New joining process - what's the incentive to join?

With the new year, Equity is implementing a new joining process for artists working in theatre. You can find much more detail on that here, here, and in the most recent Council Link. The new approach moves away from encouraging immediate joining, to encouraging informed joining once an artist's career has developed some momentum.

So, you may ask, what will be the incentive to join Equity, if non-members can have (at least temporary) access to scale fees and other contract protections?

The Old: To begin with, I should probably point out that something akin to the new scenario has existed for a while already – it was called Probationary or Provisional Membership. It was not used extensively, partly because of the registration fees involved, and partly because many new joins weren't even made aware of the option. The new approach takes that model and both improves and refines it considerably.

In the past, the "incentive" to join Equity was usually pretty simple: if you wanted that Equity contract being offered to you, then you essentially had to join. That was the basis on which we got around 85% of new members. This approach was great at racking up new joins and initiation fees, but it also brought in a lot of new members:

• whose first impression of Equity is that they were forced to join
• whose brand-new careers meant they still had a very uncertain career path ahead of them
• who felt constrained by Equity membership responsibilities at a point when they most needed to explore all options open to them
• who might never work again, or only rarely
• who were really doing a one-off tangent on a related career
• who had no idea what obligations they were assuming as a member
• etc.

The New: Recent changes largely prohibit immediate joining in theatre simply by virtue of signing a contract. Non-members now have access to theatre contracts on a permit basis, but there will be no actual membership, and consequently only time-limited access to basic benefits. Following the contract, the artist is exactly as much a non-member as they were before, so do not get to vote on things, have priority at auditions, etc. Nada.

Of course, we still want to encourage membership, but permittees must now apply to join. Also, that process will be shifted to the Equity office, not conducted in an engager's or agent's office. We will have the chance to say to potential joins "are you sure you are ready for this?" and provide them with the info they need to make an informed decision. 

In order to make certain that non-members do not abuse the new system, there is a cap on the number of permits allowed, following which we will revert to the previous, gotta-join "incentive".
There will continue to be some circumstances where permits are not applicable. These include situations where a pre-existing career or reciprocal agreements would require joining, or for long running productions, where working without a full suite of protections is not something that Equity is willing to contemplate.

Going forward, the "incentive" to join will be a real incentive: that non-members want access to what they are missing, and have a career that would benefit from the services and support we can provide.