-reaching to mention the fact that we managed to collect £203.45 during the Salsa Charity night. Nevertheless, we were not so focused on the amount because we wanted to make everyone aware of what was happening around the entire place. Most of the funds that we managed to collect came from the sale of tickets. The tickets sold at £3 presales and £4 at the entrance. We held the opinion that having the collection done at the entrance would be better than doing the collection once people had settled. Our argument would be that people would be so much into other events of the evening that they would not be into doing the collection then. Once people had settled in the venue of the event. It took a few minutes to take them through some slides that had details of the Barnardo’s campaign objectives. I must attest to the fact that those who attended were disturbed by the pictures just the same way as I was. Throughout the entire process, we had challenges with the funds coming. In as much as the collection was not the main purpose, the funds were not coming in as we expected. It was mainly because of the event that those who attended the salsa charity night did not quite understand the meaning of the whole move. It is because the attendees came with the sole reason of having fun; not knowing that one of the issues leading to holding the event have some little collection, even though the collection was not key on the agenda. In the past, the university had been organizing events where the international students were accorded free entry. For this reason, some of the international attendees who came in for the event thought that the entrance was free, and this had some negative effect on the overall set-up. On the same note, the international students thought that the food that we had prepared was to be free, and this made us reduce the cost of the foods from £1 to £0.50.The manner in which some of our group members behaved during the event was also uncalled for. It is because they were motivated to let in several people without paying for the entrance ticket. As a group, we also failed because prior to our event, we had not set up any targets that we expected to achieve. It meant that we lacked direction when it came to the financial matters. Organization of the Event In the process of doing the organization, we had some problem when it came to selecting the event that we would go for. As an individual, I held the opinion that it would be in our advantage if we organized a badminton event. It is majorly because I had earlier played an integral role in organizing a badminton event and it was a success. Another reason it was successful was the fact that badminton was highly popular among the international students who pay twice each week to participate in the event. Nevertheless, the group members did not buy into the badminton idea. Part of the reason they did not consider it was because they saw Salsa as a good choice. They were borrowing a leaf from the annual Salsa festival that normally attracts a large number of attendees. Nevertheless, we failed to realize the fact that the annual Salsa event normally aims to achieve a course that is different from our course. Concerning the participants, we agreed as a group to invite everyone who was willing to take part in our event, irrespective of the origin of the person. To this effect, we agreed to invite those of Latino origin and any other international student who felt obliged to join us. In addition to the students, we invited the locals who saw the sense in the course that we wanted to achieve. I must attest to the fact that, in as much as the event that we organized made some difference, we felt that, for efficiency purposes, it would be necessary to organize something that targets a particular group of people. In as much as the group members settled on the salsa event as the best mechanism, they were not ready to work towards achieving the objective of the event. It left me with most of the workload as the group leader. One aspect of the event organization that proved too hectic for me as a group leader was the pursuit of sponsors. It is because in as much as we did our best to explain to the organizations what we wanted to achieve, they were not ready to provide the help that we expected. We did recognize as a group that it was not the responsibility of the specific organizations to fund us, but we anticipated that, as part of our society, they would be inspired by the need to see some change. We did not expect large chain supermarkets such as Sainsbury and Aldi, for example, to ask the several questions that they were asking us. It was good for the co-operative market, however, to provide us with some snacks. However, the snacks were provided because of some links that existed between the manager and me. Contact was also made between a local estate agency and me with the view of them sponsoring us, they promised that they would chip in some amount because some of our students were their tenants. Nevertheless, this did not come to reality because, by the time that we were going on with the event, we had not received any form of support from them. I must attest to the fact that part of the reason some of the deals did not go through was major because holding discussions with the parties was a bit complicated than I thought. The organizations gave our appointments some of which we honored while we failed to honor some because we were supposed to be at two places at the same time. Some of the organizations did not consider it wise to provide us with the funds but rather to give us some of the gifts that we gave out on that evening. In return for any favors, that they provided us with, the organizations demanded that we were supposed to advertise their businesses. Some demanded that we had to include their logos on our websites while some were of the opinion that we were supposed to place their logos on our posters and our fliers. I was astonished when some of the institutions asked us to distribute their fliers for them. The Multicity European Food Market was one donor that contributed to the success of the event. They shared our vision and saw the sense to back us up because they saw it was a method one could use to give back to society. Apart from other services, that we had to pay for, it is imperative to note that we got the venue at no cost. It was because of the Students Union hub. Part of the cost that we had to cover was the fact that we had to pay the DJ and the sound technician who also charged us some amount for the equipment that we hired. Entertainment organization was neither easy; this is because the Salsa dancers who we wanted to bring in could not make it because they were held up on the Thursday we were to hold the event as it was a weekday. The Rhumba instructors too could not make it majorly because it was a weekday, and they would be training on that particular day. In as much as getting hold of the other participants proved difficult, we managed to acquire the services of the comedians and the samba dancers. In as much as organizing the event had several challenges, they were bearable because most of the people whom I interacted with were outsiders. I did expect that the promotion aspect of it would be easy given that most of the work would be internal. However, promotion proved hectic than I thought. For starters, we had agreed as a group that someone from our group would help us with the making of posters. The person did make an attempt of doing so. In the process of making a poster, however, the member made several mistakes, notably with spelling and blatantly refused to correct the mistakes. It left me with no choice as a group leader, but to take the responsibility and design the posters. The posters that I designed were not that up to standard and a professional agreed to make us better designs. We had also agreed that part of the promotion was to be made through Facebook. Moreover, we had identified a member to handle everything to with the opening of the account. The member did well with the opening of the account but failed to share the security details of the account with the group members and in effect locking other members out of the group. To get things right, I had to open an alternative account that would be used by other group members. In doing this, I had to open an account with the name the group members had agreed on, and this meant that we were to share account names with the initial account. It created confusion, as the account members as well as any other party who wanted to share something on the wall of the account did not know which account to share things on. More drama envisaged as the age question made all those who were below eighteen years were prohibited from accessing the wall because in creating an account, I had set eighteen as the age group. Similarly, it was difficult to share messages through the Facebook account majorly because the administrator blocked all the services that had to do with communication as messaging and no more additional friends could be added. I also realized that I had accorded much time to one social network in the name, of Facebook in the meantime ignoring the likes of twitter. At the end of the whole promotion exercise, I realized the amount I paid to Facebook to do the advertising, it went to waste. It was because even the people whom I invited through my own contacts were more than those who got the information through the Facebook advert. I also got the interlink coordinator to thank majorly because he managed to convey our event to the international students through their mail addresses. Reasons for our failures From the report given above, there is absolute certainty that the event was not a success. In as much as we tried to make the students aware of the situation, we failed to make any significant impact. One of the reasons that made us fail was the fact that we did not target the right audience for the event. In the course of selling the pre-sale tickets, we realized that people did not know much about our event given that only sixteen tickets were sold within the first two weeks. We even decided to sell two tickets at the original price, but it was more unfortunate given that only six tickets were sold. We had made a great mistake by hugely relying on the other people to grace the event and to leave our friends and family members on the sidelines. We realized that we would have done much better if as a group, we invited our friends and family members, who would then invite their friends and relatives. Through that, we would manage to get the right people to champion our course. As a group we also failed in carrying out the appropriate research on the event that we wanted to go through with. For example, we failed to do much research on Salsa, we knew that it would be a hit judging by the fact that the Salsa events normally organized by the school is always a success. We realised that we were over ambitious by inviting the locals and the students to take part in the event. It is so because maybe the locals did not feel the drive to join in the event given that it was held within the school. The event being held on a Thursday did not work to our favor. That is, given that most of the people, who showed interest in coming to the event, could not make it to the occasion given that they were supposed to be at their places of work the next day. Reflection on My Contribution For starters, I have to attest to one thing, I was not selected as the group leader of our group. Nevertheless, the fact that people had several excuses made me take responsibility. In addition, some members of the group could not walk while others said that they could not speak in English. Other members of the group argued that they could not talk to strangers while others raised complications to do with their travelling issues. I decided to take the responsibility because I realized that most of our group members were joy riders. Playing the role of the group leader was quite hectic because many a times I was called on to act in the best interest of the group. I had to attend occasionally to the appointments that were being created by the sponsors. All this needed time, and it forced me to sacrifice my studies to ensure that all was well. It was hard reaching all the group members in time. Thus, it was because some of them avoided the avenues that we were using for the communication as the group Facebook account. The day of the event proved more challenging than I had anticipated, for example, the dancing troops and other parties that were invited wanted to be treated with much esteem something that I had to try to do like a group leader. Similarly, I had to ensure that the hall had the correct number of audience as that would motivate the performers. Over and above, the responsibilities that I had to undertake drained me to the last, but I presume true that I did all I could do with the supplies that I had at my disposal. Assessing Teamwork Team spirit and working towards one goal are terms that did not exist in our group. Our members were not supportive at all. To be specific, only one member of the group gave me the support required to make things work. Most of the members were, however, disinterested in the activities of the group. In as much as they had suggestions, they did not want to execute the ideas that they proposed. They wanted the group to agree to their proposals without giving any considerations, and this was just unacceptable. I realized that for me to lead the orchestra, I had to show my back to the group member who were not corporative, and that is exactly what I did. I stopped being a nice person, and I stopped pleasing the group members who did not see the sense in what we wanted to achieve. Finally, I had to make do with what I had at my disposal, and positively, some of the attendees were appreciative of what I did. They felt it was a worthy course. Similarly, some of the people also advised that we should consider reaching out to several people next time we are organizing such an event. From the experience I learnt that; we would be meeting different people in the course of our activities, but the key to handling them does not please them, for if you do so, you shall fail with them. References CONNORS, B. (2010). Fundraising with The Raisers Edge a non-technical guide Hoboken, N.J., John Wiley & Sons CONNORS, B. (2013). Fundraising with The Raisers Edge a non-technical guide Hoboken, N.J., John Wiley & Sons CUTLIP, S. M. (1988). Fund raising in the United States: its role in Americas philanthropy New Brunswick, N.J., Rutgers University Press GREENFIELD, J. M. (1999). Fund raising: evaluating and managing the fund development process New York, Wiley HOPKINS, B. R. (2013). Starting and managing a nonprofit organization: a legal guide. Hoboken, Wiley LASATER, W. D. (2006) A descriptive study of select higher education fund raising programs centralized, hybrid and decentralized. Dissertation Abstracts International 67-08. [Bloomington, Ind.], Indiana University ROTH, S., & HO, M. (2005) The accidental fundraiser a step-by-step guide to raising money for your cause. San Francisco, Jossey-Bass http://site.ebrary.com/id/10304516. SELTZER, M. (2001) Securing your organizations future: a complete guide to fundraising strategies New York, Foundation Center WALFORD, J. (2008). 199 fun and effective fundraising events for nonprofit organizations. Ocala, Atlantic Pub. Group. TEMPEL, E. R., SEILER, T. L., ALDRICH, E. E., & ROSSO, H. A. (2011) Achieving excellence in fundraising San Francisco. Read More