| JULY 7,2026 -- I hope you will remember from last month the Grange rebranding ideas. While we WERE a farm-oriented group, we need to get away from that idea in selling our Order. Selling ourselves as the “Farm Group” sets us aside as something many don’t feel they belong in or would want to join.
When people you talk to do know about the Grange, conversation always seems to come back to us being a bunch of farmers. Most of us aren’t. Do talk about the good we do advocate for rural America and its many needs, but also stress that we are people coming together to strengthen our communities while supplying a place to belong and contribute. As we strengthen our towns, we develop leadership skills in our members.
In another presentation at National Leaders’ Conference, National Lecturer Dr. Richard Stonebraker talked about Evolving with Purpose. He pointed out that from our beginning in 1867, we were formed as an organization that was meant to change in order to keep up with what problems the world presented to us. He used the metaphor of a tree with a solid trunk and flexible branches to describe our solid core (roots and trunk) and the branches representing methods of doing things that evolve with changing needs of the community. It’s OK to keep our identity, the history, and ritual but please separate the sacred traditions from routine habits. Limited ritual is better than doing it poorly and robotically. Another move is to create inclusiveness by using teams for Grange work in place of committees. Words do make a difference. Sociologically life has been described in terms of “spaces” with the First and Second Spaces being the home and work. Why not make your Grange the Third Space where people see relevance to their lives and want to belong?
Amanda Brozana talked in another seminar about Strategic Doing. The idea of being strategic implies thinking ahead and anticipating outcomes based on your inputs to your Grange work. In other words, plan ahead thoughtfully. An aspect of this type of thinking involves Asset Mapping. This means analyzing the skillsets of your members so that you ask the right people with the right skills to do certain jobs. Some people are better at developing ideas for projects while other excel at making those ideas into reality.
Another good seminar on “The New Leadership Landscape” was presented by Jeff Sesol, author of the book by the same name and presenter of the “Pull the Chute” podcast. This phrase refers to hitting the pause button in life, stepping back, and just listening without action. His message was that good leaders lead by not trying to be in supreme control but by empowering others by trusting them to make the right decisions. This used to be called delegation of authority, but now it has been expanded. By working with others, including our youth, you let people own what they are doing by being responsible for the outcomes. Leadership requires us to put emotions aside and listen to others concerns. In this way, your Grange can develop and train your successors by consultation and mentoring.
In the Conference, the subject of Artificial Intelligence came up repeatedly. Like it or not, AI is here to stay. This is why it behooves us to know a bit about how it works and as a result of that, its pitfalls. AI develops answers to your requests by scouring the entire internet to develop an answer. There is no emotion or conscious thought going on in the other end, no matter how it might seem. The internet is loaded with untruths so the output of a request is merely to satisfy your request and may contain factual errors. The servers are programmed to satisfy you and keep you coming back for more.
Summer is here and that usually spells picnics and parades. Hopefully, your Grange has some plans for the Sesquicentennial Celebration of our independence. Summer is also a good time to bring people into your Grange Halls for fairs and community service projects. Keep busy and don’t forget to publicize what you do in the media.
I hear of Granges gaining new members and hope to see this trend reverse our losses. There is a place for Grange in communities to bring people together and make a positive impact in residents’ lives. Go out and talk up Grange!
State Grange Session will be here in three and a half months so work on those resolutions and get them to Pomona so they can go on to Session. This is your chance to make a difference by expressing your voice on matters that concern you most.
One final thought from the Speak like a Champ series: the phrase of the month is Decision Discipline. This refers to making choices grounded in strategy, based on your mission, and using available resources. Making good and realistic choices will serve to strengthen long-term effectiveness of your Grange in your community.
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