7. Adding and Removing Decision Makers

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Generally, the purpose of an effort is to provide pressure on many diverse targets in hopes of achieving a single campaign goal. So while the effort's ask is normally the same for all petitions in the effort, each petition targets a different decision maker. Decision makers can be added to the effort in two ways: they can be pre-chosen by administrators or they can be added by members. 

Adding Pre-Chosen Decision Makers

When creating your effort, if you indicated that you knew some or all of the effort's decision makers, you were prompted to add decision makers to the effort as part of the effort wizard process. However, if you need to add or remove decision makers after the effort was created, you can do so by going to the admin homepage > Efforts > name of the effort > Decision Makers & Petitions. On this page you'll see two tabs: Decision Makers and Petitions. 

The Decision Makers tab allows you to manage, that is add or remove, the decision makers associated with the effort. To add new decision makers, click the Add Decision Maker(s) button. 

From here you have three options: add an existing decision maker, create a new decision maker, or add a decision maker collection. Whenever you add new decision makers, you'll be asked if you want to pre-create a petition for the decision maker or if you want to leave them as a potential target.

• If you choose to pre-create the petition, you can begin collecting signatures on the petition while you work on recruiting a local leader.
  
  
• If you choose to leave the decision maker as a target, members will not be able to sign their local petition until a member agrees to be a local leader and create the petition. 

If you want to add an existing decision maker, enter the decision maker's name, location, title, or email address into the search box on this page. Click Search and we'll show you any matching decision makers. Click Add Decision Maker to add him/her to the effort. Then you'll need to decide if you want to pre-create the petition.

If there are no matches among existing decision makers, you'll be asked to create a new one.

If you need to create a new decision maker, click the Create a New Decision Maker button. We'll ask for some basic information about the decision maker, including the name, title, phone number, email, and location. We require the decision maker's name, but the rest is optional.

By default, decision makers added by admins are visible to members. Unchecking the Allow members of the public to find this decision maker in search box will prevent members from finding this target when searching for their local decision maker. This is generally not the behavior that an organization wants and will stop members from signing or leading the campaign targeting that decision maker.

Once you've added the new decision maker, you'll be asked if you want to pre-create a petition for this decision maker. 

If you're planning to run an effort with a lot of decision makers, and if you have those decision makers in a CSV, we can add a bulk decision maker collection for you. Decision maker collections are pre-set lists of decision makers that can be used across multiple efforts. Examples of these types of collections could be: U.S. Senators, Members of Parliament, or local franchises of a national company. Once a collection is added to your site, it will appear in the decision maker collection dropdown.

Choosing a decision maker collection will add all of the decision makers included in that collection to the effort. You'll then need to decide if you want to pre-create petitions for all of the decision makers.

You can learn more about decision maker collections here. To add a decision maker collection to your site, send us an email to support@controlshiftlabs.com. We'll need a CSV that includes, at the least, decision makers' names and locations.

If, at any time, you need to add a new decision maker to an effort, you can return to the Decision Makers tab and click to Add Decision Maker(s).

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Removing A Decision Maker

If a decision maker was added to an effort and you want to remove them, you can do so from the Decision Makers & Petitions page in the effort's admin. 

The Decision Makers tab includes a list of all decision makers that have been added to the effort.

To remove a decision maker, click the trash icon at the end of their row. Please note:

• If the decision maker does not have a petition attached, we'll remove the decision maker from the effort.
  
  
• If the decision maker does have a petition attached, but that petition does not have a leader, we'll remove the decision maker from the effort and delete the associated petition.
  
  
• If the decision maker does have a petition attached, and that petition does have a leader, we'll remove the decision maker from the effort and disassociate the petition from the effort. The petition will still exist, but will no longer be associated with the effort. This means that it will not show up on the effort's landing or hub pages, and the petition page will no longer link back to the effort's public pages.
  
  
• You cannot remove an individual petition from the effort if the decision maker is part of a collection that has been added to the effort. For example, Jane Smith is a US Senator who is part of the "US Senators - 116th Congress" decision maker collection. If the "US Senators - 116th Congress" collection has been added to an effort, it will not be possible to remove Jane Smith from the effort using the trash icon. The only way to remove her from the effort would be to update the decision maker collection or remove the entire "US Senators - 116th Congress" collection. (You'd then need to individually add all of the senators that you did want to target with the effort.)
• If the decision maker is part of a decision maker collection, has a petition attached and the petition does not have a leader, we'll delete the petition and leave the decision maker attached to the effort.
  
  
• If the decision maker is part of a decision maker collection, has a petition attached and the petition does have a leader, we'll disassociate the petition from the effort and leave the decision maker attached to the effort. The petition will still exist, but will no longer be associated with the effort. This means that it will not show up on the effort's landing or hub pages, and the petition page will no longer link back to the effort's public pages.
  
  
• If the decision maker is part of a decision maker collection and does not have a petition attached, we won't do anything.
  
  

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Allowing Members To Add Decision Makers

For some efforts, you may want to allow members to add their own decision makers. If that's the case, you'll first need to check the Allow members to enter their own decision makers for petitions option in the effort's leadership setting page (admin home page > Efforts > name of the effort > Leadership). When you check that option, you'll be able to choose what information you want to collect about the member-added decision makers. See: https://controlshiftlabs.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/115006516348 for more information.

Once the add decision maker's option is chosen, members will be able to add new decision makers from the effort's landing page. To see the workflow for members adding their own targets and creating their own decision makers, please see: https://controlshiftlabs.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/115006724968.

For admins, allowing members to add targets will create a few new workflows. First, admins will need to moderate the new petitions and publish the new decision makers. Second, org admins will need to review abandoned petitions as the campaign progresses. 

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Next we'll look at recruiting local leaders.