Qualification

Unable, unwilling, a game of Quaker nominations

I have written here before about my experience of Quaker nominations from the point of view of someone on a nominations committee. I am returning to the subject because something I was told recently has made me think about nominations from the other side of the fence and also about the vexed question of 'qualification' for a post.

A while ago I was asked to take on a Quaker role which seemed to me to fit my 'qualifications' perfectly. I thought that both my professional qualifications and my personal and professional experience were likely to be useful to the body on which I was being asked to serve. I was also convinced of that body's importance and hoped that my enthusiasm might be useful. In the end though, as I have written here, I was proved wrong and had to accept that others had a different view.

Having let go of that commitment I was at first a bit wary when asked if I might be willing to serve in another way here in Yorkshire. I hesitated but again I felt qualified by experience in both my professional and personal life and it seemed to me that I might fit and be of some use. I said yes and have just been appointed so I have yet to find out whether this is the case.

After the meeting at which my appointment was accepted one of the nominations committee thanked me for taking on the task. I replied that in the end I did not feel able to refuse as it felt as though the job had my name written on it. Perhaps I came across as too self-satisfied because he hastened to assure me that my name had in fact been at the bottom of the list and I was only asked when everyone else had refused! I had not in fact given a thought to who else had been asked but it was a salutary reminder that Quakers have to take what they can get!

I hope that I will find that I can fulfil my new role and that my qualifications of all kinds will be useful. I hope too that I will continue to learn and grow and become more qualified for whatever task (if any) I am asked to undertake in the future.

Quaker Alphabet blog Week 28 - N for Nominations

I have been hesitating over this post, wondering what to include, but now that my fellow Quaker Alphabet blogger Rhiannon has written her piece this week on Nominations I can content myself with recounting my own experience and filling in some gaps!

Rhiannon has never been on a nominations committee - I have been on rather a lot and of different kinds. I have helped to look for nominations for various jobs at Local and Area Meeting level, for elders and overseers, for Yearly Meeting appointments and for particular Quaker groups.

In some ways the nominating experience is the same and in other ways it changes with circumstances. The most important task of a nominating committee is to discern who might be the right person to ask to undertake a piece of work. This is not necessarily the same as looking for someone who already has the right skill-set or who has done the same sort of job before. Discernment is about looking for possibilities in a person, for their 'qualifications' for the role which may be more to do with their personality or life-experience than with their professional or academic standing. From the other side of the fence I know that I might not have been the person I would have nominated to do some of the things I have been asked to do by Friends but I also know that I have (usually) been surprised by what I have discovered about myself and others by doing them.

Of course this kind of discernment is easier when the nominations committee knows the people it is asking well. When this is not the case, as often in a larger group such as a whole Yearly Meeting, then of course it is necessary to ask people to say what their experience and interests are and Britain Yearly Meeting has a system of 'yellow forms' for this purpose. I do have a small stop in my mind about these forms however, in case nominations committees feel that they can only nominate those who have filled in forms or only to those jobs which follow the 'applicant's' experience and wishes to the letter. I am afraid that I have still never filled in a yellow form myself!

Being on a nominations committee can be interesting and exhilarating, but it can also be depressing and frustrating. The depressing side comes from the frequent refusals (often for perfectly valid reasons) that one hears. Frustration, in my experience, comes from a lack of understanding of the nominations process. Nominations committees do not appoint, they only nominate to the meeting that has directed them to find names. I have lost count of the times that Friends have assumed that having been asked they are appointed and if they are not then appointed vent their frustration on the nominations committee!

In the end both nominating and accepting nomination are about service and we can all only do the best we can with God's help. After all as Beatrice Saxon Snell reminds us (QF&P 12.08) 'My dear, we have to take what we can get.'

Getting going again

As I said in my last post I've decided to set up another blog and have been spending time thinking about that. I've also been considering what to do with this blog and how to get myself writing here more regularly, which I have tried several times before.

On consideration I don't think that giving myself hurdles to clear, or more likely not to clear, is very helpful at the moment. When it comes to day to day thoughts I have a handwritten diary which serves me better and has done for years.

So I will write here when something happens that I want to write about in greater length or when I am looking for a reaction to help me onwards. I will also write a bit about my latest writing project - a biography of an 18th century Quaker travelling minister which I expect to be working on for several years to come.

As well as getting on with writing however I am also getting more involved with my meeting again. I fell into a long period of very irregular attendance when my mother was ill and even after she died I found it difficult to go back. It has taken me years to begin to reconnect with my local Quaker community and to go to meeting for worship regularly once more. Living in community has always been the part of Quakerism that I have found most difficult and have had to work at - but I know that I must [not should] do it.

My Inward Teacher has, as always, been gently but firmly pushing me onwards and made sure that a couple of weeks ago I went to a specially called meeting about nominations in our local meeting. Among other things I heard that all three of the clerking team were standing down and the committee had not been able to find replacements. Although it was not usual to ask for volunteers that was what they were doing. As I sat there I knew that I was going to have to put my name forward and it seems that another Friend was thinking the same thing. So I went home  and wrote an email and so did she and now we have both been appointed - as she said 'Now we've really done it!' We look forward to welcoming another member of the team and setting up more of a 'one off one on' continuity.

So now I am going to be much more a part of my meeting than I have been for a long time and hope that I - and they- will survive!