North Fresno Rotary

Meeting Recap 03/04/2010

by lou on 10/03/10 at 10:30 pm

 

BULLETIN FOR MEETING OF 3/04/10

DON HENDERSON gave the Invocation and JOE MASTRO the Pledge of Allegiance. SKIP CARLSTROM announced our Visiting Rotarians and Guests. STEVE VARVIS was the only one remotely interested in claiming he went out of town – he had $100 in his pocket before he even came to the front of the room. STEVE attended a conference in Atlanta on behalf of Fresno Pacific University. I stopped writing down the name of the lecture he gave because too many Rotarians were laughing. Needless to say, STEVE rang the bell and everyone clapped. That had to be the easiest $100 made by NFR!

 

CLIFF SPEIGHT announced an upcoming ARC bowling event for Saturday, March 6, 2010 from 8:00 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.; 11:30 a.m. – 3:30 a.m. He stressed how important this event is and how many people benefit from this very worthwhile cause. He urged Rotarians to volunteer to help. By the time you read this, it will have taken place and hopefully, with a great deal of involvement from the organization.

 

ERIC MAYU announced a pizza party planned at Lowell Elementary from 11:10 – 12:30 on Tuesday, March 9, 2010. In addition, there is an academic awards dinner at Lowell on Thursday, March 11, 2010 from 5:30 p.m. – 7:00 p.m. ERIC reports that several hundred kids will be present and this is an event that needs lots of Rotary participation and bringing spouses is encouraged.

 

STEVE VARVIS told the group that the RotarAct Club will be selling Easter candy at the luncheon on March 18^th. He said each bag is $2.00 and the proceeds will be used for a microcredit project in Angola. They would like to raise $2,500 and are looking for matching gifts from other clubs. STEVE would like our club to sell at least 200 bags on that day! I’m in….are you?

 

There was a ringer in the crowd. STEVE BERGLUND apparently showed up in the “news” smartly dressed in his Sunday-go-to-meetin’ suit. Naturally, it was pressed – and no harmful chemicals were used in the process.

 

BERNADETTE told the group that NFR was invited to the 14^th Annual Fresno Compact Business Education Shareholder’s luncheon. NFR was nominated for the recognition by Fresno High and we were one of 11 recipients. Apparently NFR had no representation except BERNADETTE, who sat at a table with Cathy Gonzalez, the principal and 5 students, leaving the table with 2 empty NFR spots. No comment from this reporter.

 

ERIC MAYU reported that there is a Girl’s Night Out and a Boy’s Night Out planned. More information to come since I couldn’t write fast enough to catch it all and ERIC is the “Great Communicator.”

 

Rotarian of the Day? Don’t think there was one.

 

Raffle: SCOTT SHEWAN, the previous winner of the raffle, had the opportunity of choosing a marble because LOU left the bag of marbles home last week for his kids to play with. Yellow marble – no deal. Sorry it didn’t work out SCOTT – CELSA had her fingers crossed so you better treat her to dinner!

 

BERNADETTE won the raffle at the meeting. I may be corrected on this but the prize was $82.50 plus I saw her carrying a nice looking bottle of wine!

 

The Guest Speaker was Dennis Janzen, Women’s Head Volleyball Coach for Fresno Pacific University. Dr. Janzen (Dennis) and his team have enjoyed 5 national championships, three of which were during the past three years! He is also a member of the NAIA Coaches’ Hall of Fame.

 

Dennis spoke of “How to Create a Winning Team.” He had so many wonderful ideas and examples that I can’t do justice to them in this newsletter, especially since his buddy STEVE was sitting next to him and had just rung the bell for giving that ridiculous lecture. However, I’ll provide some of the highlights because I was crippled by the time I finished taking notes.

 

• You assemble the right people in the right environment and let them do extraordinary things.

• The team’s culture is discussed all of the time – it is key to the success of the team.

• “People will rise to the level of the standard, but will fall to the level of tolerance.”

• Who sets the standard for a team or a company? For a team, the coach takes responsibility and ownership.

• Team culture permeates from coaches to players. What do we stand for? What are our core covenants?

• A covenant is much more powerful than a promise. It is WHO WE ARE.

• Great people and great players have the ability to make the people around them better.

• Dennis explained how the change in scoring turned into a recipe for success for the team – they now go into a game saying “Just get us to Set 5.” He explained this by giving the following statistic: His team wins 95% of the time when they go to Set 5. They obviously work well under pressure – a sign of a very confidant and talented team.

• 1 Rule: Don’t let your teammates down. (Think of all of the ways you can let people down and it covers everything that is important to us)

• He recommended reading Lone Survivor. I looked it up on Amazon.com. It is written by Marcus Luttrell and sells for $15.74. It is a story about a Navy Seal team and the life and death importance placed on the team. Letting a team member down has potentially tragic consequences.

• Dennis shared that he has learned 3 basic things about coaching:

  • Players will do what you train them to do

  • All success begins with a foundation of trust

  • Coaches tend to coach the way they were coached

• Bruce Brown, a friend and a coach, said:

  • 1 Athlete of character can change a team

  • 1 Team of character can change a school

  • 1 School of character can change a community

 

Q: What do you do to find the best teams to play?

A: It’s a problem – there was talk of hosting a tournament and no one wanted to come! Fresno Pacific holds “practices” with NCAA schools in order to learn and improve. They often “beat” many of them!

 

Q: How wide do you cast your recruiting net?

A: We recruit local. It’s possible because there is such talent here. Currently, there are 4 International students out of the 16 players on the team. Great cross-cultural experience!

 

Q: What is your conditioning?

A: Mostly biometrics. There is very little endurance training because it is not a high endurance sport. It’s all about working on jumping and getting from point A to point B as fast as you can.

 

The meeting adjourned at 1:30 p.m. and we emerged from Tornino’s into the sunshine!