Talking Rotary

Growing Rotary with David McPherson

August 14, 2022 Winnipeg Charleswood Rotary Club Season 2 Episode 22
Talking Rotary
Growing Rotary with David McPherson
Show Notes Transcript

On this episode with Australian David McPherson we talk Paralympics, diversity, equity, inclusion and growing Rotary in the 21st century.

Peter Tonge:

Welcome to this episode of Talking Rotary. I'm Peter Tonge, and I'm a member of the Rotary Club of Winnipeg Charleswood. And I am Mandy Kwasnica, Past President and also a member of the Rotary Club of Winnipeg, Charleswood. We are so happy you have joined us here and I are so excited for this new podcast and thankful to our many listeners. Let's start Talking Rotary. Hi, everyone, welcome to another episode of Talking Rotary. I'm here with David McPherson and David McPherson is in Australia. Hi, David. How are you?

David McPherson:

I'm well, how are you?

Peter Tonge:

Good. Now, for our listeners all over the world. Can you orient us to where you are?

David McPherson:

Yeah, sure. I'm I live in a small town called Deniliquin, which is about a population of around about 8000 people. And it's located about three and a half hours. Drive from Melbourne, which is in the capital of Victoria. Our district is 9790. And it's stretches. Rob from the roughly where I am in denilla. Cohen, most of the northeast of Victoria. Right down to the northern suburbs of Melbourne. And yeah, so it covers a fair area. Yeah, that's 63 clubs and a 1500 lenders.

Peter Tonge:

That yeah, that's a pretty big area. And you've been the district governor for all five days.

David McPherson:

Yeah, something like that.

Peter Tonge:

Pleasure to meet, you know, mutual friend connected in some way or the reason they connect to this is you and I are both in rotary and both full time wheelchair user. So we have that in common. You want to tell our listeners a little bit about that?

David McPherson:

Yeah, sure. Yeah. I've been in the chair for 54 years as a result of a car accident when I was eight years old. Back in the days when cars didn't have seatbelts. In Australia, you have to wear a seatbelt whenever you're in a car. But yeah, I ended up underneath the dashboard when we hit the back of a truck and and the rest is history basically, sir. Yeah, I've done a hell of a lot over the years that I've been in the chair. You know, when I was a lot younger and lot fitter I was I competed in in Paralympics to two different Paralympics and also did a lot of snow skiing. And yeah, all sorts of waterskiing road racing with handcycle and all sorts of other stuff.

Peter Tonge:

Wow, what were your sports in the Paralympics?

David McPherson:

Not only track sprinting. So yeah, I was I got when I in 1984 I went to silver for the 100 meters bronze for the 200 meters. Yeah, and I broke the world record twice. But then the Mexican deep Metis

Peter Tonge:

Your name is still recorded, That's a cool.

David McPherson:

I don't have the world record anymore. Because then he beat the world record in your final that I set the world record in the heat. And I beat that and in the finalhe beat me.

Peter Tonge:

Wow, that's great to think so so for listeners that aren't familiar with terrorists ports that would be in the three wheel wheelchair with a long nose I assume.

David McPherson:

Oh, well not back in those days. No. It was there was a lockdown a lot. You know, it was a four wheel drive. Will sorry not all drive four wheel and racing chair back then. Yeah, so not as aerodynamic not as technically advanced as the chairs that they have now.

Peter Tonge:

Wow. I'm gonna have to go back and find some video for that because I don't remember the four wheel racing chairs.

David McPherson:

That's a long time ago.

Peter Tonge:

That's quite quite the push. I came to athletics very very late in my life, and I know a seated fencer and a rugby player, but there's no fear of me going to the Paralympic level, I have to tell you. I'm a very keen amateur.

David McPherson:

Oh, that's good. Well, yeah, exactly, then that's now.

Peter Tonge:

Um, so you were saying to me earlier, that that sort of life experiences brought you very much an interest in Dei. So tell me about that a little bit.

David McPherson:

Yeah, okay. Yeah, well, basically, I suppose what are the message, one of the messages I want to get across to, to the clubs is bi diversity, equity and inclusion. But yeah, you know, I basically just try and relate each of those back to something that actually means something to, to the club members, you know, I talked about by increasing the, you know, the diversity in your club, the, you know, representation from, you know, diverse groups, increases the, the, the thoughts and the ideas that you have in your club, and from those thoughts and ideas, you can have a greater range of programs and projects. And, and, you know, because you've got a greater range of programs and projects, then you can, you can provide a service in your community to greater range of people. And so you've, you've increased your impact, right, and you've expanded your reach. And because those projects and programs means something to the members of your club, you have increased participant engagement, and now they're three of the actual ri Action Plan priorities. Because if and if you've got members that are interested in the stuff that you're doing in Rotary, then the no likeliness to high in Rotary, and then basically, try and relate D I, back to my life experience. Now, you know, when I, when I first became a parent at the age of eight, and my parents wanted to send me back to school, to primary school, and the primary school didn't have any ramps, and, and so, you know, a well meaning relative said to my parents, well, why don't you put him in a home with people of his own kind? Because

Peter Tonge:

They can't see the look on my face but it is not the first time Ive heard that.

David McPherson:

Yeah, because that's what that's what I did back then, basically. And so, you know, my mother, being an ex school teacher, that was a bit like a red rag to a bull, I suppose. And, and, and say, the ramps were built and I went back to school and, and I integrated into, into the society. And, and, you know, and I, I went back, then I went to high school, which is, I don't know what you call it over there. But anyway, it's the one after primary school, and then I went to university, and, and the same sort of things. But, you know, there was one year where I had to go down to school on a bus. And, and so I would bump my way up the steps of the bus and into the seats. Right, but you know, on those days, when, when the when it was raining, and there was mud all over the steps, then, you know, my mates would currently after the sticks, which is really, you know, and so I was that was helped along the way by lots of people to, to integrate into society because the Indi to me, is integration. Because, you know, diverse groups in the community, I believe need to have an obligation to integrate into the community that they're in not hide themselves away in a home with people of their own kind that because you can then go on to join service clubs and rotary and eventually be district governor. So I for me, NDI is integration.

Peter Tonge:

I agree and it's interesting as you're telling your story. There's some very familiar points for for me, because the high school that I went With, although it was the most accessible one, in my area still had a number of steps and whatever my mates would, as you say were just picked me up and put me in. There was no question about it and nobody, nobody even thought about it. It was just what you did. Right?

David McPherson:

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Peter Tonge:

I think we've all had the experience of, you know, you're you're out with your friends and everybody jumps out of the car and says, aren't you coming? And I go, Well, yeah, why don't you give me my chair? I'm happy to come but it's it's hard for people that understand that. Things like wheelchairs are just mechanisms to everyday life. Right, exactly.

David McPherson:

Yeah, I often refer to it as just a couple of couple of wheels touch attached to my bum, you know?

Peter Tonge:

Exactly, what I get around. And, and at what point along the stream, did you become involved in sports and in competitive sports?

David McPherson:

Well, well, at a very early age, actually, because that was back then in involvement in sport was the main way of my mechanism for rehabilitation. So you're encouraged to do sport as much as you possibly can. So I started out doing swimming. And I became a pretty good swimmer, too. Back in the early days, I was I went to the Commonwealth Games to the swimmer, and in the fiery South Pacific Games in Japan as a swimmer. And in so, yeah, competition in sport was, was really carried in order to rehabilitate, and it certainly did help because I increase my strength quite considerably. And because of increased my strength, I was able to do a lot more on my own, I was a lot more independent, and not rely on people having to you know, cheer me up slips all the time and stuff like that. Right. Yeah, so then after secondary school, actually during university I then trained and competed trained for and competed in my first Paralympics in 1980. Or that stage or transition to track and because you're just by chance that I had to go doing 100 meters at a national competition and practice drive record setup decided that I decided to put me in in the in the national team to go overseas so anyway, then yeah, so now I'm at United for but you know, trying to do study at uni and then eventually hold a hold down a full time job was a was a big ask. So my involvement in in competitive sports sort of tapered off quite a lot. Over the years as I got older, because I just didn't have the time, essentially.

Peter Tonge:

Yeah, I hear you not so much the time but I hear about the getting older. They said earlier the I'm a very keen amateur. And that's that's what I'll say. But I enjoy it.

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Peter Tonge:

I know we jumped ahead a little bit but I want to go back to talk about diversity, equity inclusion within Rotary because, as you explained, it sounds like your Rotary club in your district has made a point of reaching out to diverse communities to build not only the projects that they do, but within your own clubs.

David McPherson:

Yeah, well, it's a it's an hour I product priority. And Jennifer Jones is wanting to focus quite heavily on DEI this year. And it is something which which I believe we need to do in our district. While I think in in all districts around the world, because, you know, all of our clubs, all of our clubs, the average age in our clubs seems to be It seems to be getting higher. And, and we, we do have a perception in the general community that, you know, Rotary is made up of businessmen, only older this route rather than representing the community that we that we serve, you know, we need to, if we if we represent more closely represent the community that we serve, then we're more likely to be able to serve the people that need serving, if you know what I mean, you know, if we're all uniform, if we're all homogenous, then we're not going to understand the needs of people in our community. Yet, see, I went to a club the other day, and, and it was only a small club, for their changeover that they were all reasonably older people. And there was only one woman in the club. And the incoming president told me that the only way that members leave their club is when they die.

Peter Tonge:

Oh my heavens!

David McPherson:

So that sort of gives you a bit of an indication that they need really to diversify with younger people, more female representation, and bring in people from other diverse groups. And it's the same with the same with a lot of other clubs, that that, you know, they need to look at their community and more represent the community that they're in.

Peter Tonge:

And it does seem to be the large question within rotary probably in the whole time that I've been in rotary is, you know, how do we do that? How do we become more diverse, and and over these talks that I've done in the podcast, one of the things that I've seen in several areas is, if you want to make your club, more representative of the community, get yourself out in the community, go out into the community and see what the needs are, we know the needs are there. But we're not going to discover what we are, if we're sitting around the luncheon table at the golf club, or whatever it is a Rotary Club does, let's go out and be in the community.

David McPherson:

Yeah, one of the things that we can do, one of the things that any club can do to have a greater impact in their community, is to establish a new club. Now, I don't believe that there's any community in the country that is too small to support a new club, because now, Rotary clubs can be focused on any particular area that you like. So what I'm talking about essentially is called BASS clubs. So, you can establish a rotary club with a focus to save for example, raise, raise money, or then support the local hospital or you can establish a rotary club with a focus to support the aged care facility in your town. Or you can have a rotary club which is focused on the environment, for example. So you can have a Rotary Club, which is got a particular aim or take your particular focus. And that's going to attract a different demographic of people forming a resurrect club, for example, this, that small club that I was telling you about with 14 members, well, in that that town, had a population of about I think it was about 5000 people. And in that town, there were three service clubs. There was a Lions Club, which was a lot bigger than the Rotary Club, there was a Apex club now I don't think you guys have Apex over there. Apex is primarily an Australian invention, but it's focused on young people under the age of 45. Now, you can have rotary clubs with similar sorts of focuses, you know, on different age groups, or the apex Club was focused primarily on farmers. So the majority of the people that they had in their club were farmers, and they didn't meet they didn't meet. They only had about three for projects each year, that are big projects, and they raised a lot of money, and they put a lot of money into the community that, but they didn't bother or that, you know, sitting around the table, drinking wine and having a meal and talking about rubbish. Deed stuff

Peter Tonge:

Sounds like farmers, right? Where are they going to find time to sit down and have lunch.

David McPherson:

Exactly. So you can have in Rotary nowadays, you can have all sorts of different style Rotary Clubs. And that's the way you're going to increase your impact in your community.

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Peter Tonge:

Now something that's happening in certainly in North America is sort of the rise of virtual Rotary Clubs. is the same thing happening in Australia.

David McPherson:

Yes, it is. Yeah. We've got a provisional club in the process of forming at the moment called the International positive peace club. And they've got members, one in Uganda, and another couple around Australia, of course, that there are a couple of overseas members already. And I think one in Great Britain, I think anyway, yeah, they still haven't fought, they still haven't up there required 20 members to be to be a full club, but and therefore be chartered. They're well on their way to doing it now that they are meeting virtually. Now we also have Rotex, which is Rotary Youth Exchange X, Rotary Youth Exchange students. I think our club was probably the second one formed in the world, I think, in our district. And anyway, they meet virtually. And same with a rotary club, we've only got one Rotary Club in our district, but we're about perform another two, I believe. So we, they meet both in person and virtually. So yeah, the rise of virtual clubs as an option is, is on the interest. Now, there's one club that I'm actually visiting in about 10 days time, they at every meeting, have a virtual option as well. So they have an in person meeting. But anybody who doesn't want to go go along for whatever reason, you know, that that might be up north hanging holiday in Queensland or something or just can't be bothered, they can dial in, and still the president on the day, so that's called a hybrid meeting. So

Peter Tonge:

That's how my Rotary club meets. We started that during COVID. And we're going to continue it and I'm one of the people that when we talked about the wintertime winter, when it's cold and snowy and icy, I zoom into my Rotary club because I would rather be in a warm place.

David McPherson:

I don't blame you.

Peter Tonge:

Yeah, I love the hybrid model, we use it often. Now, this might be an unfair question, but I'm going I'm gonna ask it anyway. If you could accomplish one thing during your District Governor year, what would you like it to be?

David McPherson:

Right. Well, You want to one the only one? Sure.

Peter Tonge:

I didn't want to give me your top six. I really didn't think that was fair.

David McPherson:

Oh, well. The what we've just talked about is establishing new clubs now. We had a we had a district assembly in April where we had a a new new style clubs workshop. And we had about 65 people attend that workshop and that workshop, identified seven new clubs across our district that would that people would like to perform they bond groups, and they came up with all of the things that they need to do in order to establish each one of those seven clubs. So they settled there. And then they then in the, we've got in the process of forming, we've got about another four rotary clubs that are proposed or or about to form. And, and so there's 11 clubs. So if we can get if we can get 11 clubs happening in our district this year, what an impact that would have in our community, you know, with, we've seen just this in the last 12 months, there was another town with 10,000 people, there was, there was a rotary club that was there. Now a new new club decided to form now they charted with 36 members. Now, in that town of 10,000. People, there are two rotary clubs, and 70. rotaries that rotary members remembered, that is just phenomenal. And it also has a Lions Club as well in that town. So you know, it can be done, it can be done, as we increase our input.

Peter Tonge:

Tell me a little bit more about this gathering of 75 people, I assumed someone Rotarians and some weren't Rotarians? Where did people come from? And how are they found and that kind of thing, because I think this is a brilliant idea for a group of people together to decide what they want to do.

David McPherson:

So at the district assembly, you're talking about, yeah, that they're all Rotarians. Okay? Because that was the district assembly was, was, you know, a training session for incoming board members, essentially. And so you get all Rotarians, but they all had identified, they all knew their local communities, they knew the people in their local communities. And so they, and because they were also in their own local Rotary Club, they knew the things perhaps that, that weren't being realized within the club that they saw as an opportunity to, to establish something new. Yeah, you know, and also, what one of the things that, that I'd like to achieve is the every member in every club is was able to realize their passion for rotary, you know, whatever the passion, you know, if somebody has a passion for helping homelessness, for example, then then if, if that person was able to, to establish a program to do that, and, you know, form a little committee or whatever, and get the other members to give them a hand, they're not members. enjoyment of being a Rotarian is just gonna be through the roof. And so they're more likely to stay a member because we're in Rotary at the moment, we have a problem with people leaving, you know, they come into our organization, and they, and they had a lot of leave within the first three years, you know, we, we lose more members in Rotary than what we bring in.

Peter Tonge:

Because we fail to ignite their passions when they come in the door.

David McPherson:

Exactly, exactly. You know, we always we always ask them, Well, why are you leaving? What what's gone wrong? Like they go on? Yeah. Ask them when they come into the organization. What would you like to achieve? What's your passion? In you know, what brought you to rotary? What decided here to become a member? And then we need to go about realizing that passion for every member of every club.

Peter Tonge:

Absolutely. And then you have a very happy member for a long period of time. Absolutely.

David McPherson:

I suppose. One of the things that pass district governors tell you is that they spend a lot of time dealing with conflicts in clubs and and by Basically, I think, you know, care and compassion and fairness to all is something which we need to get through to, to everybody in rotary is that, you know, if you if you're gonna have that controversial discussion in your club about, you know, how much the meal costs and what, whether they, whether they serve the right sort of food or whatever, then have it respect, have a respectful conversation, you know, respect everybody's opinion, let everybody voice their opinion. And, and then when you come to an agreement on something, agree on it, and move forward. Don't then backstab and criticize and carry on, because that happens more often than what you would believe. And it's something which we need to not having Rotary, we need to have people that because friendship and fellowship in rotary is what one of the biggest things that brings people to Rotary has the friendship and fellowship that rotary offers, you know, it's the promise of hands on service to their community, but it's also the friendship and fellowship that they get from their fellow rotary members that they're the big things that we offer, you know, as I should, and leadership opportunities to,

Peter Tonge:

I agree, and one of the things that I've heard this in, in several forms of one of the things I've heard often is, you know, you you bring together, passion and friendship, and that's where you create magic. And that's how he moves forward. And I think this is very important, too. But yes, it's very, it's very important to, to believe in whatever project you want to work on, or what you wrote in the past it is, but when you do it with a group of friends, it makes it that much easier, and that much more meaningful.

David McPherson:

Yeah, and, you know, one of the best ways to bring new members into your club, into your organization into rotary is by inviting them along to a service project. Too often, we invite new members along to a boring old meeting, you know, where they have a boring district governor talking about boring stuff that is going absolutely no interest to, to a new potential member. So if you invite them along to a service project, where they're actually doing the stuff that rotary says that it does, and where all your mates are there, and they were all having fun doing it. So they, they get an opportunity to serve their community, they'd have fun doing it. And then more likely, then to say, Yeah, this is an organization, this is a club that I want to be involved in. So you know, invite them along to a service production. Don't invite them along when you got to boring desks that.

Peter Tonge:

Absolutely. And here's that I have, I have a friend, who is now the past president of the Rotary Club in Plano, Texas. And that's exactly what they do. They don't go out and look for members, they go and look for volunteers to work on service projects. out and out through the service projects. In in a large majority of time, they end up becoming a member of the Rotary Club, because they want to do more of this work. And they do. They do the last time we spoke to, they were doing on average, seven projects a month. Sometimes our project was three Rotarians and a volunteer going out and serving meals, that is cool. But it was getting people involved. And it's been very successful for them. Because as you say, it's, it's let's get people doing what we do rather than sitting with us and talking about what we might do.

David McPherson:

Exactly. Exactly.

Peter Tonge:

It's been it's been very, very successful for them. So that's one of the things that I'm trying to do in my own role really, is to get people to come along to work with us. Right and that's also how you make a club more diverse. You want to close with the more diverse the diverse community and meet people. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So David, I only have one standard question in my podcast and I'll ask it to you now. You could be spending your time energy and money on many organizations wide Rotary.

David McPherson:

Well, you know like what I what I said earlier on was that, you know, I competed in Paralympics when I was a lot younger. And what was back in those days, you didn't get any, any, you know, funding from any government or other organization, you have to actually raise the money yourself to go overseas. And so, Rotary, and lions and Apex and any other number of community service organizations helped me out with that day, you know, held events, and they handed me over a check. And, and so I was very grateful to these organizations to, to do that for me, and allow me to compete in those, those competitions. So when I was able to, I said, right out, I'm going to give back to the community that's given to me. So you know, I joined rotary wrapped up, you know, before that, when I was growing up, I was in scouts and Venturers. And so I had that, that community service aspect in my growing up years, and then I joined row direct. And after a couple of years, I jumped ship and went over to Leo's, which is the lions equivalent to rhetoric, then, then I jumped out of that went on leave town and enjoying what I mentioned, Apex, which is, a younger organization in Australia is pretty much a homegrown thing. That it's made up of younger people under the age of 45. So I was in there up until 45. And by that stage, I had a young family, my, my kids were about five years old at that stage. So I thought I'll give him I'll have a bit of a break from community service for a while. But enough with making fairy floss that the the local shows, and stuff like that, and selling raffle tickets. And so I had a bit of a break. And then one day I was buying a newspaper in a Knight of mine, who was in rotary said, and he was also in APEX as well. And when he was alive member, and I was a lifetime member of apex. And so he said, Why aren't you in Rotary? And nobody's asked me, Gary. The rest is history. Yeah. So I joined Rotary. And, you know, it was, it was after a couple of years, and I was, you know, a leading up to the president of the local club. That, that I went along to my first district event. And my art Allah, I was blown away. Because rotary is so so much more than what happens within the 60 Kilometer zone around the Milliken. Yeah, it's so much more. The the wide world of Rotary has got so much to offer every one of us. And you know, so I can't necessarily go and build fences or learning how to plant trees, necessarily, but I can help out in this sort of a role. You know, so I'm putting back as much as I can into not only my local community, but bigger, wider rotary world. And so that's why I mean, Rotary is because I'm putting back into the community that they gave me so much earlier.

Peter Tonge:

Well, said and 40 years later, you're still giving back. Yeah. How can we prior to that, Yuri, thank you so much. This has been a wonderful conversation.

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