Asuncion: Campain Inc.

QUESTION: Hi, Mr. A! After being involved in several political campaigns in the past, I am now tasked to manage my brother's campaign for the coming 2010 local elections. I may have some direct experience but I feel that I am not that confident yet to really set up and oversee the campaign myself. I need advice from experts like you on how campaign management should be done, what best approach I could use. Since it's my brother's first attempt to join the local political race, I would really need help on how to increase my brother's chances of winning the elections. Your column has been helping me a lot. Thank you very much!

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- Mr. Campaign Manager of Baguio City

PERSONAPOWER: Dear Mr. Campaign Manager, your brother as well as his supporters feel that you are the best person who could efficiently run his campaign. With pride and confidence, take the opportunity, prepare for it well, and deliver effectively. There are a lot of things I want to share to you about this subject matter but, allow me instead to share to you the very basic thing that any campaign manager should bear in mind as he starts his gigantic task of campaign management.

Just like most, if not all, campaigns in the world, your brother's decision to run for public office and pursue his campaign, most likely, started with a couple of his friends around chatting with him over dinner or with a couple of beer bottles in front of them. While this may be the way campaigns start, they should not stay that way for long. A lot of candidates believe that the best way to run a campaign is to get some friends involved and the campaign will fall into place on its own. While some of these types of local campaigns win, most of them lose. In order to succeed, every campaign, even the most local, must take a BUSINESS-LIKE APPROACH to winning the elections.

Start with a PLAN. Most successful businesses do...before doing anything else, businessmen start writing down their Business Plans first. The same is true of most successful campaigns. Before the first hand is shook or the first area visited, a local campaign must sit down and figure out the surest path to victory. At the very least, the plan must include a Budget (how much funds will your campaign need?) a Fundraising Plan (how will your money be raised?) a Voter Contact Strategy (how will you reach the voters?) and a Get-Out-The-Vote (GOTV) Strategy (how will you get those voters to the polls?).

It's not enough that a business knows what it wants to do - it must also figure out a way to get there. For any company to succeed, it must both see the BIG PICTURE (what is our ultimate goal? what do we want to do?) and simultaneously see the SMALL PICTURE (what exactly needs to be done to get there? what are the steps? Who will carry them out?).

Most campaigns, unfortunately, fail to grasp this concept. Too often, the candidate sees only the big picture while, just as often, the campaign staff, volunteers, and consultants see only the small picture.

The key to campaign success is to merge both the big picture and the small picture - to be able to see where you are going, and how you'll get there. If your brother, being the candidate, cannot see both simultaneously, then it is imperative that you as the Campaign Manager should see it.

Despite what you've heard about new corporate concepts and practices, companies don't succeed without HIERARCHY and DEFINITION. Every successful business requires both hierarchy and definition. Campaigns also need the same. Even if the campaign structure is mostly volunteers, and is "loose", people should still know exactly what they are required to do and who they report to.

Campaigns should start as an informal idea amongst the candidate and his closest supporters. But as soon as the candidate is serious about running for office, the campaign must take a business-like approach.

The campaign must plan its activities well in advance, see the goal and know how to get there, and define roles within the campaign. By following the corporate model, campaigns can introduce a level of efficiency that "unstructured" campaigns simply can't compete with.

Having such basic framework in mind as you commence your campaign work can make the big difference. Everything else will find its place as long as you have done the ground work. Goodluck on your campaign! Enjoy the experience!