Member Committees can make more efficient and effective marketing plans. Whether the calendar emanates originally from the membership or management side, the calendar should be made widely available and published early.

Planning a year out is imperative and maintaining profit and loss reports for each event will help shape the future year’s event planning. In this episode, Ed Shanaphy, member of over a dozen private members clubs, and Britney Sanders, a leading figure in the industry, investigate club planning, creating schedules that build momentum, and marketing and publishing both the calendar and individual events.

Welcome to the Institute Of Club Directors and our Club Governance Podcast.

In this first episode of our bi-weekly podcast for The Institute of Club Directors, Britney Sanders and Ed Shanaphy look at how clubs dislike and avoid change until forced to progress.

From the anxiousness concerning admitting new members to changing management and staff, membership looks to tradition as a safety valve.

Britney relates how Seabright Lawn Tennis and Cricket Club and many of its members would not advocate for new members, or even applications. Without a general manager at the helm, it was easy for members to push back change and additional members. “They didn’t want to lose their courts for their Saturday morning games,” says Sanders.

But without membership growing, advancing, and changing, and how membership acts, private member clubs cannot survive. From staffing, where an employee might remain long past their “sell by” date and their welcome, to management not wanting to create a change to which members might not be appreciative, change is looked too often as an evil. But it’s a necessary evil if a club is going to progress and advance.

You can reach both Britney or Ed at [email protected] or by calling (508) 538-1288.

Here on the educational side of the IOCD site, we have had the pleasure to work with Harry Gilbert. Gilbert is a former national president of the United States Professional Tennis Association (USPTA). Gilbert brings to the Industry of Club Directors a forty-plus year history in, what he calls not the private members club industry, but the hospitality industry.

Gilbert has been Director of Tennis at the famed Albany Resort in the Bahamas, a resort owned by Tiger Woods and Ernie Els. He has also been, for over 25 years, the Director of Racquets at Waccabuc Country Club, where he is still serving the membership in Westchester County, New York.

Along with calling upon his roles at various clubs, he references books and experiences with several top American chefs in Manhattan along with theories of hospitality and how member service should look. He states that as club members, governors, and managers, we all tend to forget that member service is the proverbial angel on top of the tree.

This three-part series is exclusive for our IOCD members. We look forward to releasing parts two and three in the coming weeks.

Ed Shanaphy welcomes you to the first in our series of Friday Institute Virtual Luncheons. Meet up with our special guests, members old and new to share ideas and network with fellow professionals in a relaxed environment.

A warm welcome to our latest virtual lunch. Join us in an informal atmosphere to share club news and views with fellow professionals and special guests.

We love free lunches, and with your membership of The Institute of Club Directors you gain access to our monthly “meeting of the minds” which is held the first Friday of every month.

A virtual luncheon, The First Friday Lunch allows us that time to share, learn and enjoy the company of other leaders in the industry. Sharing knowledge is what the Institute is all about. The foundation of learning is sharing, mentoring and learning from and with leadership at the pinnacle.

RSVP today via email and enter the monthly draw for a free DoorDash lunch on the Institute! Please do join us for our monthly, special luncheons on zoom. And, with your membership, you also gain access to the live recording of each monthly luncheon.

To enjoy this exclusive content please subscribe to one of our membership plans.