On the role of CoCo leadership
The thing about election days is that every single one of them matters. Even the little ones. Like here in the U.S. this November - it's an odd-numbered year, so we're not electing a new president or a new Congress, but there are still matters of real consequence on the ballot nationwide. Every gubernatorial race, every mayoral one, every ballot referendum, it all makes a difference, be it big or small. Each little piece of the democratic puzzle carries its own importance.
The same is true for CoCo elections. Just like the U.S., we elect new leadership every November, dating back to 2020 when we first built out our governance structure with a board of directors and an executive director at the top. Over the years, we've had 12 different people sit on our board for a year or more - you can check out our leadership page to read through the complete history of who's served and when. And next week, our election cycle gets underway for the sixth time.
So I thought now would make the perfect time to explore - why does CoCo leadership matter, anyway? What do our board of directors and our executive director actually do? What role do we play in shaping the future of the CoCo and the future of Scrabble?
While I don't have all the answers to such questions, I can definitely give a little bit of perspective. Being one of the two individuals who have served on our board for the entire run since 2020 (shout out to the other one, Peter Armstrong), I can give a little bit of historical context around what our team has worked on so far and what we hope to accomplish in the future.
First and foremost, the board's job is to determine a long-term vision for the organization and set out to make that vision a reality. According to our mission statement, our aims are to become the premier Scrabble organization for players in North America, to build a network of directors and tournaments, to gain WESPA membership and cultivate relationships with the global scene, and to grow the game by attracting and retaining players. Are these the right goals for us to be pursuing? If so, then what could our organization be doing better to pursue them? If not, then how should we reorient our focus? These are the types of big-picture questions that our board members grapple with.
We also work on tournament strategy. At the risk of stating the obvious, the bread and butter of any Scrabble organization are the actual Scrabble tournaments they run. So - what events should we be running? Where should we run them? When? Who should be in charge? Who should we collaborate with? How should we go about organizing events, promoting them, and executing them? This is the stuff that keeps our organization going, and it rightly demands a great deal of our focus.
And then there's growth strategy. Our ranks currently include about 220 players and some 40-odd directors - not too shabby for a still-relatively-young organization serving a niche community. But we're always thinking about ways to expand. We're constantly looking for ways to reach new players, onboard new directors, and offer more opportunities to play Scrabble for everybody, everywhere. Our board meetings are abuzz with conversations about how best to achieve this.
Finally, there's the financial side of things. We're not a rich organization by any means, but we do have a little bit of money in the bank, and we do spend quite a bit of time talking about it. What should we do with the funds we have - save them, or invest them into the tournament scene right away? If the latter, then what's the best investment strategy? Moreover, what should we do to improve our fundraising efforts so that we have more resources to work with in the future? Our board searches for answers to all these questions and more. Much like Congress has the power of the purse in our nation's government, the CoCo board exerts its own form of financial decision-making power.
All of this stuff is important to us as an organization. It all matters. All of these little pieces have their place in the big puzzle that is the future of tournament Scrabble. And starting next week, election season gets underway, which means we start the process of putting that puzzle together all over again for 2026 and beyond.
We hope that you'll be a part of it. Whether it's by running for office yourself, engaging in civil discourse with those who do, or simply participating at the ballot box by casting your vote, we sincerely wish for everyone out there to play whatever role they can in our Scrabble democracy. The future of our game and our tournament scene depends on that.