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View Full Version : Benefits Of An Organization????



ErikH
3rd July 2002, 19:37
I've been puzzling over something recently. What is the value of an organization to the dojo owner? For instance, one organization in the community I'm part of charges the following:

$25 fee for kyu tests
$25 annual fee for kyu ranks
$50 annual fee for dan ranks

To be promoted to shodan requires trips to annual retreats as does further rank tests. Retreats, typically a week long, run under $500 but then there are traveling expenses. Dan tests are done at the retreats.

So adding up the costs for a 50 person dojo with say 5 dan level students runs you approximately:

45 kyu ranks x $25 = $1,125.00
5 dan ranks x $50 = $250
Testing Fees* 20 x $25 = $500

Total Annual Costs $1,875

Or nearly $20,000 over 10 years.

* assumes only kyu tests

And this is without any retreat costs.

As a non-member I can still attend their training camps. As far as I know there is no discount for members of the organization. In fact, members get nothing that I can see other than a rank certificate issued from Japan. There's not even any name brand recognition to the organization. When you tell a prospective student you are part of organization X they'll often look at you with a blank stare.

For the record, I hold the unnamed organization mentioned above in high regard but I'm confused what dojo owners get from their association with them. What do you get from your organizations? What do you think you should get from your organizations?

Shitoryu Dude
4th July 2002, 18:38
The benefit of an organization is that there is usually some attempt to bestow legitimacy upon rank and practicioners. Far too often they become the very thing they started out to fight against - the much derided "McDojo", only larger and with a bigger income.

As I understand it, the organizatons came about so that the various practicioners could agree on a common set of standards for rank and provide for tournaments, seminars, training and whatnot. That way you could identify the frauds and self-promoted grandmasters and help steer people away from them and into a legitimate school.

But, like all insitutions that grow too large, corruption and greed set in. Soon a small group of individuals at the top will realize that they are sitting on a cash cow and start to incrementally change the way the organization works until the sole purpose of the organiztion is to become the Microsoft of the MA world and suck in cash. The standards become watered down or ignored becuase they can charge more for higher rank. They tell you they can rescind your rank if you don't pay, they tell you that other organizations will be informed of your "betrayal" if you leave.

Eventually, people become fed up with the organization and leave, taking their students and money with them. Disgusted at the behavior they witnessed, they decide that something must be done and start their own organization.

If you are being told that keeping your rank depends on constant cash inflow, you are in the wrong organization. There are many organizations out there that are very non-intrusive and adminstered by people who are doing it for genuinely altruistic purposes. Many schools get along just fine without belonging to any organization at all. You will typically find that they don't promote their upper dan ranks very often or at all past a certain point - for some reason that seems to take an organization =) There are ways around that - some legitmate organizations (non-style specific) will, for a nominal fee, allow you to test for dan ranks. They hold everyone to the same standards, and while your new rank may not be from your previous organization or dojo, it is still peer acceptance of accomplishment and wholly legitimate.

:beer: