SAFREA ANNUAL REPORT 2015

CHAIRMAN’S REVIEW

Dear Safreans

We have come to the end of a term in Safrea’s history and the next cycle commences. This review and its accompanying reports should give you a full picture of what happened in Safrea from 1 April 2014 to 31 March 2015. Please do query and debate any aspect of these reports you feel necessary.

I won’t bore you with blow by blow account of the year, but will cover the major events and our outlook for this next term to March 2016. The portfolio and regional reports that follow provide more detail on any matter discussed here.

The Oracle: better than ever

In past years our Google Group – the Oracle – has been the arena for some rather spectacular online “flame wars”, but we appear to have grown up since. I’m chuffed to see how members are sharing their hard learned insights to add value to “The Oracle” that advises us all. What you bring when you respond to a query on the Oracle makes us all stronger in how we walk – or run - along the tough career path we have chosen.

In a sense we are the early pioneers of the merged digital and physical world that the workplace – society even – is moving towards. That we are confident enough to share or even be vulnerable in this online space is a healthy approach to that reality. My wish is that more of us actively participate in this forum. Getting to know the ‘digital you’ encourages people to engage with the ‘professional you’ - freelancing is all about networking and relationships.

Sharing the insights, angles and opportunities as we do is Safrea’s greatest strength at this time.

A specific example is the Contributoria opportunity, as introduced by Ray Joseph. This has given rise to a vigorous collaboration between article writers and their supporters that has generated a new source of earnings. As the digital world moves towards cooperative

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money-making platforms such as crowdfunding, this is exactly how Safreans should leverage our organisation to work together for mutual benefit.

The highlight that showed the way

In past years new Excos would get elected, take on their tasks with enthusiasm, then become overwhelmed by the time and energy needed to manage Safrea. At the term’s end they would leave en-masse. The incoming Exco would have to work out how to run Safrea, with little institutional memory to lean on. This was no way to manage a professional association.

During the energetic Helen Ueckerman’s turn in the chair, the first major step was taken to break this self-defeating pattern. In 2013 a facilitated workshop of Safrea’s leadership and old timers delivered a strategic plan and an operations manual, so that newcomers onto Exco could quickly pick up what Safrea should be doing – and how to do it.

In 2014 we took the next big step, by inviting teams to tackle specific issues, such as marketing, IT and financial management. This spread the load, enabled more to be done and saved invaluable time. In his report that follows, Bruce Cooper outlines in more detail how this approach worked.

The unprecedented result is that all the current Exco and Oversight members have volunteered for another term in some leadership capacity. At the same time, a bunch of new people have elected to get involved.

For Safrea, the impact is priceless. Institutional knowledge can flow from the old to the new so that fresh, informed leaders will emerge naturally for future years.

We have realised that Safrea shouldn’t be organised strictly along traditional association lines, but needs to be reshaped to fit the freelancer lifestyle. Freelancers aren’t hierarchical or bureaucratic, we plug our specific skills into projects – and then we plug out. The word “committee” sends most of us running for cover. We have members with amazing skills who would willingly contribute, but they fear getting trapped in a committee.

The reality is that freelancers and committees are not a natural fit. We are used to getting stuff done against the clock, so our time is precious and expensive.

To make getting involved in Safrea viable for freelancers, Exco plans to invite Safreans to join projects that fit their particular capabilities and interests. These projects will pass the fruits of their collaboration onto the set committees that manage Safrea, ie. Exco, Oversight and regional committees (Regcos), for ratification, implementation and sharing with the broad membership.

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The spin-off for Safreans who join projects will be:

Pooled knowledge in your interest areas Networking with others in your field or interest New learnings Knowing that you’re building up Safrea to work better for you.

Safrea itself will gain from getting more done on behalf of the collective us and from tapping into expertise that can raise our game dramatically. Based on the working groups established this past year, these are some of the projects we will continue, or intend running from May. You are welcome to suggest others.

Marketing, branding and PR – how do we raise Safrea’s public profile, and internally among our members?

Design House – its initial task will be to redesign Safrea’s logo, website ‘look and feel’, the member’s directory and the member application form.

IT and innovation – what tools can freelancers use to work more effectively, particularly in big data, document collaboration and online communication.

Intellectual resources (Virgins of the Oracle?) – collect and categorise all the useful tips that are shared through the Oracle.

Online and social media – staying on top of how freelancers should be engaging these fast moving platforms.

Lobbying and rates – establishing what fair reward for work is and disseminating our rates widely.

Legal advisory and intellectual property – protecting ourselves and our creative outputs.

Financial review – monitoring Safrea’s financial discipline and advising on how members should account for their money.

Industry and strategic relationships – engaging with fellow associations and partners (LAMP, UASA) and staying abreast of government shifts and regulations affecting our crafts.

Safrea reform – revising Safrea’s constitution to align it with the digital world and industry realities.

More highlights - and disappointments.

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Our membership numbers are both a highlight and a disappointment. In total, our membership grew by a healthy 26% this year. This figure could have been much higher, but we also lost a good few members who did not renew their subscriptions.

Bruce Cooper, our executive administrator, contacts each non-renewing member to find out why. Naturally, some move on as they are leaving freelancing - or the country - but others felt that they are not getting enough value out of Safrea. It seems many people join Safrea with the expectation of accessing more jobs, while others feel that we are too writer-centric and don’t offer enough for fields such as photography and graphic design.

I have personally gotten enough work through Safrea to pay my membership fee until I’m six foot under (mind you, that may not be too far off…). Finding jobs through Safrea is as much about developing relationships with fellow members as it is expecting these to pop up through the website or the Oracle.

Participating in the Oracle and sharing your insights should be a major element of your self-marketing strategy.

Safrea has a long way to go before we represent the bulk of freelancers in southern Africa. To safeguard your own freelance career, you should prioritise bringing freelancers in your circles into Safrea. Help other freelancers into Safrea to help yourself. Then we can be a louder and more influential voice for our interests.

Nevertheless, Safrea’s website has to become a far more effective jobs portal. The site’s “look and feel” is showing its age and back-end programming issues were crashing it frequently. Its current Members Directory is desperately old-fashioned and non-intuitive, which doesn’t encourage prospective clients to search for the talent to match their job requirements. Over the past six months the executive, supported by Gareth Griffiths, have tackled the technical issues preventing us from revamping the site. Safrea’s website was moved to a more reliable server and a programmer is completing all the technical fixes, while adding new features.

We can now get down to redesigning the landing page and members directory to make Safrea’s website the attractor of new jobs it was intended to be.

Yes, fixing the website’s back-end programming was a highlight, but we will only reap the rewards when a fresh and compelling front-end is bolted on. That has to be a priority over the next few months.

Show me the money

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Safrea’s treasurer, Alan Hawkins, resigned early in the term and Bruce Cooper was appointed in his place. For the sake of sound governance, the leadership decided that the administrator and treasurer roles should be split. Fortunately Yvette Wilsenach, an experienced economist and financial analyst, volunteered to become our new treasurer. In this term Safrea continued maintaining the strict financial discipline of recent years, as shown in the figures below (Also see the Treasurer’s Report). In this period we also introduced a new set of financial controls to keep Safrea aligned with best practice.

Safrea’s financial year opened with a balance of R188 197.18 and closed on 31 March 2015 with a balance of R252 675.83, which resulted in a surplus of R64 478.65.

Income generated in the year amounted to R213 135.89 and expenses R148 657.24. Income growth was due to a substantial increase in new membership: 166 new members joined the association in the year.

Expenses were carefully contained and, as a result, the Exco decided early in the financial year to provide the regions with more money for their meetings, as the annual stipend of R3 600 simply proved too low. The Exco hopes to continue this trend because regions are the bedrock of Safrea and at the coalface of the association’s marketing initiative.

The membership survey: home truths

A substantial 40% of our members responded to the recent online survey, therefore its results are clearly valid. The incoming Exco will have the task of analysing the survey in depth and assimilating its findings into our strategy plan. Nevertheless, the salient points that stand out immediately are that members:

Expect Safrea to be a major source of new jobs Require forums in which to network and share craft expertise Want their interests to be upheld in the marketplace Seek industry recognition for their professionalism.

In that light, the 2015/16 agenda for the incoming leadership is quite clear-cut.

Last, but by no means least

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Successful associations are invariably anchored by that one strong and dedicated person who persists – year after year – to keep its wheels turning and the flag flying high. In Safrea that person is Bruce Cooper, our executive administrator. Bruce has been a member of Safrea since Moses parked the boat and served in various capacities over the years, such as vice chair and on the Oversight Committee. When he became available in late 2013 to become our administrator, the Exco of the time leaped at the opportunity.

A senior executive and CEO of companies in his pre-freelancer life, Bruce put his expertise into practice and has transformed Safrea’s administration into a smoothly running machine. That factor alone is a major reason why the outgoing office bearers will stay for another term – they have every confidence that Bruce will turn decisions into outcomes.

Thank you Bruce. Salut!

Sue Charlton was Safrea’s original chair elected for this term. Due to unforeseen personal circumstances, Sue realised she couldn’t offer due attention to the role in 2014, which is why I was parted from my pipe and slippers to be brought back to the helm. I have utmost respect for Sue making a brave and logical decision as quickly as she did, in the interests of us all. I’ve no doubt that we’ll see more of Sue in future.

To the outgoing Exco, Oversight and Regional committees - you have been quite magnificent. It’s so evident how Safrea is maturing as the authentic fellowship of freelancers and I’m looking forward to working with most of you again in the next term – along with the host of young guns that are our future.

And to the hard-working freelancer, who is instantly forgotten once the deadline is met, while your clients bask in the glory of your creativity - just soldier on as you must. That is our path, chosen or not. Here you are in the company of compatriots and together we must continue building Safrea into a fortress, for in the unforgiving world of media freelancing - this is your home.

Clive Lotter

Chairman

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EXECUTIVE ADMINISTRATOR’S REPORT

In 2013, Safrea’s Exco and Oversight committees formulated a Strategic Development Plan to transform Safrea into a more professionally run association built on a solid business foundation.

The person responsible for guiding and overseeing this development was Madi Hanekom, an MBA graduate and journalist and a Safrea member in Gauteng North. Madi’s review of the Strategic Development Plan is provided with the portfolio reports in this document.

The Strategic Development Plan is the cause for some of the Exco activities which I’ll now outline.

When the current Exco took office it was faced with two major challenges:

When preparing the 2013-14 annual statements for auditing it was found that the figures on Safrea’s bank statements and those in the financial statements didn’t reconcile. On investigating the financial statements we found flawed figures owing to arithmetical miscalculations and incorrect or no postings from the bank statement, among other things. We had to rewrite the year’s financials to ensure the books balanced at the end of the year. The process took around four months to complete.

The second challenge was 115 applicants, dating back for a period of 18 months, awaiting approval. Sadly, some high profile applicants had become disillusioned and, when finally approved, no longer wished to join Safrea. The approval process took around two months to complete and of the 115 approved only around 50% joined the association. But despite this setback, Safrea’s membership grew from 316 in April 2014 to 399 in March 2015. We haven’t analysed why this should be but surmise that retrenchments in the print sector had something to do with it. Also we do know that at least 10 new members, owing to dwindling household incomes, were forced to resuscitate journalistic careers and freelance.

One of the successes achieved by the current Exco was a decentralisation of management in the form of sub-committees.

For years, the Safrea executive committee, which usually comprised never more than seven members, has struggled frustratingly at times to deal with the business at hand – and not always successfully. This year it was decided to establish pertinent sub-committees to act as think tanks on important issues and report back to Exco the decisions taken. These decisions are presented at Exco meetings and invariably adopted. A useful spin-off of these sub-committees is that relevant Safreans from the broad membership are co-opted onto them,

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thereby involving members who ordinarily wouldn’t have got involved in Safrea’s management and decision-making.

The following sub-committees are active:

Financial Review Committee

This committee is tasked with all financial issues relating to Safrea including proposed changes to the financial segments of the constitution. It can be commissioned by either Exco or Oversight to discuss and report back on a pertinent or controversial financial issue.

It presented two papers for Exco and Oversight to approve this year:

A detailed outline of central financial procedures and the responsibility and role of certain office bearers in carrying out these procedures. To cite only one example: no payment from Safrea’s bank account can now be made without authorisation from two Safrea signatories, who are currently the Safrea chair and the Oversight convener.

The second paper was a detailed outline of how regions must handle finances.

Both papers were presented, passed and approved by Exco and Oversight and will form part of an annexure to the proposed revised Constitution.

Marketing & Branding Committee

As the name implies, this sub-committee is tasked with promoting Safrea in all possible ways in order to attract and grow the association’s membership. It is currently involved with the following:

The design and launch of a regular newsletter to members that will be linked to the Safrea website. Members will be called on to supply content. An editorial team will run the newsletter and several members have already offered to help.

The redesign of the Safrea website homepage to achieve a better visual appearance, post testimonials and incorporate a Twitter feed, among other things.

Improve the association’s branding and enhance engagement on Facebook and Twitter. Safrea regularly gets new members through its Facebook page.

IT Committee

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Owing to the difficulty of getting regular support for its Ruby on Rails website from an expert developer, Exco tasked this committee, formed for the purpose, to investigate a new web presence for the association on a third-party platform called Wild Apricot, which specialises in hosting membership databases for associations.

The committee were granted a 90-day trial by Wild Apricot and established a mock membership database for testing functionality.

A number of disturbing issues emerged that justified dumping the platform, but the most serious discovery was that the WA platform had nowhere near the sophistication inherent in the current Safrea administrative functionality run on Ruby on Rails.

The committee has since achieved better support from Safrea’s Ruby developer who, at their request, has made significant and improved changes to some of the administrative backend functionality and is also working, with Marketing & Branding, on improving and enhancing the homepage.

The committee also recommended, and Exco approved, a Ruby on Rails software upgrade and a move to a new server in order to eliminate the regular site crashes that had been occurring. To date this has been successful.

Constitution Revision Committee

This committee is tasked with presenting and writing into the Constitution all proposed changes tabled and approved by Exco, Oversight and Safrea’s broad membership. These proposed changes will be presented to members by the new Exco in the first few months of the current (and new) financial year.

Disciplinary Committee

This committee is finalising a discussion paper to streamline the disciplinary process for inclusion in the revised constitution. It is also updating and revising a Safrea Code of Ethics.

Resources Committee

This committee was formed a month ago to source and provide interesting content for Safrea members via the website and Google group.

So it’s clear from the above that the outgoing Exco has taken its managerial role very seriously and has successfully spread its executive network of sub-committees, which involves approximately 29 members compared with the, till now, traditional seven.

Succession planning

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Another very good initiative implemented by Exco is succession planning.

In the past, at year-end, Safrea always struggled to find volunteers to serve on national and regional committees and was left, usually, with the ‘old guard’. As fresh ideas and new perspectives are needed, we decided in August last year to make direct approaches to selected Safrea members to ascertain if they’d either be willing to be co-opted onto national, regional or sub-committees or be placed in a resource pool to be called on at a later date. This is an ongoing project as only around 10% of our members have been contacted thus far.

I never expected such a positive response. Twenty-one came forward and are now serving on regional and sub-committees. It bore out my thought that many members are willing to serve but sometimes are shy or reluctant to independently come forward and stand for election. This resource pool is growing and approaches to members will continue to be made during this year.

NPO and PBO status

The Exco examined the usefulness or otherwise of its Non-profit Organisation (NPO) status to determine whether it should continue as such. Attorney Rael Gootkin (WC chair Caryn Gootkin’s husband) generously undertook to investigate this on behalf of Safrea free of charge.

What emerged was that we should remain an NPO for one very important reason: we discovered we are not tax exempt and on the strength of our NPO status we can apply to become an exempt-from-tax Public Benefit Organisation (PBO). This we have duly done and submitted the application to the Tax Exemption Unit of the South African Revenue Services.

Student membership

In the financial year just ended we became consciously aware of a need to engage more with our student membership and to increase the numbers. We made this a project for two reasons:

Some students may not find work immediately after graduating. Students tend to be left on the fringe in our association and not helped in ways that

we could help them. More engagement is needed.

Safrea member and lecturer in the Department of Journalism and Media Studies at Rhodes University, Simon Pamphilon and I discussed this at an Eastern Cape regional meeting in September last year and he proposed, a few weeks ago, that Safrean Hagen Engler visit Rhodes as a guest lecturer and promote Safrea to the students.

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Hagen visited Rhodes several weeks ago and had a successful visit. His visit initiated a discussion at Exco and we’ve already established similar possibilities in the Western Cape, Durban, Johannesburg and Pretoria. These will be placed on the new Exco’s agenda.

But a further student initiative has arisen.

Before our most recent Exco meeting on 31 March, the Gauteng North regional chair, Magda Naude, emailed a proposal to me for another student initiative, asking for my comment. She suggested that we sponsor one student per region per year for the duration of their studies and, if they’re willing, co-opt them onto regional committees. She had already pre-empted this initiative by selecting a post-grad Honours student, who had shown an interest in Safrea and who was prepared to pay the fee, and had offered her a seat on the GN Regco. The student willingly accepted. I’m also pleased to add that another student, with strong accountant attributes, has joined our financial review committee.

I thought it an excellent idea because it would lead to practical engagement between Safrea and the students and the latter would benefit from the experience of being part of a media association and having it as a resource should finding work be difficult after graduation. And if the students enjoyed the experience they would, no doubt, spread the word among their peers. If the students are of sufficiently high calibre and take the association, and their involvement with it, seriously, I can even foresee a student sub-committee in Safrea acting as an intermediary between the association and students generally, one which could ascertain ways in which Safrea might better serve students, particularly those graduating and seeking work. This might have a ring of idealism about it but, depending on how Safrea manages this initiative, may not be improbable.

I placed it on the 31 March agenda and it was discussed enthusiastically. To make it more attractive, I proposed the following to Exco:

That two students per region per year be selected. That the students would pay no fees for the duration of their studies. That they would be offered, and encouraged to accept (not compelled), a seat to

serve on Regcos. That after the completion of their studies they would be sponsored for a year as a

Full or Associate member.

Because the initiative won’t cost Safrea anything, and if it proves successful, I suspect the number of students sponsored could be significantly increased.

This year we will endeavour to sponsor students from all our regional provinces who are studying at various tertiary institutions.

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Lastly, you will have seen the membership survey results which I distributed. This was an initiative of vice chair, Lyse Comins, who ran the survey and collected the results.

I’ve not had time to study and analyse this but at a glance it’s clear that Exco has some issues to address, arguably the most important being the need for the posting of more job opportunities for members. More and more members are seeking this resource and usually join Safrea for that purpose. We know the association isn’t specifically here for that purpose but it’s an area that should be investigated in order to source more job opportunities, which we know are out there. It will be placed on the agenda for the first new Exco meeting sometime in early May.

It’s been a pleasure working with the Exco, Regcos and sub-committees, who have shown a willingness and commitment to improve the management, structure and vision of our association as it continues to grow and sustain itself as a valuable networking resource.

Bruce Cooper

Executive administrator

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PORTFOLIO REPORTS

Treasurer’s report

On 1 April 2014, Safrea had an opening balance R188 197.18 and on 31 March 2015 a closing balance of R252 675.83, which resulted in a surplus of R64 478.65.

Income generated in the year amounted to R213 135.89 and expenses R148 657.24. The good income was due to a substantial increase in new membership: 166 new members joined the association in the year.

Expenses were carefully contained and, as a result, the Exco took a decision early in the financial year to provide the regions with more money for their meetings, as the annual stipend of R3 600 simply proved too low.

The Ruby on Rails software driving Safrea’s website was upgraded and the site moved to a new server, which has resulted in greater stability and speed. The Ruby developer has also made significant enhancements to Safrea’s backend which has provided additional features for the administrator to use and further increased the sophistication of our custom-built administrative system. However these costs will be paid in the new financial year and treasury will take this into account when preparing the association’s new budget.

The association reviewed its Non-profit Organisation (NPO) status, with the help of legal advice, and confirmed it as being vital. It has also applied to become a Public Benefit Organisation (PBO), which will make it a tax-exempt body.

Exco established a financial review sub-committee to study Safrea’s financial structure and advise on any changes deemed necessary. The committee comprised the treasurer, executive administrator, a member from the oversight committee and another member from the Exco. The committee prepared two financial papers for review by Exco and Oversight and both were adopted and will become part of the revised constitution.

Safrea finances remain in a healthy position, and if the trend of increasing new membership continues, the association can look forward to another surplus at the end of this financial year. The financial statements are available on request from admin@safrea.co.za. These must remain strictly confidential to Safrea members only.

Yvette Wilsenach

Treasurer

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Membership portfolio report

Safrea’s membership grew significantly during the year under review particularly when compared to the previous financial year, despite the ongoing challenge of an unacceptable number of members opting not to renew their annual membership for various reasons.

Membership Growth

Safrea’s membership grew from 316 members at the end of the 2013/14 financial year to 399 at 31 March 2015, representing a 26.3% growth rate. The current membership comprises 296 full members, 92 associate members and 11 student members. The association’s membership growth rate therefore almost tripled for the period under review compared to the 9.63% growth rate recorded in 2013/14.

Safrea’s membership base is currently located regionally as follows:

Western Cape 139

Gauteng South 132

KwaZulu-Natal 40

Gauteng North 37

Eastern Cape 23

Frees State 7

Mpumalanga 6

Other 5

Northwest 5

Northern Cape 3

Limpopo 2

Safrea registered 166 new members against a budgeted 115 for the year, with the result that new members now comprise 41.6% of the association’s total membership.

The strong membership growth recorded could debatably and partially be attributed to a wave of retrenchments and structural changes that have rocked the local print media and communications industry in South Africa, where most members are currently based. Such changes may have contributed to a rise in the number of professionals turning to freelancing as a permanent or a temporary stop-gap self-employment alternative as they seek new employment opportunities in the industry.

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Membership Renewals

However, this healthy growth must be viewed in light of the relatively high rate of attrition of the number of members’ choosing not to renew their annual membership during the period under review. The problem was identified during the previous two financial years when it was recorded at 24.65% and 22.65% respectively and which worsened to 25.26% in 2014/15, despite attempts to address the problem.

The membership secretary is grateful to administrator Bruce Cooper who efficiently handled the general vetting of new members and the collating of membership figures and other data on a monthly basis. This task also involved follow-up telephone calls and exit interviews with non-renewing members in an attempt to improve retention and to understand the wide ranging reasons for the ongoing attrition. Some of the recurring reasons for non-renewal included: a lack of finances; a lack of freelance work opportunities/clients gained through the association, gone into full-time employment, moved overseas, a lack of value for photographers and graphic designers, or that the non-renewing member had simply stopped freelancing.

Prospective Members Backlog

Safrea also had to deal with a sizeable backlog of approved prospective members who had completed their online application forms but had not paid their first annual subscription. There are currently 28 approved applicants dating back to 30 December 2014 from whom the association is still awaiting payment. Some reasons given for not paying included: “not ready to join”, “no longer interested” and “send bank details again”.

Regarding these prospective members, the administrator has suggested that their prospective Regcos might have greater success in getting them to register, a point that has been noted for discussion by the future executive committee.

Membership Category Discussion Paper Once again, Exco spent a lot of time discussing the establishment of new membership categories as part of the overhaul of the association’s constitution but this will remain an issue for discussion and final approval by the future Exco and oversight committee.

Membership Discipline

There was a decrease in the number of members who had to be reprimanded for transgressing Safrea’s e-group etiquette. There were only minor transgressions reported and the offending members took the reprimand in a good spirit and apologised with no

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further problems.

The membership secretary was elected to sit on a new Disciplinary Committee, which was formed during the period under review following concern during the previous financial year which had seen some serious infringements of the association’s Google Group etiquette. The committee embarked on email discussions around the development of a new disciplinary procedure and code draft document, which currently a work in progress, that the future committee will need to finalise.

Membership Survey

A membership survey was undertaken during the year under review to assess members’ needs and to gauge satisfaction with existing benefits and management of the association. The survey was sent out to the entire national membership with a response rate of about 160 members (40%).

The results of the survey provided useful insight into members’ experiences of the association and its management as well as ideas to consider when seeking to improve existing benefits or to launch additional benefits.

Lyse Comins

Membership Secretary 2014-2015

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Advocating and lobbying

The Advocating and Lobbying contacted EMD Media to get a list of all contacts for media in South Africa. SAFREA paid them their fee and we receive a list of all the contacts every quarter. These lists do change quite a lot as the media tends to shuffle its staff around. However, these lists are very valuable to contact various media departments. SAFREA Exco made a deal with EMD Media in that only SAFREA Exco could use the lists for advocacy and lobbying and not the rest of the SAFREA members. If any members wanted the list they would have to purchase it individually from EMD Media. Emails were sent to various media heads explaining who and what SAFREA is. A greater awareness of SAFREA has been created through this.

The next step is to create an acceptable rate card. This is a very contentious and sensitive issue. I have asked Exco that the Advocating and Lobbying position have a committee to assist with setting up a rate card that would be suitable.

Rates should be considered negotiable and as a guide line only. I belong to SAGE (South African Guild of Editors). They have just released their new rate card. A suggestion would be to work with organisations like SAGE with our rate card. This would stream line rates to be similar in different organisations. The rate card needs to be inflation matching. SAGE has also organised the rates according to three experience groups, namely, junior, mid-level and highly experienced. I think this would be a good idea.

Thank you for all your support.

Sharon SalmonExco portfolio manager

Strategic Development Plan (SDP)

1. Overview of status of Strategic Development Plan

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The Strategic Development Plan (SDP) for the Association was debated and prepared during the strategic planning workshop that took place on 13 and 14 July 2013, attended by the majority of Exco and Oversight Committee members. The current approved SDP covers the three-year period 2013/14 – 2015/16.

It is the intention that the SDP will remain a three-year rolling plan which means that an annual review of the Plan needs be undertaken by the incumbent Exco and Oversight early during their respective terms of office to assess progress against stated targets for the immediate past year and to execute forward planning for the SDP to always maintain a three year horizon.

However, due to the time required to write up the SDP to an acceptable standard after the workshop (the SDP was approved only in November 2013) and Exco losing a number of its committee members during the 2013/14 which impacted on progress made with the implementation of the Plan during that period, Exco decided to not have an annual strategic workshop in 2014/15 to review the status of implementation but to rather focus on implementing key activities of the current plan.

Exco decided during 2014/15 that the next strategic workshop should take place early in the 2015/16 term to review progress to date and to prepare the next SDP covering the three-year period 2015/16 – 2018/19.

The main areas addressed in the SDP are:

• Restating the vision, mission and values of Safrea;• Defining Safrea’s core business;• Identifying the Association’s main programmes and projects; and• Proposing priority areas for implementation.

The full document is available on Safrea’s website.

2. Main areas of implementation of the SDP during 2014-20151

During the year under review Safrea’s National Exco made progress with implementation of the four main programmes of the SDP: (membership, communications, legal framework,

1 Please refer to the reports from the various portfolio managers for further detail on the programmes implemented during 2014/15.

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professional development), the organisation structure and operations, as well as financial matters, as follows:

SDP MAIN PROGRAMMES PROGRESS FUTURE ACTION

REQUIREDRESPONSIBILITY

Membership Programme

Objective: “A 70% retention/renewal of members; the achievement of new member targets and the achievement of growth targets as detailed hereunder.”

Grow membership to approximately 400 by March 2015

Membership target for March 2015 achieved.

Branches to state their membership targets for 2015/16 and action plans to achieve these.

Exco to approve targets and ascertain how to assist branches to achieve targets.

Retention strategy to be developed.

Establish one new branch (Free State)

Incoming committees: Mainly Safrea branch leadership with assistance from Exco & Executive Administrator, as required.

Re different categories of membership & demographics: Safrea’s membership is still dominated by writing/editing-type members with limited representation in other categories such as photographers, graphic designers, etc. Our country’s demographics are not sufficiently reflected in our membership.

Branches to focus on attracting more members from categories other than writing/editing and to focus on addressing the needs of these members. Also to focus on attracting members from all population groups.

Mainly Safrea branch leadership with assistance from Exco & Executive Administrator, as required.

Re student membership: Progress was made with interactions with some tertiary education institutions (i.e. Rhodes & Pretoria Universities) to market Safrea

Branches to actively attract student membership, including through approaching tertiary institutions and selecting two students per branch to assist

Mainly Safrea branch leadership with assistance from Exco & Executive Administrator, as required. Possible

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SDP MAIN PROGRAMMES PROGRESS FUTURE ACTION

REQUIREDRESPONSIBILITY

amongst media & communications students in order to grow our student membership. Exco approved that two students per branch can be sponsored to become members but that they be expected to assist Safrea to grow the portfolio and to better understand students’ needs.

Safrea with this category of membership,

create an Exco portfolio to deal with student membership.

Membership categories, criteria, fees and benefit package to be reviewed.

Draft document on membership categories, criteria, fees and benefits prepared.

Document to be finalised as a matter of priority & Oversight approval obtained.

Membership to be informed of changes and their input/approval sought.

Relevant sections to be included in the revised constitution.

Final document to be included in the Operations Manual.

Incoming Exco under the leadership of the Constitution Review sub-committee.

Executive Administrator.

Vetting processes to be streamlined & retention to be addressed

Achieved through action taken by Executive Administrator to actively follow-up on outstanding membership applications and streamlining the approval process.

Investigate involvement of branches in following up with the the 'approved - not paid' category, as it's possible that the Regcos may have greater success in getting these potential members to complete the registration process.

Executive Administrator in conjunction with Regcos.

Undertake a membership survey to gain better

Survey completed. Analyse survey results and implement actions as required.

Incoming Membership sub-committee with

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understanding of their needs and expectations & target appropriate support

Consider updating the current rates survey in 2015/16.

assistance from the Executive Administrator.

Improve access to job opportunities for members

Limited work has been completed in this regard, i.e. job opportunities are posted on the e-group and on the website. Some jobs are also posted on the Facebook page by Facebook participants.

Investigate ways to increase job offers which members can pursue.

Incoming Exco, relevant sub-committees & Executive Administrator.

Communications Programme

Objective: “Safrea has been effectively communicated as being an esteemed organisation recognised by all its stakeholders and attracting the right mix of members whose marketability and client base are positively influenced by the Association.”

Member- and industry communications Safrea website: After in-

depth investigation, it was decided to stay with the current Ruby on Rails system and to move to a new server. The move was completed. Some updates/upgrades have been effected and the remainder are receiving attention.

Finalise upgrades to website.

Redo the Safrea home page.

Develop the freelance content materials for placement on the website as a resource to members on key issues relating to running a freelance business, Contributoria magazine, etc.

IT sub-committee, in conjunction with the external Safrea website developer.

Social media: Safrea has an active presence on Facebook and Twitter.

Increase use of appropriate social media, and decide on the use of further social media such as i.e. LinkedIn & Instagram.

Incoming Exco (relevant portfolio manager)

E-group: The group is functioning well with no

Review the e-group etiquette

Disciplinary sub-committee, in

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major disciplinary matters which required disciplinary action. There are a number of areas however that require attention such as size of attachments, tone of communication and a general review of the e-group etiquette to capture the latest thinking.

consultation with:

IT sub-committee & Administrator of the e-group

Media/Press releases: Safrea Exco send out only a few media releases on issues such as condemning the Charlie Hebdo massacre.

Be more proactive in identifying key issues affecting freelancers and prepare press releases.

Incoming Exco (relevant portfolio manager)

Initial work was done on an E-mail digest/pilot Newsletter.

Finalise work on the development of the E-mail digest/polio newsletter and integrate with website as well.

Incoming Exco (relevant portfolio manager) with assistance of the web developer.

The work on re-populating the Safrea Dropbox has not progressed due to other priorities receiving attention.

Relook the Dropbox content and update.

Executive Administrator

Strategic relationship building

- LAMP: Safrea’s representative plays a key role in LAMP.

- Media: Some interaction took place with various media platforms.

- Tertiary institutions (refer

Review key stakeholders identified in the SDP and develop a prioritised action plan for interaction.

Incoming Exco to decide on Safrea representative on LAMP.

Incoming Exco (relevant Portfolio manager)

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student membership above)

- Other (Journalists in Danger, etc)

Advocacy/lobbying

Some attention was given to advocacy and lobbying but this portfolio is planned to receive considerable attention in 2015/16.

Develop action plan and implement

Incoming Exco (Advocacy & Lobbying portfolio)

Investigation was launched into possible union membership for Safrea members. UASA was identified as one of the unions. Interactions took place between Exco members and UASA to ascertain benefits offered. Draft discussion paper developed and awaiting finalisation before submission to members for their consideration.

Initial interaction established with new proposed body Creative and Cultural Industries Federation (CCIFSA).

Finalise UASA discussion paper and interactions.

Stay abreast with developments re CCIFSA to ascertain Safrea’s possible role.

Incoming Exco (Advocacy & Lobbying portfolio)

Media packages in the process of being finalised.

Finalise media packages.

Incoming Exco (Advocacy & Lobbying portfolio)

Marketing & Branding Refer to Communications Programme above for

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detail.

Preliminary work was undertaken on the development of a PowerPoint presentation which can be used to market Safrea amongst freelancers and students

Finalise PowerPoint presentation.

Develop and implement action plan of presenting at key institutions.

Incoming Exco (Membership secretary)

Marketing & Branding materials: The pamphlets and banners are available but outdated.

Relook available materials and develop more appropriate materials.

Revise logo in digital and print media (as well as Safrea members’ email signatures) to reflect the revised wording of Safrea’s vision statement: “To advance the interests of independent professionals in the media and communications industry.”

Incoming Exco (Marketing & Branding portfolio)

Legal Framework Programme

Objective: “An approved legal framework embodied in a constitution that reflects Safrea’s reality and provides flexibility for a changing environment.”

Revise the Constitution

Draft revision available. Extensive further work is required on revising the Constitution to include various issues which emerged during 2014/15.

As input into the Constitution, the draft membership and disciplinary discussion

Constitution Sub-committee

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documents need to be finalised. The e-group etiquette needs to be reviewed in line with the disciplinary document.

Registration of Safrea as PBO (Public Benefit Organisation)

Application for PBO status submitted.

Awaiting response from the Tax Exemption Unit of SARS on Safrea being exempt from paying tax.

Complete PBO registration process.

Executive Administrator

Professional Development Programme

Objective: “An effective mechanism in place by the end of March 2016 or sooner to keep Safrea members informed about opportunities available to them for improving their skills and enhancing the quality of their performance as freelancers”.

This objective did not receive targeted attention as there were other more important objectives to attend to.

The e-group features regular postings about relevant courses offered by institutions, often at a discount to Safrea members.

The e-group is also an active sharing forum where members can ask questions about their freelancing businesses and receive input from other members.

The incoming Exco to decide whether it wants to give more targeted attention to professional development of members.

Incoming Exco

Organisational structure & Operations

Objective: “The appropriate organisational structure and operations processes in place to execute the SDP and to enable the future growth of Safrea.”

Appropriate organisational structures and procedures to be in place and functioning

Oversight committee in place and functioned well.

Exco in place and functioned well.

All newly elected committees for 2015/16 to be properly constituted and portfolios allocated

Incoming Oversight, Exco, Regcos, Executive Administrator & Webmaster

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effectively and efficiently

Various Exco sub-committees in place and functioned well.

Regcos in place and functioned well.

Executive Administrator in place and functioned well.

Webmaster in place and functioned well.

after the AGM.

Follow-up action list from Exco meetings kept to ensure that all actions receive appropriate attention.

Keep list updated and review from time to time & add points to the Exco agenda for discussion.

Executive Administrator

Operations Manual developed to capture the key processes and procedures relating to the Association’s operations.

Keep Operations Manual updated.

Executive Administrator

Financial matters

Objective: “Appropriate systems and procedures that meet the required standards in place to ensure transparent and disciplined financial management.”

Appropriate financial structures and procedures to be in place and functioning effectively and efficiently

National Treasurer in place and functioned well.

Regcos had secretaries/treasurers in place and functioned well.

National and regional budgets approved and utilisation of funds monitored. Income was in excess of the budgeted amount and expenses incurred a saving against budget. A

New national treasurer to be fully briefed and taking over from Bruce Cooper.

Regcos to ensure that secretaries/treasurers are in place for 2015/16.

Regcos to prepare final budgets and National Treasurer to consolidate into national budget

National Treasurer

Regco chairpersons

Regcos & National Treasurer

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REQUIREDRESPONSIBILITY

sound positive bank balance is in place.

Developed two financial policy documents (approved):

(a) Safrea Central Financial Procedures

(b) Safrea Financial Management Procedures of Regions

Documents captured in Operations Manual.

It is not envisaged at this stage that further financial documentation will need to be developed but the new Exco will take a decision on this.

Incoming Exco & Financial sub-committee

Madi Hanekom Exco Portfolio Manager

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Marketing and branding

Press releases

It was noted by Exco that continued writing and placement of press releases remains an effective way to keep Safrea relevant in SA’s social and media scene. This year, Safrea press releases related to Safrea’s condemnation of the Charlie Hebdo killings in January, and in July 2014, rejecting SABC chair Hlaudi Motsoeneng’s calls for the licensing of journalists. We also spoke out against the Protection of State Information Bill and the proposed Media Appeals Tribunal. In September 2014 Safrea condemned the killing of freelance journalist Steven Sotleff in Syria at the hands of ISIS.

Safrea Marketing Analysis

At a meeting of the Safrea marketing subcommittee in December 2014, we conducted an analysis of the Safrea marketing strategy and came up with the following recommendations.

* Market the Safrea Google Group better. This is our greatest value proposition as it leverages the combined experience of all our 400+ members, and some members are not even aware of it.

* Create a newsletter. This has been in the works for a while now, and is currently contingent on the redesign/redevelopment of the website. Ideally an email newsletter would link back to a blog page on our site, where the content would reside permanently as a resource.

* Conduct a member survey. Lyse Comins has successfully conducted this survey.

* Collect endorsements from members and clients and showcase these on the site.

* Communicate better. The marketing of Safrea to our members is as important, if not more important than marketing the organisation externally. We lose dozens of members annually and this is probably through not managing the expectations of new members adequately. Internal communication has improved, largely through a mind-set shift by Exco members. We always work hard, but sometimes neglect to communicate this to our membership. This has got a lot better.

Rory Peck Trust

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Through Michael Schmidt of the IAJ, we were contacted by the London-based Rory Peck Trust. This is an organisation that supports freelance journalists in crisis. They also provide training and emergency cash support where necessary and also run an awards programme honouring excellence in journalism. We communicated our interaction with Vincent Gourmand of the Trust to our membership and explained what the Trust stands for, with links to its website. We were able to refer former member Douglas Mthukwane to the Trust, where he may be able to find some support.

Newsletter

This promises to be a useful internal marketing tool. I have undertaken to compile an initial dummy newsletter to get the ball rolling. Following several consultations with web designer Marc Howell, we are still waiting for the web restructuring to be complete so that we can integrate a mailer into the site’s blog functionality. I have investigated MailChimp as a stand-alone email method. It would indeed by useful as it also offers analytics on the relative success of each email campaign. However, I still feel an email that is based on links to a blog on the website would have the dual benefit of enriching the Safrea website and bringing traffic to the site.

Facebook page

The Safrea Facebook Group is relatively well supported, however it suffers from the common Group problem of being a mouthpiece for all members and not really a platform for Safrea to communicate our message coherently. So there are non-members using it as a Jobs page, others simply promoting their personal projects. There was even a porn scare, where a member posted porn links as a comment to one of Ray Joseph’s posts. While this could just as easily have happened on an FB Page, Pages offer extra functionality like being able to run FB ads and marketing campaigns for content. It’s also a good way to put out a coherent message that isn’t cluttered with posts by people who aren’t even members of Safrea itself. The new Page exists at https://www.facebook.com/Safreans, however it is not yet adequately populated to close the Group and migrate. Hagen Engler and Bruce are having some hassles with admin accreditation, which should be resolved soon.

Safrea at Rhodes University

In March 2015, Safrea was invited to present a series of lectures at the Rhodes University Journalism and Media Studies Department. Lecturer Simon Pamphilon is a founder member of Safrea and now active in Safrea Eastern Cape. He is keen to build a relationship between

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the Rhodes journ department and Safrea – and to encourage students to join the association. There were four lectures presented at Rhodes, to 1st years, 3rd years, 4th years and postgrads/staff. All were well received. The most encouraging was the staff/postgrads lecture, where the staff realised the increasing “freelancerisation” afoot in our industry. They spoke of perhaps introducing a course on the “business of freelancing” to equip students for freelance careers as it is inevitable that journ graduates will be working as freelancers at some stage of their careers. The lectures also established Safrea as a credible journ/media association with the Rhodes Journ department, which is one of the biggest and most respected on the continent. A version of the presentation we gave has been uploaded to Slideshare, and is available to any Safrean who wants to view it our indeed present it, at http://www.slideshare.net/HagenEngler1/safrea-prezopdf

Hagen EnglerExco Portfolio Manager

Industry relations portfolioHagen Engler managed this portfolio until mid-year before taking over the Marketing and Branding role. Clive Lotter then took responsibility for it.

LAMP

Founded in 2011, the Alliance of Language and Media Professionals (LAMP) is an alliance of professional associations in the language and media field, grouping together to speak with one voice for all professionals working in the broad fields of language practice and media.

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LAMP members recognise that each association represents a specific set of skills or needs, but that we need to work together to defend those basic rights that apply to all of us. The alliance establishes regular communications between our leaderships and coordinates our actions on common interests as well as our approach to media issues, where possible.

The current members of LAMP are:

Association of Southern African Indexers and Bibliographers (ASAIB) Professional Editors' Group (PEG) Professional Journalists' Association (Projourn) Southern African Freelancers' Association (SAFREA) South African Science Journalists' Association (SASJA) South African Translators' Institute (SATI)

LAMP meetings were convened on 25 July and 13 November 2014.

Moneyweb

Moneyweb has launched an application in the Gauteng South High Court against Fin24 for alleged plagiarism, copyright infringement and unfair competition.

This application is the first of its kind in South Africa and may set a legal precedent for fair use and content aggregation policies. This is desperately needed as Fin24’s current modus operandi and interpretation of fair use principles poses a serious threat to future investment into original content and investigative journalism.

The Moneyweb application concerns a series of articles written by Moneyweb journalists and contributors, which Fin24 copied, either fully or partially, and published unlawfully. Moneyweb contends that Fin24’s actions amount to systematic plagiarism on an industrial scale and forms a core part of its business model in an effort to gain a commercial advantage for itself.

The overwhelming majority of publishers in South Africa adhere to high standards of ethical journalism. Fin24’s conduct suggests that different rules apply for online publications. Moneyweb seeks clarity from the courts as to where the line is to be drawn between plagiarism and fair usage of the work of others.

The case will be heard at the Gauteng South High Court, on 5 May 2015. SAFREA and other organisations such as the SABC, ETV, PDFM, Times Media and Independent Newspapers have submitted affidavits as part of the court papers supporting Moneyweb’s case.

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UASA

The possibility of linking up with a trade union to help protect freelancers in legal disputes was first raised in 2009. Safrea’s Exco at the time gave Clive Lotter and a team of members the mandate to contact UASA and explore a possible relationship.

UASA was established in 1894 (120 years old) and its current membership is 73 000. From representing just one sector in 1998, UASA is now active in 23 economic sectors. The union has a staff of approximately 130 people, supported by numerous part-time shop stewards.

An Agreement of Alliance was signed in February 2010 between Safrea and UASA. The offer to join UASA was advertised to Safrea members, but wasn’t well marketed or followed through, as other concerns were more pressing at the time. As a result, few Safreans joined UASA and the alliance fell into limbo.

In 2010, the Actors’ Guild of South Africa (SAGA) decided to join UASA as a group. Their relationship with UASA has been far more active than ours and in 2014, SAGA’s executive informed us that the arrangement is working well for them, with UASA being involved in court cases that have been instrumental in defending their professional rights.

As a result, Safrea’s current Exco examined the possibility of reviving our UASA arrangement and consequently held several meetings with UASA’s management.

Over the year, Hagen Engler, Clive Lotter and Madi Hanekom attended several meetings with various UASA leaders to clarify our alliance and establish what benefits the union can offer freelancers.

We have determined that UASA will be able to represent independent contractors, but only within the ambit of labour law. In the event of a dispute, contracts between the self-employed and their clients can be reviewed by UASA, in an attempt to find areas where labour law could be applied so that UASA will be in position to represent freelancers. Should the client contract not constitute an employer/employee relationship, and labour law therefore not be applicable, UASA can still advise, help draft and send letters, and mediate towards a settlement. Besides its legal support, UASA offers numerous additional benefits to individual members, such as access to affordable medical aid, pension fund schemes, insurance, maternity benefits and various commercial discounts.

By definition, most of Safrea’s members are independent contractors/freelancers, although a significant number of our associate members are presently fully employed. For full-time employees belonging to Safrea, UASA’s offering is straightforward - you will have access to its full range of legal and representation services offered within the scope of South Africa’s labour law.

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Some members are concerned that we haven’t examined other trade union options. They pointed out that although UASA is highly regarded and strictly non-political, its management remains primarily middle-aged white male, which raises a flag regarding its internal transformation.

With these concerns in mind, Safrea’s Exco identified all other unions active in the media and communications sector and narrowed these down to two possibly credible alternatives, being the Communications Workers Union (CWU) and the Media Workers Association of South Africa (MWASA). The CWU is a well-established Cosatu union, while MWASA was apparently formalised in 2013, but further details are not easily obtainable as its website isn’t functioning at present.

Our initial inquiries to the CWU and MWASA weren’t responded to.

Regarding the status of transformation at UASA, the union confirmed that a succession plan is in place and employment equity plans are filed each year with the Department of Labour to chart its path to transforming in accordance with South Africa’s demographics. To confirm this, the Department of Labour’s document was provided to Safrea.

Should enough Safreans join UASA, the union can claim representivity in media fields such as writing, photography, design or editing and will be able to lobby government and the major media players on our behalf.

However, during our talks with UASA, we mentioned that government was planning to launch the Cultural and Creative Industries Federation of South Africa (CCIFSA). Through this umbrella body, sectors in the cultural and creative industries in South Africa would have a unifying body to represent their interests at governmental, economic and social levels. With this in mind, we decided to postpone pursuing our UASA alliance until the outcome of CCISFA’s inaugural meeting was known.

Cultural and Creative Industries Federation of South Africa (CCIFSA)

Driven by the Department of Arts and Culture (DAC), CCIFSA is intended to be a sort of “COSATU” umbrella organisation through which all creative workers, including language and graphics practitioners, could organise themselves and collaborate for fair working conditions in these fields.

After postponements and much uncertainty, the CCIFSA consultative and elective conference was set for 23-24 March in Bloemfontein at the OFS. Clive Lotter was delegated to represent the LAMP associations at the conference.

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On the day before the conference, Clive withdrew from attending it for the following reasons:

A blanket lack of information and strategy, or only provided at the last minute. Advice indicating that the conference would be “hijacked”, which proved correct. A Gauteng delegation was going down to Bloemfontein with a "slate" of industry

unknowns. Clive did not believe a LAMP vote would have any significance, which proved correct. Several other creative or cultural associations withdrew at the same time

The conference itself was dramatic as forecast. It featured allegations of corruption, political interference and a lack of transparency as well as death threats, walk-outs and boycotts. Although CCIFSA’s Memorandum of Incorporation wasn’t voted in, which meant the conference should have been dissolved, a “council” of sorts was eventually elected that side-lined most credible arts-related associations.

What influence the CCIFSA actually wields now is a moot point. It doesn’t have legal status and no enabling legislation as yet exists to give it teeth, unlike trade unions and the Labour Relations Act. It may, however, have been a ploy for the present government to take control of the creative and cultural sectors. Many of the “arts” personalities that popped up at the conference have a political background.

These events have placed Safrea and LAMP in uncertain territory how we can apply our influence in future. For the moment, we need to connect with our fellow associations decide on a workable strategy.

Clive LotterExco Portfolio Manager

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REGIONAL REPORTS

Western Cape regional reportChairman’s Report April 2015

The WC region enjoyed a full year of meetings and events. Our Regco met regularly and worked very well together. The elected members were:

Caryn Gootkin (Chair) Gareth Griffiths (Vice-Chair) Mike van Ryneveld Miriam Mannak Vince Love (treasurer) Rebecca Weber

During the year we co-opted Ray Joseph to our team.

Our events were all well attended by both Safreans and non-members and we saw a good increase in membership and lots of interest in Safrea.

Miriam took over the social media portfolio and grew our presence on both Facebook and Twitter. She also used MeetUp to advertise some of our events and this drew crowds that would not have known about Safrea before.

We held the following events during the year:

1. Our first event was on 28 May. We introduced a Soapbox slot for Safreans to showcase their work to their colleagues. Our first was Keith Murray, loyal Safrea photographer from the Overberg.

After the curtain raiser, Safrean Lynn Smit, seasoned journalist and social media trainer, gave us a Social Media Strategy 101 presentation.

We had 33 Safreans present at this inaugural event of our year.

2. 26 June 2015: Our Soapboxer was Marco MaLaughlin – one of our graphic design and illustration members. Cameron Ewart-Smith, the outgoing editor of Getaway and an ex-Safrean, shared his many years of media experience as an editor, photographer and writer. Thanks, Gareth, for your help with this one.

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3. 31 July: 60 of us listened to Eric Miller, seasoned Safrean photographer and photojournalist, sharing insights and images from projects close to his heart. Journalist Glynnis O’Hara joined Eric as she was the commissioning editor at Femina who believed in his story about the Never-give ups from Grandmother’s Against Poverty.

4. 28 August: Safrea was hosted by Mondiall Restaurant in the Waterfront where we enjoyed delicious snacks and an evening of improvisation with our own Tarryn Saunders, writer, editor, actor and jewellery maker! Thanks, Vince, for sorting this one.

5. 30 September – a panel on The Business of Freelancing. Robyn Wynne, a lawyer; Gareth Griffiths, longstanding freelancer; Ian Meaker, financial consultant; live link up to business guru Pete Carruthers in Norway – a technological coup and a first for us. Thanks, Rebecca for helping put this one together.

6. On 29 October we met at a new venue, Blah Blah Bar in Kloof Street, for a presentation on Twitter for Freelancers with our social media guru and veteran journo, Ray Joseph. As an added bonus for members and at Rebecca’s suggestion, Safrean Anna Morris took portrait photos before and after the event. Thanks, again, Vince for arranging this one.

7. 4 December was our end of year party at Blah Blah Bar. We feasted on their delicious snacks and were treated to a moving and thought-provoking performance by Neuro, Slam poet.

8. 12 February: Sarah Hartley from Contributoria at Codebridge in Newlands and via Google hangout. We were really excited to host this event – thanks to Ray and Rebecca for organising this one. Another technological first for Safrea.

Caryn GootkinWestern Cape Chair

Gauteng North regional report During 2014/2015, SAFREA’s Gauteng North region has established itself as a much stronger grouping within SAFREA. The membership for the region increased steadily from 27 in April 2014 to 39 in March 2015.

The small committee comprising Magda Naudé (chairperson), Greer van Zyl (treasurer) and Madi Hanekom held its first committee meeting in Irene on 21 May 2014 to discuss a plan of

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action for 2014. The biggest challenges included recruiting new members, establishing a meeting schedule, finding a suitable venue, deciding on speakers and topics and expanding the committee.

Meetings and Venue

Frequency: We agreed to hold meetings once every six – eight weeks in the morning from 11:00 – 13:00 on either a Wednesday or Thursday. Our first priority was to find a meeting venue that was convenient and affordable. With the help of Madi Hanekom who had good contacts at the Pretoria Centre for Work-based Learning (PCWL) in Hatfield Pretoria, we were very fortunate to negotiate an affordable arrangement.

Venue: The venue is conveniently located within walking distance from the Gautrain Hatfield station and some members and guests from Midrand and Johannesburg have welcomed this convenience. Early in 2015, the PCWL relocated to another building two blocks away in the Hatfield Plaza centre (Fourth Floor, Office 4A, Hatfield Plaza, corner of Grosvenor and Burnett Street, Hatfield, Pretoria).

At our June meeting, Peter Ucko, a regular at GN meetings, agreed to join the committee. Albeit small, teamwork pulled us through. The experience and guidance from Madi Hanekom (national Exco member) was a major factor in boosting the GN regional committee. Without her help, GN would not have grown the way it did. We realised that GN needed a bigger committee (at least six members) to share the work and to expand its activities.

Feedback/reports from meetings: Greer van Zyl (treasurer) also served as scribe at our meetings and summarized the proceedings and the speakers’ presentations in a concise report for distribution to GN members within 24 hours after the meeting. Where available, speakers’ presentations or URL links were included in the reports. We also distributed the reports to the entire Safrea Google group because we believed that the information would benefit all members.

Finances and meeting fees

Fees: We charged a R20 attendance fee per person to cover some of our costs. Attendees paid their fees (cash) directly to Greer van Zyl (treasurer) on arrival and signed the attendance register at the same time. Greer kept a cash float with sufficient change.

Speaker gift voucher: We usually bought a R250 gift voucher from a popular outlet/retailer (Woolworths, Exclusive Books or a shopping mall) as a token of appreciation to the speakers.

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Refreshments: The venue fee included coffee and tea. We purchased light snacks (muffins, sandwiches, juice and chips) for every meeting. At the end of every meeting we sent scanned copies of the invoice for the venue PCWL and invoices from other expenses (refreshments, gift voucher) to Bruce Cooper (admin@safrea.co.za ) with EFT details for reimbursement. This system worked very well and Bruce made payment and refunds the same day as the meeting.

Budget: The region’s annual stipend was R3 600 (R300 per month). We kept our expenses low. Fees for meeting attendance covered the refreshments, while the stipend covered expenses for venue hire and speaker gift voucher (five meetings during 2014/15). We have not had any fund-raising activities in 2014/2015, but it something the new committee might want to consider.

Bruce Cooper (Safrea administrator) sent an updated cashbook excel spreadsheet after every meeting. These documents are available on request.

Income from meetings: In total, 63 persons attended five meetings, of which 56 persons paid R20 each per attendance (gests do not pay).A total of R1120 in cash was collected in attendance fees, which was used to cover expenses for refreshments at every meeting. The treasurer keeps a cash float, which currently stands at R360.

Financial status as on 1 April 2015

Description R

Regional stipend 6008.00

Funds raised 100.00

Total 6108.00

Minus expenses for meetings and sundry expenses 3573.90

Balance 2534.10

Speakers and topics

The choice of speakers and topics emanated from committee members and from suggestions at network meetings. (See table below for a summary of meetings.)

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Invitations and marketing of meetings

SAFREA: Once a speaker has been secured for a meeting, I compiled an invitation and included bio-sketch about the speaker and the topic to be discussed. I distributed the invitation by email on Google Group to all Safreans. We also invite SAFREA members from other regions to attend if they are in the area or wish to drive through from Johannesburg or use the Gautrain. I obtained updated lists of Gauteng North members’ contact details from the SAFREA administrator and sent follow-up invitations to the GN members.

The invitations were also sent to:Other organisations such as PEG (Kim Rasmussen at tzar42@gmail.com ) and SATI (office@translators.org.za). Invitations sometimes end up at other organisations too, and we were often surprised at how far they reached. We received a good response from PEG and SATI members that attended regularly.

Students: In 2015, we started inviting students by sending the invitation to the student advisory centre at University of Pretoria (TUKS). The first student attended our meeting on 11 February 2015 and she has since joined SAFREA. We trust that the new committee will continue with this initiative and expand the relationship with students who might be potential freelancers in the future.

Community media: We included a short notice of the meetings in the calendar pages of the Record newspaper (free) which resulted in non-members attending or making enquiries about SAFREA.

Social media: We added a shortened version of the invitation to the SAFREA Facebook Page.

Timing and frequency of invitations: Invitations were usually sent out via email about two weeks before the meeting, with a reminder one week before the meeting and yet another reminder two days before the meeting. We ask people to confirm attendance for catering purposes. Often members indicated that they would attend but could not make it because of work pressure or deadlines.

Committee meetings and day-to-day matters

In the interest of time, SAFREA GN held its regional committee meetings immediately after the network meetings at the same venue. We asked all committee members to make themselves available for another hour to allow us to discuss other matters. These meetings lasted from 30 minutes to one hour. Any other matters were handled by email, Skype or telephone.

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It has been an interesting year. Personally, I learnt a lot about Safrea and how the organisation serves the interests of its members. I wish the new committee all the best for 2015/2016.

Magda NaudéChairperson GN Regional Committee April 2014 – March 2015

SUMMARY OF MEETINGS, SPEAKERS, TOPICS AND ATTENDEES

Date & Venue

Guest Speaker Topic Attendees

18 June 2014

De Wet Potgieter, veteran investigative journalist

Challenges of investigative journalism

The importance of reliable sources; his article in M&G about Al Qaida’s presence in SA for which he was widely criticized; his book on this topic (White Widow, Black Widow), shortly before its release in July.

8 attendees of which:

7 members 2 non-

members 1 guest

speaker

7 August 2014

Helen Ueckermann, PR and marketing manager on SAFREA’s Exco, past national chair of SAFREA

Marketing for FreelancersClients are out there – we need to develop plans which work for us, which includes marketing.

13 attendees of which:

10 members 2 non-

members 1 guest

(member)9 October 2014

Clive Lotter, national chairperson of SAFREA

The rise (and fall?) of the freelancer: how to make freelancing work for you.

Clive Lotter gave a comprehensive presentation about the challenges of freelancing and dealing with an ever-changing environment and media landscape.

17 attendees of which

14 member 2 non-

member 1 speaker

(Member)

27 Guest speaker, Isabel shared her experience and 10 attendees of 40

November 2014

Isabel Ringel (Library and Information Association of SA (LIASA)

challenges in creating accurate and useful contacts for future reference, especially in Africa

which

4 members 2 SATI 2 PEG 1 LIASA

(speaker) 1 PACASA

11 February 2015

Ignus Swart, Senior Security Researcher at CSIR Cyber Defence

Ignus spoke about communication security (mobile phones, computers, social media platforms), broadly titled “Information security and how one can protect oneself from hackers”.

12 attendees of which

6 members 2 Academy of

Science 1 student 1 PEG 1 guest 1 speaker

(CSIR)

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Gauteng South regional report

Hagen Engler, Susan Reynard and Sue Charlton were asked to stand for the SAFREA Gauteng South Regional Committee in March of 2014. They agreed to do so despite their inexperience and knowledge of SAFREA workings, in main, due to the assistance offered by the extremely knowledgeable and SAFREA-experienced Helen Ueckermann.

After much stop/start and then stop again, I resigned the representation at Exco level to Hagen due to time constraints. Hagen has done exceptionally well at Exco level, and l am sure his input has been greatly appreciated. Susan Reynard assumed the Treasurer/Financial Portfolio with me taking the Chair.

Towards the end of 2014 Susan found full-time employment and left the committee, leaving Hagen and myself to wrap-up the year.

FunctionsThrough this year we have organised five functions, one of which was called off due to late cancellations making it embarrassing to proceed (Katy Katapodis). The other three functions were well supported, bar one where 50% of RSVPs via Facebook turned into no-shows. This led the committee members to re-think the catering costs that venue suppliers IAJ offered. Despite this change in catering, and a small increase in the cover charge, it proved impossible to cover costs at the majority of these events. The last function, as I write this, was in January 2015 and was aimed at introducing SAFREA to new members: explaining the role of the organisation and the various regional committees, think tanking future events and new committee member nominations.

The high percentage of no-shows is worrying, not least because of the costs involved in organising events. The current committee requested cash at the door, due to it not being practical to have funds deposited into our individual accounts as we wanted to settle the IAJ account promptly.

Maybe the solution going forward is to have these funds deposited into the SAFREA main account and allocated to Gauteng South in advance of the function for venue/catering settlement?

It was not the goal of the committee to make a profit from these events, but to break even financially. These larger events, l believe, can achieve this, if perhaps a smaller yet suitable venue could be found. It was discussed earlier last year to try and find a venue that also provided for a more ‘interactive' type of seating. Having said that, I do personally thank the

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efforts and support of the IAJ profusely, they have always been extremely accommodating and helpful.

SAFREA NicheThis was introduced by me with a goal to provide much smaller get-togethers (rather than events) where there was no presentation, but more interaction to queries and questions by SAFREA members. One so far has been held, to which l thank Tiffany Markman for the generous giving of her time, at a small luncheon Q and A session. The feedback has been quite positive, as it is more a learning/resolution encounter than a presentation, which members seem to appreciate.

The publicity for these events has been quite extensive: Facebook, Twitter, The Media Online, The Common Room, Biz-Community, PRISA, Wits, local radio station online event pages and the usual media and journalistic associations.

The DilemmaMany SAFREANs would prefer to watch events being podcast, live streamed or even available after the event rather than make the journey, and with the current load-shedding and traffic chaos, coupled with busy schedules it does seem that technical know-how could be embraced positively. The downside is covering costs of event overheads when it becomes preferable to login.

MembershipThe Gauteng South region's membership continues to grow and is a very buoyant and active membership.

Incoming CommitteeA big welcome and good luck to the incoming committee members. It is a time consuming role especially when sitting on the Exco at the same time as running your own business. I do thank those on Exco who agreed to replace and release me due to my own business time constraints.

I would also like to express my thanks and appreciation to Bruce Cooper who has calmly steered me through administrative procedures and often pointed me in the right direction — his input has been invaluable to me. Hagen’s support and help at functions and finding speakers has been innovative — thank you Hagen you have been a wonderful colleague who took on more than expected and it has been very much appreciated.

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Sue CharltonGauteng South chair

KZN regional report

Safrea KZN has continued to evolve to cater for the interests of the association’s increasingly diverse members, which includes a mix of photographers, graphic designers, public relations practitioners, journalists, editors, writers and social media experts.

Meetings and Membership

Safrea KZN continued to grow during the year under review. The region started the year with approximately 30 full, associate, provisional and student members and steadily grew to 40, despite several members not renewing their membership.

This was partly as a result of the efforts of regional members making an effort to heed the call to proactively recruit new members from among their personal networks as well as the effect of retrenchments in the media industry that resulted in more people turning to freelancing. The region experienced strong growth of around 25%.

KwaZulu-Natal had struggled in its formative regional years to secure suitable and affordable meeting venues to host professional speakers. This problem continued in 2014/15 and was the focus of constant discussion by the region’s committee, which sought a viable long-term solution.

The regional committee explored The Durban Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the Durban Botanical Gardens’ Conference Centre, The Foundry and The Sett as possible options for future venues. Some members raised the issue that it would be prudent for Safrea KZN to host monthly meetings at the same venue every month so that members and potential members would become familiar with it as our regular meeting place. Durban Botanical Gardens Conference Centre was one of the more affordable venues if a half day rate of R600 could be secured and it is an option that the new committee could consider exploring for 2015/16.

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However, in the absence of an immediate affordable solution, the committee continued in the meantime to host meetings at various venues around Durban and alternated between networking/knowledge sharing sessions hosted at the Blue Zoo restaurant in Mitchell Park and presentations by an outside speaker hosted at various venues. Regional members were actively involved in suggesting speakers and topics for the meetings.

During 2014/15 Safrea KZN hosted the following meetings:

April: Speaker and Knowledge Sharing: Time Management and Google+ presentation by Alana Baranov

May: Knowledge Sharing: Onwards and Upwards Open Discussion on National Strategic Plan with the new Regional Committee

June: Speaker: Future of Digital Technology presented by Vodacom engineer Chris De Wet

July: Knowledge Sharing: Information sharing on MOOC's (Massive on-line open courses) by Freda Findlay and Sheetal Cross

August: Meeting cancelled due to low numbers attending - we had planned to visit the AFDA film school for a presentation and decided to shift the meeting to September. This was also preferable for the speaker who was exceptionally time constrained.

September: Speaker: Scriptwriting ‘from concept to pitch’ by Janet van Eeden from The South African School of Motion Picture Medium and Live Performance (AFDA) October: Speaker: How to use email and web marketing to promote your services by Michelle Driman Director of Trade & Lateral Development.

November: Knowledge Sharing: Personal Branding and Social Media Ethics for Journalists by Amanda Mathe

December: No meeting held.

January: Knowledge Sharing/Networking: Discussion regarding budget, venues and speakers for 2015 followed by networking.

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February: Photography tips: discussion of use of techniques and potential of production of photobooks for clients by Rory Baker as well as a tour of Fotomax and discussion of use of printing techniques for client brand extensions.

February: Google Hangout with Sarah Hartley of Contributoria was hosted at two venues in Ballito and Glenmore.

March: Leadership skills development presentations by Arthie Moore and Jan Robberts certified John Maxwell Leadership Coaches.

April: Knowledge Sharing/Networking: Brief discussion regarding recent budget spend, upcoming speakers and potential venues followed by networking.

Members’ attendance at meetings was disappointing and averaged between 20% and 25% of the membership base. Members’ reasons for not being able to attend meetings ranged from family responsibilities - several members are mothers of small children - to health and work pressures. The economic impact of a higher petrol price, although it dropped towards the end of the period, as well as the impact on time management of load shedding may have also played a role in making it difficult for members to attend meetings. However, the region enjoyed a healthy flow of guests attending both the free networking sessions and the more formal meetings.

Attendance at the Google Hangout that was organised at two venues in Glenmore and Ballito was poorly attended with just one member, apart from the hosts, attending as well as oversight member Patricia McCracken who was able to connect from her home.

The regional committee made a concerted effort to regularly consult with members to discuss topics and speakers of interest to consider in its planning for future meetings with a view to attracting greater numbers to meetings.

Finances

Safrea KZN received R3600 p/a for meetings plus an additional R2408 that was transferred to its cashbook from national treasury’s marketing budget in September.The regional committee was constantly aware of budget constraints and did its best to save money by negotiating the use of venues free of charge, which it was able to do on every occasion. Costs were incurred for speakers’ refreshments and gifts as well as for refreshments for members on several occasions.

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A total of R200 was raised by charging guests R25 for attending our meetings after the committee decided to implement a fee for visitors. No charges were levied for guests who attended knowledge sharing/networking meetings. The committee has placed it on the agenda for the new committee to review this decision following some concern from members that the first meeting a guest attends should be free of charge.

The committee managed to save most of the allocated funds, about R5500, and decided together with several members upon voting at a meeting in January to use the money to buy a projector and a portable screen for the regional branch. The region appealed to Exco for additional funds of R2700, which were granted, to enable it to purchase a higher quality LG projector and screen rather than opting for a cheaper model as advised by a member who is a photographer and familiar with such equipment. At the time of making the appeal the regional chair had underestimated the total of outstanding claims that the co-chair still had to make for speakers’ refreshments at the most recent meeting with the result that a negative balance of R466.98 has been carried forward to 2015/16.

The reason for purchasing the projector was that the branch would no longer be in a position where it had to ask for “donated venues” to host professional speakers or shop around for expensive conference rooms that mostly had unaffordable price tags of R1000 upwards, especially when projector facilities were required. The region is especially grateful to Exco for providing the additional funding to further develop the region.

With the acquisition of the projector the region is now in a position to host professional speakers free of charge at its regular venue Blue Zoo, although lighting is a potential problem as the room cannot be darkened, and to negotiate better rates for alternative venues without requiring the use of a projector that inflates the hire price.

Leadership

The Regional Committee for 2014/15 comprised the following members:

Rory Baker: Nominated: Mikhail Peppas; Seconded Lyse CominsLyse Comins Nominated: Sheetal Schneider Cross; Seconded: Nicola JennySheetal Schneider Cross: Nominated: Patricia McCracken; Seconded: Lois KuhleFreda Findlay: Nominated: Patricia McCracken; Seconded: Rory BakerWanda Hennig: Nominated: Anne Schauffer; Seconded: Lyse CominsLois Kuhle: Nominated: Nicola Jenvey; Seconded: Rory BakerAmanda Mathe: Nominated: Patricia McCracken; Seconded: Lois Kuhle

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Lyse Comins and Sheetal Schneider served as co-chairs with the former representing the region on the Executive Committee. The regional committee members shared the duties of planning and executing meetings. It really was a team effort focused on meeting members’ needs, growing the region and raising its status in the province.

A special thanks is owed to Sheetal for her hard work as co-chair, to Lois Kuhle who tirelessly and cheerfully produced an e-invitation for our meetings, and to Freda Findlay who provided us with minutes of our meetings, without fail despite their own busy schedules that often take them out of town and country. Amanda Mathe graciously handled the RSVPs behind the scene and Rory Baker generously opened his home for a Google Hangout.

Despite numerous efforts to recruit new members to the regional committee for 2015/16 the region unfortunately did not succeed in its goal. The following current committee members have been nominated, without objection, to serve on the regional committee for 2015/16.

Rory BakerSheetal Schneider CrossFreda FindlayLois Kuhle

Lyse Comins agreed to stand for nomination for direct election to serve on Exco as one regional representative in 2015/16 but she is not available for nomination to the regional committee.Special thanks must also go to Sheetal Schneider who has volunteered to stand for nomination as the regional chairperson for 2015/16, but of course this will be decided by the incoming committee at its first meeting.

May Safrea KZN continue to grow ever stronger!

Lyse Comins (Regional Chair) and Sheetal Cross (Regional Co-chair)

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Eastern Cape regional report The SAFREA Eastern Cape branch has grown quite substantially. We are currently 22 members and have lost only three members. One of our members moved to the USA and another to Johannesburg. The other member could not afford the SAFREA fees.

We started having “Café” meetings in the Eastern Cape. These meetings are held in various towns. The distances in the Eastern Cape are vast. As a result not everyone was getting to know their fellow SAFREANs, especially if they could not make our SAFREA weekends away. We’ve had three Café meetings in East London. There have been two Café meetings in Port Elizabeth and a Café meeting in St Francis Bay. These have been very well attended. We’ve mainly focused on getting to know one another, sharing tips and experiences and given feedback from Exco. Part of our budget went to these meetings.

We’ve had a weekend away to Kariega Game Reserve. We were very fortunate to get some sponsoring for the weekend. Simon Pamphilon and Russell Kaschula from Rhodes University were our guest speakers. It was a very successful weekend.

We had our AGM in Port Elizabeth. It was very well organised by our outgoing vice chair, Nicky Willemse. Our guest speakers were Brian Hayward and Bruce Cooper. Both gave excellent talks on Social Media. Brian’s presentation was exceptional. The Paxton Hotel gave us great rates and some of the budget was used for the weekend.

Our new committee for 2015 is as follows:Chair – Sharon SalmonVice Chair and advocating and lobbying – Simon PamphilonTreasurer – Tim SalmonBusiness planning – Bazil Raubach

Sharon SalmonChair

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