Grassroots Tips

What’s Your WHY?

December 19, 2025 by Drew McKissick in Grassroots Tips | Leave a comment

Why are you involved? What do you care about and why?

When you’re involved in politics, one of the most important things that you can do in order to be more successful and have a greater impact on the things that you care about is to know “why”.

What’s important? What are you trying to change? Why are you running for office? Why are you volunteering to help a candidate or an organization? Why are you donating money?

Knowing your “why” keeps you centered, especially through all of the unpleasant things (and people) that you have to deal with by virtue of being involved in politics. It’s the North Star that can guide your next steps, and it’s the fuel that can drive you forward and help get you up in the morning.

You Need To Know “Why?”

For political activists, you need to know why for yourself, but also so you can communicate it to others.

For candidates, it’s what can give you that “fire in the belly” to keep going, to do the organizing, the events, the media, and raising the money that it takes to run a successful campaign. It helps you answer the “Why are you running” question.  (See this 1979 example of Ted Kennedy not being able to answer “why?”) 

Remember, sooner or later “stupid” is going to catch up with you. Maybe in the form of events, a process, or rules. Maybe a person that you have to deal with, or people saying things about you on social media that they wouldn’t say in church, and who make being involved seem like a visit to the dentist.

When that happens, (and it will), the odds that you could burnout or quit go up. And if that happens, then you won’t have any impact at all.

In order to push through, keep going and make a difference, you need to know “why”.

So, what’s YOUR why?

How to Create a Political Elevator Pitch

November 12, 2025 by Drew McKissick in Grassroots Tips | Leave a comment

political elevator pitchJust as every business needs to “sell” something, politics and public policy is about sales too. And people respond (or not) to political messages in pretty much the same way that they do to any other sales pitch.

Good messages that are relevant are more likely to cut through the clutter. Bad messages get tuned out.

When it comes to effectively communicating a message, there are a lot of great lessons from the business world that we can apply to politics. One of them is known as the “elevator pitch”. It’s a condensed way to get a clear and convincing idea or proposal across to someone else in about the time that it takes to ride in an elevator. A quick and succinct summary of what you’re doing, why, and what you want people to do.

What’s the thumbnail version? Why is it important? Can you bottom-line it in thirty seconds or less? In a way that defines a problem to fit your solution, and describes how your solution will fix it? Or, in a way that matters to your target audience?

Outline of a Political Elevator Pitch:

  • Describe your idea, what you’re trying to do or the result that you want
  • Why is it important? Make it relevant to people and their values.
  • Describe the key benefits of your “solution”. What’s in it for them?
  • Clearly state what they need to do. Make it easy and actionable.

Be sure to frame the problem in a way that fits your solution. Be passionate and use “benefit” focused terms. Be concise and clear. Write it down. Read it. Then delete anything that’s not critical.

Remember, the trick is to get all of this across in a few sentences, or about thirty seconds.

Making yourself go through the process of creating a good elevator pitch can help you clarify what you’re “selling” in your own mind, and get a better understanding of the point of view of your target audience.

If you’re going to go to the trouble of speaking out for a policy or proposal that you believe in, (or even run a campaign), then you may as well go to the (slightly more) trouble of crafting a clear and concise message that can help you be more successful.

Otherwise, what’s the point?

Don’t Quit

November 5, 2025 by Drew McKissick in Grassroots Tips, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

What happens when you quit?  Nothing.  Or at least not anything that you’d want to happen.

It’s one of the few guarantees that we have in politics: if you quit, you’re usually guaranteed not to like the results.

When you’re not involved, it’s more likely that things will not go your way.  You’re giving up your seat at the table to someone who probably doesn’t think like you do, or who doesn’t have the same priorities as you.

The Law of the Jungle says that, if you sit still long enough, something’s going to eat you.  Others will take advantage and gain ground against what you believe, or possibly even undo something that you’ve been able to accomplish.

We quit too easy

The problem is that too many conservatives have a lot of “quit” in them.  We get upset, get involved, ramp up, make a difference, then quit and go home and leave things up to someone else.  Or maybe we lose, get mad, then quit and go home.  Neither is a recipe for long-term political success.

Quitting leads to the additional problem of having to spend too much time ramping-up, rather than staying engaged and being ready for the next battle.  It wastes time, resources, opportunities and potentially any previously hard-won gains.

Ramping-up is expensive.  Staying engaged is cheaper and more productive in the long-run.

The question is, do we want to make a difference and have an impact, or just complain?

Proverbs 12:24

Years ago I adopted Proverbs 12:24 as a political motto.  It tells us that “The hand of the diligent shall bear rule; but the slothful shall be under tribute”.  If we feel like we’re “under tribute” politically – and there are a LOT of reasons to feel that way – it tells us why.  Someone, at some point, got lazy and quit.  Maybe that was us or someone else, but that’s spilled milk at this point.

One of the great things about scripture is that it not only diagnoses our problems, but it also tells us how to fix them.  To make a difference, we have to be diligent.

So don’t quit!

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