Sierra Club Activist Training

Michele Perrault, International Vice President for External Affairs

The Sierra Club is an activist organization. We do civil activism to protect the environment.

We design plans of action to win environmental victories.

Victories can include:

• getting good people elected

• passing good laws or initiatives

• defeating bad practices

We use many skills and techniques to be successful for environmental protection.

Our activists work together within the Sierra Club, and also with other organizations.

Activists organize in their communities, their towns and cities to mobilize many citizen activists.

They develop good messages to attract the public and the media.

Activists help to educate the public, young and old.

Activists contact public officials to inform them about issues and concerns,to help public officials develop new programs or laws to protect the environment,

Or to thank them for good work.

Good action plans need good leaders.

Some skills of good leaders include:

• Knowing one’s strengths and weaknesses.• Being flexible, able to change course if new

opportunities arise.• Having good listening skills, patience,

sensitivity, and making time to listen.

• Understanding how to organize a group of people.

• Being able to communicate well, both speaking and writing.

• Asking the right questions.

• Using good analytical thinking skills and efficient information management.

• Using good organization skills to meet deadlines, track progress and monitor records.

• Being able to make decisions alone and with input from others.

The Sierra Club is making a special effort to develop training materials to help make our members better leaders.

Good leaders help others to develop good plans.

In the Sierra Club, we call this process a PLANNING MATRIX.

PLANNING MATRIXA good plan has

1. An issue focus, an environmental concern that needs action.

CAN YOU NAME SOME ISSUES NOW THAT CONCERN YOU?

A good plan also has a campaign goal.

2. Once you pick an issue, decide what you want the public to ask for, and what you want decision makers to do.

CAN YOU PICK AN ISSUE ALREADY MENTIONED AND LINK IT TO A

GOAL?

How will you get a friend or other citizens to help you succeed?

USING AN ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUE, CAN YOU SUGGEST AN ANSWER?

3. Checking out resources.

• What resources do you need? (Money, people, other.)

• Who else might share your interest in the community? In other organizations?

• And who might be opposed to your ideas.

4. Strategy

• What way do you expect to win? Pass a law? Get a law changed?

• Can you do public education to build awareness of your issue?

• Who has the power to help you win? Any special people, agencies, public officials, other?

5. Campaign Communication

• Think of good messages you can use to attract interest throughout your campaign.

• Can you tell a story connected to your message – a story about your campaign? What is the problem? What are the obstacles? What can you do to fix the problems?

5. Campaign Communication. . .

What media can you use to tell your story?• Newspapers? • Magazines? • Television? • Radio? • Theater shows? • Internet? • Other?

6. Tactics and timetable.

• What actions or tactics will you use?

• When and in what order will you use them?

7. Resource management.

• Is there a cost to run your campaign? Can you find ways to get financial help for your campaign?

• Can you find ways to run a campaign if you cannot locate funding?

• Do you have a plan to get people to help as volunteers?

• Do you have a plan to train volunteers?

I hope this brief presentation of one of Sierra Club’s training materials, it’s Planning Matrix and Manual, will be useful to you.

The Sierra Club’s job is to bring people together to protect the places and people we love.

Many of you are doing this same work and we can learn from each other.

We look forward to sharing ideas and learning from friends in China now and in the future.

We can do for the global environment more working together!

Thank you!