The Campaign Manager, aka the Organizer

As an electoral organizing campaign manager, you have a very unique vantage point that no one else can see. Perhaps the most important quality of any organizer is their ability to relate. To relate to all kinds of different people and all kinds of different roles. In order to achieve your dual goals of winning the campaign and building the movement, you’ll need to have these on your radar at all times:

• Voter face time with candidates or spokespeople

• Field numbers: voter contacts, support IDs, volunteer shifts filled

• Fundraising: dollars raised, number of donors

• Budget: how to make up a deficit and where to spend a surplus

• Media: social and conventional (paid and earned) 

• Opponent’s campaign: exploit weaknesses, avoid strengths 

• Volunteer base, electorate, public sentiment (don’t confuse one for the other) 

You should be able to relate to both the stresses of a candidate constantly in the public eye and of an ardent supporter who can’t fathom why someone wouldn’t vote their way. You must be able to relate to data and field managers staying up late cutting turf and de-duplicating and uploading lists day in and day out. Even to relate to your opposition’s supporters, to understand what compelled them to choose them over you.

All while leaving yourself enough time and capacity to be patient and wait for opportunities to arise, and be prepared to seize them when they do. In electoral organizing, no single election cycle matters more than another. Success is about building from one cycle to the next and making the most of the time in between.

Just like in effective community organizing, the goal is not just about a housing campaign or a rate-payer fight. It’s about how each effort builds on the last to create something greater: working-class power!