Solfa Decides Members Can ‘Handle the Truth’ About Centralized Dues

Chief Operating Officer
Leonard J. Solfa Jr.

> When Leonard Solfa, Moose International’s longtime General Counsel and newly named Chief Operating Officer, arrived onstage to tackle the subject of “The Dilemma of Centralized Dues,” accompanied by the ominous theme from Phantom of the Opera, it drew a huge laugh and set the tone for a very serious topic, delivered in his typical tongue-in-cheek fashion.

Solfa used clips from movies and television shows to add humor to his points. He first used a clip of the courtroom battle in A Few Good Men with Jack Nicholson uttering the infamous line “You can’t handle the truth! ”, to poke fun at the adverse situation created at Moose International with last fall’s poorly handled introduction of Centralized Dues--and what “really goes on” at the backlogged call center.

“Now, I don’t want to give you the impression that every call and every response follows this format and becomes as agitated and combative as this dialogue,” Solfa said. “But--the call center is continually backed up with incoming calls making the need for swift and clear response demanding and necessary if we, as an organization, are to meet and satisfy member expectations.”

This was followed by Solfa’s account of “Bill Airey’s approach,” which Solfa said facetiously is the “warm, cuddly, feel-good approach” which he demonstrated with a clip from Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. Finally, Solfa used the classic opening monologue from Patton to illustrate his own supposed “show–no–mercy” approach.

Members were nearly rolling out of their seats with laughter when Solfa uttered, “the employees are my soldiers and the enemy is Centralized Dues.” In seriousness, though, Solfa said the issue needs to be tackled in every direction, and explained how Moose International is doing just that.

First of all, Bill Clevenger was promoted to the position of Director of a department that will, hereafter, be known as Member Services. Clevenger comes to Moose International as an outside consultant. To streamline the operation, Solfa and Clevenger divided the operation into two stand-alone departments, one for Centralized Dues processing, and one for the call center. There will be a manager in each department reporting directly to Clevenger.

Through the efforts of new Director of Information Systems Eric Vonhoff and his staff, improvements to computer hardware and software, and the old backlogged calls are being whittled away, he said.
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“A faster system, additional employees, new management and dedicated departments--is this the total package and solution to the problems that confront us?” Solfa asked “No, we still have to educate you. . . as to the payment process we are seeing a marked improvement in this area. . .we need your trust and confidence-- we will work very hard to earn that if we have lost it, and to retain it if we already have it.”

“Without you, we do not exist--with you, everything is possible. I thank you for your support, yesterday, today and tomorrow,” Solfa concluded.