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Our official response was:

"Our team [The Transition Team] is very careful when crafting word choice on the site. When we say “I have helped The Transition Spread the Word by referring one new website user, using the Memory Jogger.” we mean just that. If we wanted to make sure someone joined because of one of our website users Spreading the Word we would have used the word “Recruit” for that task. We would never delay an active participant knowingly, because we were making their success based off of someone else’s actions. As an organization we do not believe in “Spray and Pray” marketing where a person or group spam info all over the web and pray it brings in the right people. We believe in developing meaningful relationships that build and grow as time progresses. That’s why we have people invite people they know, like, and trust on a 1-on-1 basis and reflect on who they know personally who have values aligned with those who are part of The Transition. We know a lot of people are in the same boat as you, where other people are using you as their guinea pig to test the water and we don’t want anyone to force or feel forced to be part of our organization, that kind of system doesn’t create the better world we strive for. As long as you Spread the Word and let others know what you are up to we are happy with that. Our mission cannot thrive if our organization is stagnant. The site gets better and better as each new person like you, joins and becomes active on the site."

Our official response was:

"There are various places on the site that relate to the question you ask, but if you are anything like those of us on The Transition Team you might not find them currently in a state that satisfies what you are looking for. 

We have an Endorsements page.

Individuals or Groups leave their personal reasons for why they endorse and support the work of The Transition here.

We are collecting "I'm Part of The Transition..." videos for our Youtube channel.

Over 30 people have committed to making a video for us, only 1 has been submitted.

We have the Report Portal for individuals or BUDs to submit their progress reports.

Most reports have not been substantial enough to be considered "news worthy" (not written in article format, no photos or video submitted etc. a common complaint is that The Transition Team does not do this for the individual or group, but given our team's work load and the amount of people registered and using the site this is an extremely unreasonable expectation to have). Our user base is telling us about their "successes" (however they personally define success), during their Progression Sessions or personal conversations, but they are not then being submitted as Progress Reports. Another issue is groups that are proving to be moving along towards their goals in a productive fashion don't want to report anything officially until they have hit one of their major targets that they feel would be more "exciting" (in instances like this we miss out on posts with photos of them working doing gardening, rehab work or doing every day type tasks pertaining to their cottage industry or income producing work.), because they feel most people would not be interested.

Progress Reports are then posted in the Updates section of the site.

So far one Progress Report has been properly written, submitted and posted.

We have Case Study information for Contributors to review. 

While this is research material currently and not "successes" of current website users it demonstrates the feasibility of objectives we propose on The Transition website. In the future we hope to feature material from our actual user base, but such reports have not been submitted. We also intend to get more case studies up from our research, but given our team's work load and the needs of our active users this has not been marked as a high priority task.

Individuals can submit projects they want to start.

Most individuals who register on our site have a vision, but are currently alone. The vast majority of our user base are in the early phases gaining the skills they need to find a team and begin developing a group project.

Ultimately our site is co-created by those using it. While in the past we tried reminding people of commitments, we have found that to be ineffective for those who have not made it through the early phases and thus have not yet done personal development work. We have found that website users who have not yet made it to Phase 2 see reminders as "nagging" making them feel demotivated which does not help The Transition reach long term goals. We are continuing to do research to discover how we can help our user base adapt a mindset of radical responsibility that helps them see the larger vision that our organization is working towards. The more people use the site and are active on Your Action Plan the better it gets!"

Our response is: Our team is very careful when crafting word choice on the site. When the tasks says“I have helped The Transition Spread the Word by referring one new website user, using the Memory Jogger.” we mean just that. If we wanted to make sure someone joined because of one of our website users Spreading the Word we would have used the word “Recruit” for that task. We would never delay an active participant knowingly, because we were making their success based off of someone else’s actions. As an organization we do not believe in “Spray and Pray” marketing where a person or group spam info all over the web and pray it brings in the right people. We believe in developing meaningful relationships that build and grow as time progresses. That's why we offer Examples of Spreading the Word so our website users can see positive examples of how to bring The Transition into a conversation with their peers. That’s also why we have people invite people they know, like, and trust on a 1-on-1 basis using their referral link and give them the opportunity to reflect on who they know personally who have values aligned with those who are part of The Transition. We know a lot of individuals friends or colleagues are using them as a guinea pig to test the water and we don’t want anyone to force or feel forced to be part of our organization, that kind of system doesn’t create the better world we strive for. As long as you Spread the Word and let others know what you are up to we are happy with that. If you are talking about The Transition to other people feel free to check the box and move on to your next task on your given Phase. Our Mission cannot thrive if our organization is stagnant. The site gets better and better as each new person LIKE YOU joins and becomes active on the site.

Inspired by: The Suggestion Box

Contributors: Laura Bochinski 

Recommended Reading: Memory Jogger, Our Mission, Spread the Word