As noted from the email, I have moved the discussion to the board. If you can help in any way to help with the change or ways to ease us over to the board, then it would be very prudent to discuss and suggest ways of which we can succeed. If you respond here then there is no need to duplicate and send to my personal email. Thanks so much!

Here is the original email posted 04/14/08:

Hi everyone, I thought I would go ahead and send you submission 2 of my homework requirement on change. As you recall hopefully, I am using this particular email list as the basis for the assignment as a part of my class on Implementing Change. I received another 100 as a grade but please know that I feel compelled to focus on our group at God’s calling, not my own and it is for the love of everyone that I wish to see us all succeed in our mission together. I will need to prepare my submission 3 portion which entails the actual plans for implementing the change through: change intervention, planning the implementation, actually implement the change, and then evaluate how well we did on implementation. I will need to discuss recommended solutions, the role of all participants, develop a new diagram if need be and how any expected resistance will be managed. If you would like to email me offline (not via the webmail list) with suggestions on these things, then please know that I am all ears for suggestions. I do believe that this is an important thing that we need to try to do. I’m not sure if any of you caught any of the comments from Ray, I know he doesn’t speak much, but there are a number of our discussions which should occur on the website and not via our email list. I realize that we hold it very dear to our hearts, but there are better more practical ways of handling things and we need to adjust. We need to help take a load off of Ray from having to pass along our emails and he wouldn’t need to do this if we used the board for its intended purpose. The best part about using the board, it captures (histories) our conversations where some people might just delete the emails and never read them. We know from the board that we can do searches for certain topics and it is much easier to do than what we might think. If any of you believe you have difficulty in maneuvering through the website, please let me know and I would be happy to help walk you through it. I do anticipate a need for more moderator help in the website so this is something that we need to consider as to “who” might be appropriate to help fulfill this role – kind of like shift work on the board. Most new people only find out about the email list from doing a websearch about prophecy like I did so it is imperative that we focus on utilizing what has been established. If we don’t learn it and migrate to it now, then are we to only start using it when we “have to?” Let us get the learning curve out of the way and help more young baby Christians in their walk, let us do it out of love if for no other reason. I pray you all hear what I am saying,
Your fellow servant in Christ,
Eva
PS - Anyway, please consider what I have written below and hopefully it will help guide us in our next steps. Please understand too that these are my perceptions from the various emails and comments or trends throughout the list. I mean it all from as an objective standpoint as possible to drive the need for change. Please do not take anything personal, as it is not intended to be personal, it was an assignment and one I believe that we need to work on together as a united force. Again, if you have any comments intended for me personally in regards to our next steps, then please send it personally and not to the list. If it is something that we as a list ought to consider then we need to take it to the discussion board and I would be more than happy to transfer it over to the website. In fact, as soon as I get back from picking up our son from school, I will add this whole thing to the discussion board for discussion. I love you all and I am praying for everyone to see the wisdom in change.


Submission 2 – Email List
A. Step 1 – “Recognize the Need for Change” - Examples from email recipients who commented on my submission to the group
1. “…but it is dragging on and needlessly taking up his precious time. Could it be moved to a format like (sic website) (for those who can get on it). Can the emails then be freed up for prayers, Praise reports, encouragement, of the brethren, healing of misunderstandings etc. That way the long discussions on fine points of scripture can be dealt with in the correct place, and he can have more time to do the Lord's work. People also will not find their email clogged with topics that they may not be interested in.
2. one of three e-mails from the list (in regards to Submission 1 that I posted to the group for their consideration) I kept from deleting today using Gods hand to choose those I kept. I don't know if I can keep up with the volume of e-mails anymore.
3. From the middle person or forwarder of the emails to the group - So if you have a email you want sent out to the list please send it before Sat 22, 2008. God bless you all and have a happy Easter.
4. Granted these are but a few emails, the message is pretty clear that there is a need for change and as the email list continues to grow, then this will continue to be a problem for many people especially those who are on dial-up internet access for their email.
5. This table represents the amount of volume in a 2+ week timeframe with a synopsis of email volume for a 45-day period.
Email statistics

Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday
wk Mar 30-Apr 5 29 14 43
wk Mar 23-29 5 20 5 12 7 2 12 63
wk Mar 16-22 22 23 33 28 19 17 7 149
Total 56 57 38 40 26 19 19 255

Avg 19 19 19 20 13 9.5 9.5 15.52



Not all emails sent so far as the day is not complete
On avg, all emails have been counted however there may be a couple which might have been deleted.

From Feb 15, 08 - today, there have been approximately 776 emails in a 45 day time frame.
On avg, this is 17.25 emails per day for each list member.

Websites Domain Names Videos
125 350 200



B. Step 2 – Establish Goals for Change and Diagnose the Relevant Variables
1. Goals for change should be the following:
a. Reduce email volume in a way that continues to promote the “family” feeling without offending anyone of the change.
b. Kindly sway, or nudge, the email members to post their issues, questions, etc. on the website in such a way as that it does not disrupt communication but rather enhances the traffic since most new users usually find the website first and then ask to join the email list.
c. Free time from the moderator of the email list to focus more on their work which might have more priority or urgency.
d. As a result of the change, a continued goal would be additional members to the list on the website who wish to actively participate or at least read the communications so as to learn about being a Believer.
e. More goals may be discovered during the process and can be amended as necessary.
C. Variables
1. The numbers of emails per day in processing historically, which will not be included in the statistical portion, seem to slow down during the weekends and especially during American holidays where people gather with family and are not hooked into their computers constantly.
2. With reading through the emails, some emails stimulate more communication than others depending upon the subject such as asking a question and people offering their wisdom/discernment on the subject at hand.
3. More prayer requests seem to be coming through the email list, some of who are new to the list because they found the website. Not seeing much activity within the website, they most likely contacted the owner who added them to the email list.
4. Creatures of comfort, the people on the list are finally bonding on the list and like creatures of comfort, they do not take change well. They seem to recognize the need for it but it is not enough to make them want to change venue. The occurrence of disconnect about certain topics or language has led some email members to leave the list. This variable then concentrates on not so much as what is said, but how it is said, the tone of the typing, the knowledge of the writer using a language conversion program or even in the skill of using English as an additional language.
5. There are no guarantees that all members on the list are on it for the same purpose i.e. education, prayer assistance, support. Some who belong on the list may be there for dissension or for subversive reasons as is any open forum type of email list on the internet.
6. Another goal for change may be to give a trial run, sort of like a vacation for the moderator, which would in some ways “force” the users to resort to communication through the website. As this trial run is in action, identify any issues which arise needing address for future permanent change inclusion.
D. Processes
The diagram below indicates the intricate involvement with the moderator in sending out various emails, contact with new email subscribers who also usually join the website. The extra circles by the emails represent the quantity of emails.


E. Analysis
1. As stated from Submission 1, the reasoning for change lies in the fact that the users, though finally getting more comfortable with communicating with each other are also doing so more frequently depending upon the subject matter/discussion at hand.
2. The moderator would have more free time to pursue other duties as necessary but if these email duties were neglected then the purpose in setting up the email list in the first place would be lost and the mission a failure.
3. The email users will need to find a reason to “want” to move to the list for whatever reason. The Easter email from the moderator indicating an absence for forwarding email did seem to slow down the volume of emails during this timeframe however, it was also a religious event and thus many members were likely occupied at the time.
4. A recent review of the website indicates an “unfriendly” or non-familial type of presence that is not present in the emails or at least has not been for a while. More oversight from the user list on a whole – semi peacekeepers within the list will need to be as strong if not stronger to move over to the website and continue the same vigilance. In fact, this may need to be done prior to the mass list moving over to the website to ensure an easy crossover.
F. Resistance
1. Those who resist change will likely be:
i. New users
ii. Previous users who do not know of the change to move over to the website
iii. Users who know of the change but do not like change
iv. Users who know of the change but cannot assimilate to the website (does not feel comfortable)
v. Users who are friendly with email usage but not in a forum
vi. Users who have email access (ie blackberry or computer) but do not operate very well in a website type atmosphere
G. Extent for need of change/Disadvantages for not Changing
1. As noted at the beginning with the quotes, there is a need for change. The extent to which this can be measured is by the volume increase in emails. The more emails which are passed through the mediator the more dire the need to change the venue for communication.
2. For those users who have a hard time sifting through the volume of emails, which can lead to disenrollment from the list (against having the volume clogging their email accounts), then this would further necessitate the need for changing venue. This may also be a disadvantage of not changing since the purpose is to share information and grow in walk with Christ at the same time. In other words, it is more proper to want to change because we do want to grow as a body rather than to have people want to leave the group for any number of reasons.
3. The moderator is likely spending much time forwarding the emails, though they are performed as a service to the list, it does take away from other duties which could be done in the interim.
4. The spreadsheet indicates that the volume of emails is steadily increasing. Servers have failed in different locations or due to subscription issues. There is no accurate quantitative count of the number of users either via email subscription or website user access.
5. To the extent that one does not know how many users there are at all is of some concern as it is difficult to analyze where the success are compared to the locations of which need more focus. There are websites for other language based users other than English which may be easier to track for web forum usage but there is no information as to how many are affiliated with the email group or whether there are other language based email groups.
6. The primary disadvantages are:
i. People tend to delete and not pay attention to the information given or discussed.
ii. The business side of the email list is potentially lacking in attention because so much attention is focused on the manual forwarding of email.
iii. Communication becomes diluted or convoluted because there are the variables which come into play. While some of the variables cannot be helped, these can be avoided to some degree.
iv. The moderator in essence is “on-call” at all times(during waking hours) to forward emails to the list. He has no so called free time to enjoy without being the one who constantly forwards the emails all the time.
v. The emails are not being preserved historically for further insight and reading in an open type format since they are only located via email if the user has so chosen to keep the emails. New users to the group do not have the ability to visit the ground that has already been covered as a group. In some instances it has caused a repeating issue unnecessarily or the person never gets answered as they should have because the emails are not available for searching.
7. Identification of all participants:
i. Moderator and potentially new moderators as needed for volume control
ii. Email recipients
iii. Posting/email writers who can be the email recipients too
iv. New or potential new users
v. IT
vi. Web forum users and the moderators for those boards
vii. God (last but certainly not least)