Political Campaign
As the political campaign manager for Oprah’s Presidential campaign in 2012, I follow the five basic management functions: planning, leading, organizing, control, and staffing. Each of those functions will be important roles to the different divisions I have created. The staff and volunteers that will help the campaign are hard working people that enjoy working, have self-control and are trustworthy, like Theory Y people. All decision-makings will be a team effort. Meaning each department is able to have a say so we can find the best solution. The department consists of scheduling, field, finance, communications, legal, and technology.
The people that run the department has the skills and experience to know what will work for this campaign. I trust they will do what is best for the campaign. Each department will have their own set of volunteers and their own objective to reach our goal, to win the Presidential campaign, if not at least let everyone know who Oprah is and what she stands for. The scheduling department is responsible for Oprah and her campaign to have full exposure in the public eye so the voters know who she is. The team will arrive to events before the candidate to make sure everything is in order.
As the campaign manager, I am responsible for scheduling, planning events for Oprah to attend, managing her personal and campaign schedule, and the schedules of all the coordinators. The coordinators will be in charge of their staff and volunteers. Also part of the scheduling department is event planners Nate Berkus and Peter Walsh. They are responsible for addressing Oprah’s purpose and message, in meeting formats including seminars, conferences, trade shows, executive retreats, incentive programs, golf events, and conventions (Hard). They will make sure the location, food, and people, are set to come and enjoy.
In the field department, there is Laura Berman, the organizer, Gayle King, our volunteer coordinator, and Mark Consuelos, the GOTV (Get out the vote) coordinator. Laura is responsible for organizing the jobs such as making phone calls, sponsoring a coffee or brunch, putting up yard signs, typing, mailing address envelopes, computers, distributing brochures, driving, giving rides, registering voters, etc. Gayle is responsible for recruiting volunteers. Each volunteer will “fill out a volunteer card with their name, address, ask if [they are] able to make a contribution and if not how they can help (Gray 244).
The purpose of this is to keep track of who we have volunteering and making sure they get the right recognition when the campaign is over. Gayle and Laura oversee the volunteers and make sure jobs are assigned to the right people. They both have to plan out how to distribute their good volunteers throughout the different areas and consistently check up on the volunteers, making sure work is getting done. As the coordinators, Laura and Gayle have to avoid bruising egos and prevent bad days. Mark’s job is to plan the GOTV efforts. He will work with volunteers and his team has to encourage those who have not registered to vote.
They have to explain to non-registered voters why their votes are important. Recruiting the right people is very important. Some of the traits they should have are alert to social environment, cooperative, persistent, adaptable to situations, ambitious, willing to assume responsibility, achievement oriented, energetic and dependable (Dessler 273). Once volunteers are establish, they will go through a brief orientation about our campaign and will receive a job description from the departments. They will choose which they prefer. Suze Orman will be the financial coordinator and is charge of money and fund-raising.
She has to prepare a budget and see how to get the money for each budget item. Suze will be maintaining a balance sheet of all the expenses the campaign is charging for the necessary things such as, headquarter rent, stationery and envelopes, office supplies, postage, printing of the brochures, maps, etc. She will also have to keep up with the operating budget for the departments, making sure they are staying to the budget they receive. As the financial coordinator, she has to spend as little as possible on the necessary item because more money will be needed in advertising.
Suze will also be responsible for raising the money, but she won’t do it herself. Under her will be Jean Chatzky, the fund-raiser coordinator, who will work with Nate and Peter, the event planners, to plain a fund-raising event. The fund-raising event would be a high-priced sit-down dinner with Oprah. Another fund-raising technique it to send out e-mail messages to potential donors asking for money. The volunteers will be asked that for every event they work, to ask for donations. Every cent will make a difference. The communications department oversees both the press relations and advertising.
They are responsible getting out the campaign’s message and image. Press releases, advertisements, phone scripts, mailing list, and other forms of communication have to go through this department before they are released to the public. People working in this department include press secretary, who monitors the media, manage the campaign’s relations with the press, set up interviews between the candidate and reporters, brief the press at press conferences, and perform tasks that involves in press relations (“Campaign Staff Training and Jobs”).
Another person working in the department is Marianne Williamson, the rapid response director, who makes sure that the campaign responds quickly to the attacks from the other campaigns. The staff constantly monitors the media and the moves of their opponents, making sure that attacks are rebutted quickly. There are two other people part of this department, the political consultants and the professional speech writers. The political consultants will advice Oprah throughout her campaign when she needs it. The speechwriters are there to help Oprah give a great speech from her and not from someone else.
Volunteers will be making, folding, and sending out letters, making signs and posting them everywhere and they will also be making many phone calls to the general public. The legal and technology department are self-explanatory departments that requires many staff members. The legal department will have dozens of lawyers and treasurers making sure that the campaign’s activities are consistent with the law and also make sure that the campaign files have the appropriate forms with government authorities. They are also responsible for tracking the finances, such as bank reconciliations, loans and donations (“Campaign Staff Training and Jobs”).
The technology department has armies of computer professionals spread throughout state or country handling the website’s designs and maintains the campaign technology such as Voter File, blogs, and databases. They will oversee the online forums, and help create “buzz” worthy news about Oprah. As Oprah’s Presidential campaign manager, I work with all five departments to make sure we get out Oprah’s message across America. I am a participative leader with an authoritative and democratic style, because I believe that problems should be solve with everyone who is involve.
Making sure everyone is staying to the plan and creating a great team with 100% participation and communication with each other. You could say I follow the situational leadership model. It is not just I who will be affected but also everyone who worked hard to get to where we will be. Each department interlace with one another. Not one department is left alone to do all the work. The departments are divided into a smaller area to create a flat organization. Everyone who is part of this campaign has their own skills that will have a great effort on one another. With the help of the many volunteers, I believe we will have a successful campaign.
