A market approach to reduce fluctuation and encourage hosting.
A few years ago, there was some frustration in CISV international about the fluctuation of CISV hosting. Many chapters in the world seem to be hosting according to their individual pattern (every year, every second year, every three years), which then through overlaying lead to quite some differences from one year to another. (In physics, I think this is called Interference). On the chapter level, fluctuation results in having a lack of invitations in one year, which leads to less promotion, when in the following year, it's hard to fill the empty spaces. On the international level, it's mainly a financial problem, since the participation fees are our main source of income. While the expenditures for AIM and IO stay mostly the same every year, the amount of collected fees varies quite a bit.
Enter the Global Hosting Plan: Since 2004 the responsibility is given to the regions to align the chapters hosting patterns in order to reduce fluctuation. Let's take a look at hosting numbers to see what we are talking about:
(You may get the impression, that the number of programmes have grown enourmously over this time period, but the "total"-curve's upward trend is mostly a result of lack of Youth-meeting data before 2003)
Check out the big "Tsunami wave" around 1996-1998 in village hosting, which we have been able to avoid happening again, Whether the Global Hosting Plan will help to even the curves out even more, the future will have to tell. It seems like there is a bit of flattening from 2008 on. Is this a good thing?
Even if the Global Hosting Plan seems a reasonable solution, it dose remind me of central planning, communist style: I can remember the GDR publishing big "5-year-plans" on where their economy should develop. However, none of the economies in Eastern Europe managed to get anywhere with this approach before they turned towards market economy.
What also strikes me as odd, is that at this years AIM we are introducing new hospitality points and hosting fees to encourage hosting, which is more of an incentive system than a planned system: How does that go in line with the Global Hosting Plan, that actively discourages some NAs from hosting certain programmes?
It doesn't. And that's why it should be scrapped. Yes, let's get rid of an attempt to plan ahead in time what to host. Because it won't work. Instead, let's try to come up with something like a free market system, that will encourage to host, especially in years, where others won't.
A few years ago, there was some frustration in CISV international about the fluctuation of CISV hosting. Many chapters in the world seem to be hosting according to their individual pattern (every year, every second year, every three years), which then through overlaying lead to quite some differences from one year to another. (In physics, I think this is called Interference). On the chapter level, fluctuation results in having a lack of invitations in one year, which leads to less promotion, when in the following year, it's hard to fill the empty spaces. On the international level, it's mainly a financial problem, since the participation fees are our main source of income. While the expenditures for AIM and IO stay mostly the same every year, the amount of collected fees varies quite a bit.
Enter the Global Hosting Plan: Since 2004 the responsibility is given to the regions to align the chapters hosting patterns in order to reduce fluctuation. Let's take a look at hosting numbers to see what we are talking about:
(You may get the impression, that the number of programmes have grown enourmously over this time period, but the "total"-curve's upward trend is mostly a result of lack of Youth-meeting data before 2003)
Check out the big "Tsunami wave" around 1996-1998 in village hosting, which we have been able to avoid happening again, Whether the Global Hosting Plan will help to even the curves out even more, the future will have to tell. It seems like there is a bit of flattening from 2008 on. Is this a good thing?
Even if the Global Hosting Plan seems a reasonable solution, it dose remind me of central planning, communist style: I can remember the GDR publishing big "5-year-plans" on where their economy should develop. However, none of the economies in Eastern Europe managed to get anywhere with this approach before they turned towards market economy.
What also strikes me as odd, is that at this years AIM we are introducing new hospitality points and hosting fees to encourage hosting, which is more of an incentive system than a planned system: How does that go in line with the Global Hosting Plan, that actively discourages some NAs from hosting certain programmes?
It doesn't. And that's why it should be scrapped. Yes, let's get rid of an attempt to plan ahead in time what to host. Because it won't work. Instead, let's try to come up with something like a free market system, that will encourage to host, especially in years, where others won't.
Here's a few ideas how:
- Give away hospitality points (or host fees) according to the number of programmes hosted. If 10 NAs host Seminar Camps in 2010, they get to split up the pool of hospitality points among them. Then, if 20 NAs host Seminar Camps in 2011, they'll only receive half of the points. Maybe some NA will consider changing their plans.
- Give away hospitality points for camps hosted in the future: let's say, Germany wants to send more Youth Meeting delegations this year (e.g. because they have tons of applicants), they can try to squeeze in another Youth Meeting in the future.
- The most radical concept would be to create a "stock-market" of camp invitations: Let's create a website were invitations can be traded freely: Chapter Darmstadt wants to host a village in 2014: Which chapter wants to participate? And how much are they willing to contribute to the cost of hosting? This system could not only favour countries that manage to host cheaply, but also those with good airline connections, reducing the overall costs of our camps. Furthermore, the system would "learn", which dates, locations are better than others. Finally, if camp evaluations were transparent, chapters could financially profit from hosting good quality camps.
Don't get me wrong, I am a fan of the new system of standardized host fees, hospitality points and penalties. And it does appear a bit obnoxious to complain about a system that was just introduced. But sttill, let's be brave and think ahead in time.
- Give away hospitality points (or host fees) according to the number of programmes hosted. If 10 NAs host Seminar Camps in 2010, they get to split up the pool of hospitality points among them. Then, if 20 NAs host Seminar Camps in 2011, they'll only receive half of the points. Maybe some NA will consider changing their plans.
- Give away hospitality points for camps hosted in the future: let's say, Germany wants to send more Youth Meeting delegations this year (e.g. because they have tons of applicants), they can try to squeeze in another Youth Meeting in the future.
- The most radical concept would be to create a "stock-market" of camp invitations: Let's create a website were invitations can be traded freely: Chapter Darmstadt wants to host a village in 2014: Which chapter wants to participate? And how much are they willing to contribute to the cost of hosting? This system could not only favour countries that manage to host cheaply, but also those with good airline connections, reducing the overall costs of our camps. Furthermore, the system would "learn", which dates, locations are better than others. Finally, if camp evaluations were transparent, chapters could financially profit from hosting good quality camps.
Don't get me wrong, I am a fan of the new system of standardized host fees, hospitality points and penalties. And it does appear a bit obnoxious to complain about a system that was just introduced. But sttill, let's be brave and think ahead in time.
Very interesting point. These days I'm reading a lot about markets and the capitalist theory. It does make sense, but at the same time does every piece of it really fit it in our context?
This is definitely something to look into, at least on the point systems. The "village stock market" even if it makes very sense on some point of view, is still hard to picture.
since u were talking about the eastern european countries that used to have a planned economy, after free market was introduced to them their economy crashed more than they could ever imagine during communism,
in asia on the other hand economies grow enormously in my opinion because they didnt open their markets all together but had restrictions on import and thesort...
where im going with this is, that a capitalist approach to camphostingplanning may sound like a good solution at first, i think in the long run many countries will be left behind and camphosting will be, as well as participation, mostly centered in europe...
or every continent will have their own camps... which sounds interesting actually... but nevermind
so in conclusion such a camp-market could work if there are certain restrictions on big cisv-nations entering the market so that smaller nas are in favour or at least have a chance to compete
participation should be made fair in a way, but still should keep up quality and keep down cost... interesting topic indeed
@Paul - point taken: I agree that capitalist Eastern Europe isn't such a great example, and I also agree that the stock market system might favour big European NAs.
The more I think of the issue of creating incentives for chapters to host programmes, I really believe we are just at the beginning of the process.
- Shouldn't our philosophy alone be the strongest motivator for people to volunteer and host and host and host? And if not, is our philosophy not good enough? (This leads to the often discussed Why don't we work like Al Quaeida-question, discussed on Devils before)
- Our current system assumes that chapters want to send as many participants as possible, but don't want to host, mostly for financial reasons. But I guess it's more complicated than that. Shouldn't we do some more research in what makes (or prevents) chapters from hosting more?
- If we do endeavour into an incentive system, maybe some experts in Game Theory could help us figure a better way. Maybe this could be a project for an economics grad student.
- I do think our hospitality point system should keep a back door open to tweak the points rewarded for hosting in a way to steer the organisation towards a certain direction: More points in "bad years", more points for "weak programmes", etc.
Any other thoughts?
The most challenging part of our hospitality system is that it must balance each year; participation space in each activity is a fresh goods; it is either consumed or it is lost. Giving out more points that what is offered means that somebody will not be able to spend their points. (Something commonly occuring in Eastern Europe during communism... people had money but nothing to buy.) This clearly limits creative solutions. What could be fun would be a market-add-on; remove the "free" delegations used to fill up camps; and rather have countries buy them from others in an auction. :)
Regarding the market model as such; I think it would favour Eastern Europe quite significantly. In business we see the trend to outsource where costs are lower. In IT distance does not really matter... in CISV travel cost does, hence a balance of cheap-but-nearby is important. Lower cost of hosting, safe environment, and low cost of travel for a majority of the participants. Sounds like a winner to me.
Other winners are those that are still good at fundraising; some chapters simply get the money they need when they need it. They, too, could offer cheap camps.
The loosers; high-cost and long (average) distance. This could be Australia, New Zealand and the likes...