Signature Projects
6 January 2003

One of the first questions new friends or acquaintance asked me when they learnt that I am a Rotarian is, "Which club do you come from?" This would invariably be followed by questions on the sort of community projects that our club has been pursuing. Sometimes I drew a blank, not because I had not been following what the club had been doing or trying to do, nor because the club had not been doing anything, and nor because I felt the projects were not worth mentioning. I was trying to name a project or projects that would leave an impression on my friends about the sort of club to which I belonged, so that they would remember what we were by what we did or tried to do, and hopefully would visit us again and perhaps join the club as members.

It is at such times I feel the club or the district could perhaps do more or better in public relations and brand building.

For a number of years now, RI leadership had reminded clubs and districts the importance of PR, not for its own sake, but because PR is an effective tool to spread the messages embodied in Rotary and the ideal of service it seeks to promote. One would like to believe that we are making progress, but by any standard, progress has not been significant.

Now, people remember best when they see real action. Perhaps they would remember us better if we have more signature projects and if our members can discuss them fully and intelligibly with others. At the RI level, PolioPlus would be an ideal example of a signature project, which is why it is make or break for Rotary to succeed with the pledge to eradicate Polio from the face of the Earth.

At the District level, these are few and far between, until recently. The recently announced Hepatitis B Project which seeks to immunize 1 million new born babies in China with the Hepatitis B vaccine over the next 10 years is a good and meaningful signature project and for which we would be remembered.

Similarly, at the club level, many clubs have developed good projects, such as Admiralty's Outstanding Disabled Persons Awards which held the last award presentation over the last weekend in Guangzhou, to name just one. But the important thing is that these projects must be sustainable and more importantly relevant to the community, which is why clubs should develop mechanisms to map out long range strategies. This is what continuity is all about.