It should go without saying that the order of all this is going to change drastically. But there, i said it anyway.
You do develop a sense with people. You can see from about ten feet back whether they have reserved a space in their busy or bereft lives for some modicum of political consciousness; in most, you see only a blankness, in the eyes and in the jaw. You are of no more consequence to them than a deoderant commercial – even less, since you’re not hawking anything real. You are noise, momentarily amplified and given form outside of headlines and talking heads, of a world that doesn’t speak to them and doesn’t make sense if they should happen to hear it.
But his by no means makes it ok to not call them, even if you think you’re sure they won’t respond. You really never know when an exception will walk by, and anyway, it is both politically correct and zen to make your cast without interruptions, hesitation or discrimination. The smart canvasser plays this to his advantage – she finds pockets of untapped sources, people who didn’t expect to be approached themselves, who are startled by the very question Do you want to help beat George Bush and who cross over from the faceless stream into the realm of political participation in the very instant that the canvasser raps them.
Nevertheless: the majority of the people out here don’t want to speak to you. The majority, of course, is not your concern.
All it takes is a handful of people out of the hundreds who will walk by you in a day; your job is to connect with them when the time comes. Some of them you will catch at the right moment, for whatever reason they will give you $100 straight off – they’d been meaning to do it, they just got paid, they just saw Farenheight 9/11 again, or they just got off the phone with their granmother or some shit like that. Even beginners snag them; that’s what makes the operation work for almost anyone. But a good canvasser does something more.
* * *
Canvassing is a skill, there is no doubt about that. There are techniques, Some people surprise themselves when they find out that they are able to get people to give them money; many others don’t make it through a full day. But even though the fundamental requirement is that you feel comfortable talking to strangers, there is also a defined set of tools with which you can equip yourself. Of course, nobody wants to talk to anyone else on the street. A walk down the street is for many people a private act – they might be looking around them, but they don’t care to be looked at, much less approached. They also don’t expect you. When you greet them, it is going to catch them a little off guard, and as a result, their response is going to be very similar each time. As a canvasser, you grow used to hearing the very same small set of responses from everyone; through training and experience, the canvassers acquires a matching set of rejoinders. A breakdown:
“I don’t have time.”
This will only take a few minutes, and it’s really important.
(Except for people who are actually late to an appointment, everyone has time. This is a weak front, easily penetrated.)
“I don’t have any money on me.”
Well let me tell you what we’re doing.
(Snag yourself some wiggle room. Almost everyone carries some kind of currency on them – this statement could very well be true they were to say it to a bum, as in “I don’t have any change on me,” but they probably aren’t wandering about without $. Still, you can’t quite blurt out “We take credit cards and checks!” Gotta get them to stop first.)
“I’m already registered.”
That’s great, but we’re not out here to register people. We need your help to get other people to vote. Let me tell you what we’re doing.
(People often misunderstood what we were doing, and if you could swiftly correct the misunderstanding, you had yourself a very easy target for the rap. This person is probably politically aware, since they are registered, but not enough to have thought about the complexities of electoral patterns and campaigns. Our plea to them can create a small realization that more needs to be done, an awareness of activity, out there.)
"Not right now.”
Well sir, there’s only X days left until the election, and with Y (just having happened/about to happen) we need your help more than ever.
(Another easy front. A good canvasser can break it with a deft, witty, or otherwise appealing volley.)
“I’ll do it with my vote”
Do you vote in a swing state?
(The response above is risky – for one, some people walking through Manhattan are from Pennsylvania, or even Ohio. Even Jersey, which was swinging just enough to discomfort, what with all that gubernatorial butt-sex out in the open – so yes, you would have to concede that a vote in New Jersey is ‘important,’ but still -- .
The other problem with this is that the person might not really feel the thrust of the question. They might not really think about swing states, and your response would simply not register.
This is a tough one, because the response is based in a literalist interpretation of voting and democratic responsibility. It is an answer that, in strict terms, passes our ‘test’ – yes, the person does want to beat George Bush, and he or she will do it at the polls as will all other responsible citizens – so why would they have any business with you?
A different way to phrase it is: In New York, that’s just not enough. This was the reflexive answer for me – because the logic is more direct, and brutal – but for some reason it was significantly less successful. Logic needs to be slick and easy to get someone to stop.)
"I’m already doing it."
Well let me tell you what we’re doing.
(This one is also tough, as it’s really more of a dismissal than a response. It might be tempting to respond sardonically – Oh, great! You’re on the case. Well I guess we can all go home now, thanks I’ll tell the others – although that really only serves to pop your own top. This is the response of someone who may or may not be giving in other ways, but in any case does not believe that this way is worth their resources.
You’ve got the standard set of options – we need your help for the swing states, or we need your help right now because of X, or are you doing it on a grassroots level -- sometimes these do you some good.
Also, you can somehow express to them the personal element of the campaign – well, I need your help because I am going to be going to the swing states to knock on doors – but basically anything that is going to work here will work by dint of sheer charisma.)
“Why are you here, in New York City!?”
(This question should have been the ideal prompt for the rap, it taps right on the very reason for us to be here. But the person who said it would usually be angry. In fact, the person was often so angry as to be unwilling to listen when you tried to tell them: that we’re here in the country’s liberal stronghold because we need its help in order to reach those areas that don’t have this kind of Democratic community, but need it desperately. It didn’t matter that your answer directly addressed their question – usually, they didn’t want to hear it. I don’t know, maybe they felt like just living in New York City fulfilled their responsibility, and that it could not be held responsible for the rest of the country’s actions.)
"I already gave."
That’s great! When was the last time you gave?
(This was, increasingly, the most common response. As the summer went on, people were hit up from a thousand angles at once – most of the people who were willing to give had given at least once already by the time I signed on. This, of course, didn’t cover their tab as far as we were concerned – someone who gave already is still more likely to give you money than the next person behind them. You just have to remind them that their help is still needed.
I found this to be the toughest exchange, and it was increasingly the most crucial. If someone said within two weeks, I would just say Good for you! Thanks for your support! Thumbs up, make them feel appreciated.
If it had been longer, I’d say something like Well we haven’t beaten him yet! Or, time to give again! Or, Didn’t it feel good?)
Once you’ve got someone stopped, your job is halfway done. Another quarter is getting the clipboard in their hands, and the rap – though deliberately worded and sequenced – is mostly just stuffing. Many people get the idea right away, and will be impatient with the rap. Either your manner makes them want to give, or their resistance bears out; the rap doesn’t reveal or reason so much as it provides you with words that can function as emotional levers. A successful canvass makes an appeal become a connection and then a transaction – there is no need discussion, any more than there is for negotiation.
That said, there are a few responses you can expect people to make once they’ve stopped:
“Sure, I’ll sign.”
Actually, we’re out here asking for more than just signatures…
(This a rather slick evasion, the offer to sign. It is hard for the canvasser not to be greatly annoyed by someone jumping right up to get the pen in their hand, only to recoil with a nasty face when you ask for more – why would we be out here, pouring sweat all over Manhattan, busting our asses for a bunch of signatures? Don’t you know how deep the shit we’re in is? It’s going to take a whole lot more than petitions to stop George Bush. The trick is to make them grasp the enormity of the situation in the same breath as the insufficiency of the act of signing a piece of paper; add a pinch of shame, and immediately after that smother it with the goodness and nobility of the cause.
Even then, these people will rarely if ever give you a hundred dollars. Shoot for fifty, grab for twenty.)
"Can I just give online?”
You sure could, but this right here is a grassroots level.
(This one was the most troubling response. Yes, of course people could give online, although you could expect that many of them would just forget to do so. Especially once we discovered that our money from the street didn’t go to any ‘special fund,’ this required the most maneuvering -- )
We’re showing the Democratic party that this kind of campaign – face-to-face dialogue between real committed people – actually works. It’s time to start bringing people back together in our politics, and this election is showing that we can do that more than anyone expected. It reminds the Party that people want to be talked to, listened to. Plus, your support helps keep us out here every day – spreading the word, building morale, getting people hyped, pissing off Republicans…
"I can't give that much money."
(The only way to get at this one is to have fun with it. Make up ridiculous reasons to give specific amounts (a popular one is that $217 is the price of a plane ticket from DC to Crawford Texas). Guilt them by asking if they are planning to go out to dinner at a restaurant in New York City sometime this week, or month. Ask them how much their last night out at a bar cost them. Come on, you’ve got Netflix! This is a good reason to catch up on your movies. Stay in on Friday night and watch the West Wing. Walk to work next week, lose some of those pounds….
The fact is that people do have money, especially people here in this city. It is not every day that they are able to do something good with that money – you are out there to help them.)
Once people are ready to give you money, it is crucial that you set the terms of how much. Set high. The only way you can do this is if you truly believe that there is nothing better that they can do with this money, or, alternatively, you can act really fucking well.
* * *
* * *
* * *
The zennest way to approach canvassing—and it really does require a certain amount of zen, if you are planning on keeping with it for more than two or three days—is to play it like fly-fishing. You are standing in a stream, posture firm, legs slightly apart. The vast majority of people who will pass you on the street are not your quarry. They are the water; they don’t care for your mission—or, more likely, they are hardly aware of any mission at all. They are the flow. Become at peace with the flow; the flow is neverending, you cannot stop it. You are planted within the flow, set amid it but not against it; you are enveloped and it rushes past and always onward. Your quarry will hither to you, its instincts will spring it forth from the flow. So make your cast, calling to people when they are a good ten paces away, allowing yourself time to answer their response. Your cast flits in the flow, but do not allow it to be subsumed into the flow. As soon as your cast lands unheeded, begin to cast again; you are the focus point of a looped arc. Eventually, your cast will strike a target, and you and the target will be frozen together as the flow continues onward.
If you cannot foster a sense of this duality—of isolation and immersion—then the fact that you are asking thousands of people for money will be inescapable and suffocating.
This work is not hard – but it is tough. If you’re not careful, it’s hard on your feet and brutal on your soul. In the New York Office, with its staff of 60 or so, a few canvassers would drop out each day. As far as our mission is concerned, however, each canvasser had a numerical value: each canvasser – even the ones who are just good or competent – brings in hundreds of dollars a day. The logic of numbers out on the street applies in the office as well. Therefore, canvassing is really only half of the operation – the other half is recruiting and training more canvassers.
But his by no means makes it ok to not call them, even if you think you’re sure they won’t respond. You really never know when an exception will walk by, and anyway, it is both politically correct and zen to make your cast without interruptions, hesitation or discrimination. The smart canvasser plays this to his advantage – she finds pockets of untapped sources, people who didn’t expect to be approached themselves, who are startled by the very question Do you want to help beat George Bush and who cross over from the faceless stream into the realm of political participation in the very instant that the canvasser raps them.
Nevertheless: the majority of the people out here don’t want to speak to you. The majority, of course, is not your concern.
All it takes is a handful of people out of the hundreds who will walk by you in a day; your job is to connect with them when the time comes. Some of them you will catch at the right moment, for whatever reason they will give you $100 straight off – they’d been meaning to do it, they just got paid, they just saw Farenheight 9/11 again, or they just got off the phone with their granmother or some shit like that. Even beginners snag them; that’s what makes the operation work for almost anyone. But a good canvasser does something more.
* * *
Canvassing is a skill, there is no doubt about that. There are techniques, Some people surprise themselves when they find out that they are able to get people to give them money; many others don’t make it through a full day. But even though the fundamental requirement is that you feel comfortable talking to strangers, there is also a defined set of tools with which you can equip yourself. Of course, nobody wants to talk to anyone else on the street. A walk down the street is for many people a private act – they might be looking around them, but they don’t care to be looked at, much less approached. They also don’t expect you. When you greet them, it is going to catch them a little off guard, and as a result, their response is going to be very similar each time. As a canvasser, you grow used to hearing the very same small set of responses from everyone; through training and experience, the canvassers acquires a matching set of rejoinders. A breakdown:
“I don’t have time.”
This will only take a few minutes, and it’s really important.
(Except for people who are actually late to an appointment, everyone has time. This is a weak front, easily penetrated.)
“I don’t have any money on me.”
Well let me tell you what we’re doing.
(Snag yourself some wiggle room. Almost everyone carries some kind of currency on them – this statement could very well be true they were to say it to a bum, as in “I don’t have any change on me,” but they probably aren’t wandering about without $. Still, you can’t quite blurt out “We take credit cards and checks!” Gotta get them to stop first.)
“I’m already registered.”
That’s great, but we’re not out here to register people. We need your help to get other people to vote. Let me tell you what we’re doing.
(People often misunderstood what we were doing, and if you could swiftly correct the misunderstanding, you had yourself a very easy target for the rap. This person is probably politically aware, since they are registered, but not enough to have thought about the complexities of electoral patterns and campaigns. Our plea to them can create a small realization that more needs to be done, an awareness of activity, out there.)
"Not right now.”
Well sir, there’s only X days left until the election, and with Y (just having happened/about to happen) we need your help more than ever.
(Another easy front. A good canvasser can break it with a deft, witty, or otherwise appealing volley.)
“I’ll do it with my vote”
Do you vote in a swing state?
(The response above is risky – for one, some people walking through Manhattan are from Pennsylvania, or even Ohio. Even Jersey, which was swinging just enough to discomfort, what with all that gubernatorial butt-sex out in the open – so yes, you would have to concede that a vote in New Jersey is ‘important,’ but still -- .
The other problem with this is that the person might not really feel the thrust of the question. They might not really think about swing states, and your response would simply not register.
This is a tough one, because the response is based in a literalist interpretation of voting and democratic responsibility. It is an answer that, in strict terms, passes our ‘test’ – yes, the person does want to beat George Bush, and he or she will do it at the polls as will all other responsible citizens – so why would they have any business with you?
A different way to phrase it is: In New York, that’s just not enough. This was the reflexive answer for me – because the logic is more direct, and brutal – but for some reason it was significantly less successful. Logic needs to be slick and easy to get someone to stop.)
"I’m already doing it."
Well let me tell you what we’re doing.
(This one is also tough, as it’s really more of a dismissal than a response. It might be tempting to respond sardonically – Oh, great! You’re on the case. Well I guess we can all go home now, thanks I’ll tell the others – although that really only serves to pop your own top. This is the response of someone who may or may not be giving in other ways, but in any case does not believe that this way is worth their resources.
You’ve got the standard set of options – we need your help for the swing states, or we need your help right now because of X, or are you doing it on a grassroots level -- sometimes these do you some good.
Also, you can somehow express to them the personal element of the campaign – well, I need your help because I am going to be going to the swing states to knock on doors – but basically anything that is going to work here will work by dint of sheer charisma.)
“Why are you here, in New York City!?”
(This question should have been the ideal prompt for the rap, it taps right on the very reason for us to be here. But the person who said it would usually be angry. In fact, the person was often so angry as to be unwilling to listen when you tried to tell them: that we’re here in the country’s liberal stronghold because we need its help in order to reach those areas that don’t have this kind of Democratic community, but need it desperately. It didn’t matter that your answer directly addressed their question – usually, they didn’t want to hear it. I don’t know, maybe they felt like just living in New York City fulfilled their responsibility, and that it could not be held responsible for the rest of the country’s actions.)
"I already gave."
That’s great! When was the last time you gave?
(This was, increasingly, the most common response. As the summer went on, people were hit up from a thousand angles at once – most of the people who were willing to give had given at least once already by the time I signed on. This, of course, didn’t cover their tab as far as we were concerned – someone who gave already is still more likely to give you money than the next person behind them. You just have to remind them that their help is still needed.
I found this to be the toughest exchange, and it was increasingly the most crucial. If someone said within two weeks, I would just say Good for you! Thanks for your support! Thumbs up, make them feel appreciated.
If it had been longer, I’d say something like Well we haven’t beaten him yet! Or, time to give again! Or, Didn’t it feel good?)
Once you’ve got someone stopped, your job is halfway done. Another quarter is getting the clipboard in their hands, and the rap – though deliberately worded and sequenced – is mostly just stuffing. Many people get the idea right away, and will be impatient with the rap. Either your manner makes them want to give, or their resistance bears out; the rap doesn’t reveal or reason so much as it provides you with words that can function as emotional levers. A successful canvass makes an appeal become a connection and then a transaction – there is no need discussion, any more than there is for negotiation.
That said, there are a few responses you can expect people to make once they’ve stopped:
“Sure, I’ll sign.”
Actually, we’re out here asking for more than just signatures…
(This a rather slick evasion, the offer to sign. It is hard for the canvasser not to be greatly annoyed by someone jumping right up to get the pen in their hand, only to recoil with a nasty face when you ask for more – why would we be out here, pouring sweat all over Manhattan, busting our asses for a bunch of signatures? Don’t you know how deep the shit we’re in is? It’s going to take a whole lot more than petitions to stop George Bush. The trick is to make them grasp the enormity of the situation in the same breath as the insufficiency of the act of signing a piece of paper; add a pinch of shame, and immediately after that smother it with the goodness and nobility of the cause.
Even then, these people will rarely if ever give you a hundred dollars. Shoot for fifty, grab for twenty.)
"Can I just give online?”
You sure could, but this right here is a grassroots level.
(This one was the most troubling response. Yes, of course people could give online, although you could expect that many of them would just forget to do so. Especially once we discovered that our money from the street didn’t go to any ‘special fund,’ this required the most maneuvering -- )
We’re showing the Democratic party that this kind of campaign – face-to-face dialogue between real committed people – actually works. It’s time to start bringing people back together in our politics, and this election is showing that we can do that more than anyone expected. It reminds the Party that people want to be talked to, listened to. Plus, your support helps keep us out here every day – spreading the word, building morale, getting people hyped, pissing off Republicans…
"I can't give that much money."
(The only way to get at this one is to have fun with it. Make up ridiculous reasons to give specific amounts (a popular one is that $217 is the price of a plane ticket from DC to Crawford Texas). Guilt them by asking if they are planning to go out to dinner at a restaurant in New York City sometime this week, or month. Ask them how much their last night out at a bar cost them. Come on, you’ve got Netflix! This is a good reason to catch up on your movies. Stay in on Friday night and watch the West Wing. Walk to work next week, lose some of those pounds….
The fact is that people do have money, especially people here in this city. It is not every day that they are able to do something good with that money – you are out there to help them.)
Once people are ready to give you money, it is crucial that you set the terms of how much. Set high. The only way you can do this is if you truly believe that there is nothing better that they can do with this money, or, alternatively, you can act really fucking well.
* * *
* * *
* * *
The zennest way to approach canvassing—and it really does require a certain amount of zen, if you are planning on keeping with it for more than two or three days—is to play it like fly-fishing. You are standing in a stream, posture firm, legs slightly apart. The vast majority of people who will pass you on the street are not your quarry. They are the water; they don’t care for your mission—or, more likely, they are hardly aware of any mission at all. They are the flow. Become at peace with the flow; the flow is neverending, you cannot stop it. You are planted within the flow, set amid it but not against it; you are enveloped and it rushes past and always onward. Your quarry will hither to you, its instincts will spring it forth from the flow. So make your cast, calling to people when they are a good ten paces away, allowing yourself time to answer their response. Your cast flits in the flow, but do not allow it to be subsumed into the flow. As soon as your cast lands unheeded, begin to cast again; you are the focus point of a looped arc. Eventually, your cast will strike a target, and you and the target will be frozen together as the flow continues onward.
If you cannot foster a sense of this duality—of isolation and immersion—then the fact that you are asking thousands of people for money will be inescapable and suffocating.
This work is not hard – but it is tough. If you’re not careful, it’s hard on your feet and brutal on your soul. In the New York Office, with its staff of 60 or so, a few canvassers would drop out each day. As far as our mission is concerned, however, each canvasser had a numerical value: each canvasser – even the ones who are just good or competent – brings in hundreds of dollars a day. The logic of numbers out on the street applies in the office as well. Therefore, canvassing is really only half of the operation – the other half is recruiting and training more canvassers.
posted by Greg Bloom at 6/05/2005 10:44:00 PM
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