The first year, we held meetings once every few weeks. The meetings provided a sense of community where the women could go over best practices, scheduling, and maintain a collective motivation about the feel-good aspect of the program. This was important because it was a new program and the women could learn a lot from each others' feedback. Because they are so busy, the women gave the input that meeting times could be cut back and most of the logistics could be dealt with via email.
This was done the second year. Most of our members were returning, so there was no need to hold meetings for the purpose of training. This worked fine, but the women felt that a sense of community was lost. The women did not have a chance to develop the same collective excitement about the program because they didn't have an opportunity to share with each other.
We are still trying to find a happy balance where we are meeting just often enough to not strain the women's already busy schedules but still get what we need done. |
