MANIPULATION: People will try to manipulate you in various ways. Watch out for the following:
- "Here's a list of things that need to be resolved". Not everything on that list will be equally important. Do the important items; don't worry too much about the unimportant ones.
- "Here's a suggested schedule (or policy wording, or whatever), so let's use it without further discussion". Just because someone did a nice job of writing it down so that the columns all line up doesn't mean that person should have disproportionate power in deciding whatever's being decided.
- "Just a few minor technical issues". Sometimes people like FEDS will attempt to get you to agree to major policy statements by slipping them into the middle of a list of trivial administrative stuff and attempting to get you to agree to the list as a whole.
- "Let's table this discussion to next meeting". If it's a discussion about changing an existing policy, then the people who are against the change will attempt to table it endlessly, or make the discussion so boring that people hate to participate, as a backdoor way of defeating it. This tactic was used to good effect in the proxy voting debate.
- "Someone's got to do it". A volunteer delegated to do a job will sometimes not do it and expect you to pick up the slack. You may do that if you wish, but you should ONLY do it if you actually want to, and you should NOT do it every time. If you fall for this one you'll just be expected to do more and more work until you crack. It's better to let the occasional thing be left un-done, as long as you make sure that anyone who cares knows whose fault that is. It is not your fault just because someone else doesn't do their job, no matter what anyone says about it being the President's job to pick up slack.
- "We already agreed to this, so there shouldn't still be a debate about it." If you don't remember agreeing to it, guess what - YOU PROBABLY DIDN'T AGREE TO IT!
- "We're supposed to be a non-profit organization". See Non-profit.
- "Wouldn't it be cool if…" Don't sponsor someone's elaborate pet project if the very basics, like having a show at all, are still in doubt. On the other hand, if it's harmless and doesn't take away from more important things, it's generally a good idea to support any project someone is willing to volunteer to run.