Base Building

How to Find Your People

“Every moment is an organizing opportunity, every person a potential activist, every minute a chance to change the world.” ~ Dolores Huerta

Keys to Base Building

Here are our main keys to base building:

• Use a mix of tactics to engage people where they are at (e.g., canvassing and house meetings).
• Setup a house meeting model campaign to both engage with new people and build leadership.
• Build leadership in communities by supporting neighborhood teams.

Principles of Base Building

Meet People Where They Are At

For example, Cesar Chavez was a dedicated community organizer who focused his time on meeting people where they were at (e.g., their homes). Cesar Chavez and his team talked to one person at a time, slowly recruiting people to join the union, later called the United Farm Workers of America.

Show Persistence When Recruiting

Most people need multiple visits before they commit to get involved. That means you should call, text, and follow up with them three to five times to really make sure people know you care about their involvement. 

Have a Disciplined Follow Up System 

It is easier to get people to come to one action or meeting, it is much harder to make sure they keep coming back. That is why you need to ensure you consistently and quickly follow up with people when you first meet them, and then remind them to keep showing up. It is more than an email, follow up with texts and personalized appeals.

The general guideline is to follow up with those you want to engage within 1-2 days (48 hours at the latest!).

Base Building is About Instituting Intentional Recruitment and Retention Systems 

Similar to the follow up system, remember you need to put time and energy into both recruitment and retention to build a resilient base.

Sign People Up to Become Members (Then They Will Grow Their Engagement)

Some base building organization note the importance of getting people to become dues-paying members before people even really get involved. People donate and then get more involved. 

Constantly Engage in Base Building and Invest the Time

Never stop base building, no matter what your current focus is. Recruitment, follow up (multiple times), and development all are very time intensive so you need to make sure you are setting aside enough time to do it well. 

Setup Weekly One-On-One Meetings for Individuals Starting Autonomous Teams

Once you identify an interested community member and a good fit for launching a team, make sure to set up a weekly one-on-one and work through challenges and set goals. Hahrie Han in How Organizations Develop Activists notes that having weekly one-on-one calls is important to help activists address challenges, reflect on their work, and make clear action plans. 

Canvassing

Overview

Canvassing is door-to-door outreach. Ideally canvassing is focused on building meaningful connections (e.g., over a 15-20 minute conversation at the door). Avoid doing one to two-minute interactions where you are trying to “sell” an idea or cause. It should be a back-and-forth building of the relationship.

Canvassing allows you to meet people who are outside your current networks. They also allow you to be very targeted (e.g., canvassing in a specific legislator’s district to galvanize support for a particular bill).

Principles

• Listen and engage people (i.e., back and forth). Focus more on learning about their issues and letting them talk, rather than trying to share as much as you can about yourself.
• Keep track of information. Go over data entry sheets. Write down as many notes as possible about what they say (e.g., issues, how long they have lived in the neighborhood, etc.).
• Identify their level of support. If someone leans your way note it, also do the same if someone leans the other way. We are looking for their level of support. 
• Share your story. Share your Story of Self and why you are there.
• Always have an “ask.” E.g., who they are voting for, will they host a meet and greet, or sign a petition/interest form.

Tips

• Be honest if you do not know the answer to a question. 
• Offer to get back to them with answers and follow through. 
• Be respectful, use common sense and good judgment. 
• If you are not comfortable walking up to a particular home, skip it. (e.g., a fenced-in area with a dog).
• Keep It Short and Sweet (KISS Principle).
• Be authentic and relatable. People will appreciate this and be more likely to engage.
• 20% of the doors you knock on, you will actually talk to someone (e.g., if you knock on 100 doors, you will likely talk to 20 people).  
• Leave literature in the door handle or on the side of the door (never in mailbox!).

House Meetings

Overview

House meetings are gatherings at a community member’s residence where they mobilize their family, friends, neighbors, colleagues, and/or members of their faith tradition. House meetings are driven by the host’s ability to turn out people and thus serve as a good indicator of their community leadership.

Principles

• The host drives turnout. This means the organizer should work with the host a few weeks in advance to create their invite list, secure RSVPs using a combination of tactics (e.g., texting and social media), and ask their connections to help at the meeting (e.g., provide food, take on other tasks).
• Know the “story” you wish to tell. Use your public narrative and the history of the organization to build a compelling story that other people want to get involved with.
• Allow time for people to share and get to know each other. One of the best parts of house meetings is the chance for people to build relationships and group interests. 
• Host makes the ask. At the end of the meeting whether the ask is to volunteer, donate money, or host their own house meeting the host should publicly go around the room and ask attendees to state their commitment. 

Neighborhood Teams

Overview

Creating self-sufficient neighborhood teams is one of the highest levels of organizing. A neighborhood team in its ideal form is an autonomous team of volunteer leaders taking responsibility for accomplishing the goals of the organization/campaign in their area. 

Elizabeth McKenna, in the book Groundbreakers, notes this approach for the Obama campaign and how “Giving teams responsibility for outcomes gave volunteers the sense that they owned a piece of the overall strategy.” Developing neighborhood teams takes time, but can greatly expand out your capacity if done well.

Principles

• Set goals for teams (the what), but give teams autonomy/support on ways to accomplish them (the how). Teams want to know they are helping the cause so making sure they know where they are going is important, but they also want to feel like they can be creative and do their own thing. It is very helpful to give them templates, guides, and training.
• Apply best practices of effective teams. Marshall Ganz discusses the importance of snowflake structures, leadership tests for volunteers (e.g., hosting a house meeting or canvass), interdependent roles, and shared purpose.
• Foster a culture of team relationship building. Remember, teams need to stay connected to each other to grow and develop. As Groundbreakers notes the relationships with each team member help build commitment.

Give extra time to developing the team at the beginning. To get off the ground teams will need extra support from their organizer/coach, so make sure you are planning enough time and energy to make that a success.