Expect better results and shift expectations
I've seen this movie before. It played in July 2004, February 2006 and in October 2008. Call it The Expectations Game.
In 2004, Green party members expected the party to win Saanich Gulf Islands. We didn't. In 2006, the party raised expectations that the party would win seats. We fell short, far short. And in 2008, this same expectations messaging repeated itself and regrettably with comparable results.
Just as there was a let down in 2004, there was a let down in 2008.
However, as someone who was deeply involved in the 2004 and 2006 campaigns, I can attest to the fact that winning seats was truly beyond our grasp in both those campaigns. The party simply did not have sufficient resources in concentrated areas. No one is to be blamed for this reality. It's political life. If we had won a seat, it would have been a fluke.
I believe the same circumstances prevented the party from winning seats in 2008, despite final results that clearly showed winning seats is now on the horizon. Seats are not won solely based on wishful thinking or making the televised leadership debate. They're won because of hard work, talented staff and the commitment of hundreds upon hundreds of volunteers working over months and sometimes years (see Linda Duncan in Edmonton Strathcona).
Since May 2004, the Green party has fought three general election campaigns, two leadership races and a handful of by-elections. This is unprecedented in Canadian political history.
To repeat, no political party has faced such an organizational task in Canadian history. Not the Progressive Conservatives, not the Conservatives, not the Liberals, not the Bloc Québecois, nor the NDP. Only the Green party, effectively at its political birth as a force in Canadian politics, has met such a challenge.
And yet, despite this, the party has increased its vote from over 100,000 in 2000 to nearly one million today. The progression has been constant and it has been consistent.
Someone must be doing something right. And a tip of the hat to those who contributed never hurts. In fact, more hat-tipping might bode well for a party that wants to demonstrate to Canadians it is an honourable political alternative to the mud-slinging and brinkmanship they see in Ottawa.
There are members who believe that the party has failed or committed grievous errors. They are both right and wrong.
But where they are right, the party continues to fail in finding the appropriate means and forums to deliberate upon and learn from these mistakes. Instead of looking for answers, many prefer to seek scapegoats. And there may very well be individuals – leader, staff or volunteers – who did not meet the objectives that were assigned to them. But this cannot be determined until the right questions are asked.
Did the party make mistakes in 2008? Yes. Did they listen to good advice? Not always. Have we all identified the areas that need work? Not really. And certainly not in a way that will help the party grow over time.
No election is a carbon copy of the last. Pardon the analogy but just as Hollywood builds movie studios to control variables, there will always be the unexpected that occurs on the set of The Expectations Game. It is in these moments that those un-enforced errors occur and campaign teams are called upon to do their mightiest.
But be assured that mistakes will always be made even by the mightiest. Just ask the Poopin' Puffin. It's how we learn from them and fix them that sets us apart.
During the 2006 convention, we had an opportunity to have bear pit sessions on the 2006 campaign. I spoke at one of those sessions and found it a constructive opportunity to exchange views and to learn from each other.
Might I suggest that in this inter-election period the party commit itself to a similar process so that it can ask the right questions and hear the answers. These are the kinds of expectations that will build the party.
And a little more hat-tipping wouldn't hurt. 
Dermod Travis is former Director of Communications for the Green Party of Canada and organized the Green Party's 2006 National Convention
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