Future President
 

Hey ya'll! I'm going to run for president of my chapter in a month. :eek: As far as I know, no one else is running for that position. (Is that typical in everyone else's chapters that you have to pull teeth to get someone to be president?)

So since I am probably going to get the job, I wanna be the best darn president this chapter has ever seen. I'm looking for a little advice. What are things that your presidents did that you thought were really good?...were really bad? From the stand point of a president, what thing stressed you out the most and how did you deal with it? From the stand point of a member, what do you wish your exec council had done differently or better?

I'm looking for anything and everything you have to give me. Thanks in advance for the help!

My advice would be to:
1. Stay level headed
2. Realize that you may have to separate yourself from the chapter emotionally
3. Don't play favorites
4. Don't get dragged into drama.. nip it in the bud
5. Stay organized and run your meetings efficiently
6. To keep yourself sane, limit your availability to office hours. Do NOT accept 2 am phone calls from Suzy Sorority who is complaining because Loose Lisa kissed her boyfriend. That is a personal issue, not a sorority issue. Be able to identify the difference and define EMERGENCY situations for your members.

Don't be afraid to make decisions. That's what leaders do...at least good leaders do. There is a time and place for gathering opinions, and then there is a time for some one to step up and lead. That's the president's job. This will really prepare you for making decisions later in life. Good luck!

My advice would be to remember that in a chapter of any size there are going to be different opinions and no matter how hard you try, you will never make every sister happy. Accept this and be prepared to stand behind your decision - like a good leader should. That said, good luck running for president! My chapter usually only had one or two girls running for a president in any given year - in the 4 elections I saw, only one had more than one sister running.

I agree that you can't be afraid to make decisions (inaction is worse than action sometimes) but unless there is a timeliness issue, involve the chapter with whatever "decision" you are making. If you force the chapter into something you think is a good idea, chances are that the chapter will just change right back after your mere year is over. So what do you do? Use your influence to truly persuade people individually that change is necessary (if that is your situation). That is a mistake I made as a chapter president. If I was to do it all over again, these would be my goals:

1. Keep an outwardly positive attitude.

2. Have more frequent meetings with the recruitment chair and be her right-hand sister. Practice what I preach as far as recruitment goes and not let myself think that my role as president superceded my role as a chapter member and to get out and recruit quality girls.

3. Be honest and up front with anyone who is causing a problem and don't be afraid to talk about things that are awkward. Never delegate this, either.

4. Realize that sometimes as chapter president you feel like the person with the least faith in sisterhood. Your "friends" in the chapter might start to see you differently and you may lose those friends in the end, but don't let that affect your belief in sisterhood and the group as a whole. When you lose faith, so does everyone else.

5. A sorority chapter is not a business and you are not there to teach more irresponsible members how to follow through, not procrastinate, etc. Some people will be like that their entire lives and it is not up to you to teach them that if they can't get X turned in on time that X will not happen. Be flexible and always ask yourself what is best for the chapter in the end.

I very much disagree with this one. A sorority chapter IS a business, and it is a VERY good time to learn the lessons that will help them when they get out in the "real" world. The sorority experience starts exactly like a job, with an interview, which in sorority terms is rush. You hold business meetings that everyone is expected to attend. You set budgets and goals and have deadlines and turn in reports. The only difference is that the sorority's "product" is a social organization, as opposed to marketable services or goods. I do agree, however, that there will be people that procrastinate their entire lives, and someone will have to pick up the slack, but again...no different that the "real world".

I VERY MUCH agree -- SigKap, listen to AlphaFrog! She is dead on on this.

I agree as well. At some of the larger greek schools, the yearly chapter budget tops a million dollars. The president gets a real world look into what it takes to run a company!

I was President of my Collegiate Chapter as well as President of several other organizations, in college and also in profesional organizations.
Being President is A LOT OF WORK!!! You DO have to run it like a business!!! You also need to forget about wanting to win any popularity contest-you are not going to please everyone!!!
My advice:

1) Make sure you have read your Chapter's By-Laws and pretty much convert to memory;

2) Make sure you memorize your Chapter's Rules & Regs and Disciplinary actions;

3) READ, several times, your National's By-Laws, Rules & Regs, etc.

4) PAY ATTENTION during your officer training and TAKE NOTES!!!

5) READ your Officer Manual

6) Having a GOOD working relationship with your exec Board;

7) Have handy (AT ALL TIMES) all of your National's contact info and cell phone numbers in the event you need to contact them at 3 AM;

8) Learn how to delegate, learn how to manage your time and follow up with your members;

9) Set times when members can call you and/or come to your room (And STICK to these times)

10) Listen to ALL sides before taking action.

11) Purchase your own copy of Robert's Rules of Order

12) Stay Neutral

13) When in doubt, contact your HQ and ASK!!! They are there to help you. (Don't forget to thank them when you have asked for assistance.)

I can go on and on. You will hear EVERYTHING and your members will confide in you regarding things you would rather not know. Be Prepared!!!

It is a very exhausting and time consuming office, but it is also very rewarding.


Phi Mu Alum

I would also like to add, one thing that I started the year I was President of my collegiate chapter was "Pass the Gavel". We sat in a huge circle and passed the gavel to each sister. EVERYONE had a chance to speak if they wanted to and they could say ANYTHING they wanted. Anything that was said in the room STAYED in the room. If anything was found otherwise, there was severe disciplinary action taken.

As I mentioned above, as President, you will hear EVERYTHING. A lot of times, what you hear are several sides to the same story. You learn how to mediate pretty quickly. Passing the Gavel was one way to get these things out in the open and resoleved before there were any further hurt feelings.

I am happy to know that this tradition of Passing the Gavel is STILL being done in my chapter (I won't even tell you how many years that it has been). After our Pass the Gavel Meeting (sometimes it could last a couple of hours), our chapter was always a lot closer and we were all able to see the other person's side of the story.

Phi Mu Alum

Is there anything specifically that would make more frequent meetings with the recruitment chair helpful? Is it to ensure that progress has been made so that Work Week and Recruitment are less stressful? Or that we are on the same page for the kind of members we wanna recruit and how we can improve our strategy as a chapter for recruiting those girls? Something else?

It's funny that you mention this because I was thinking I would make it a tradition to bi-monthly have a short sisterhood like "Gavel Pass" during chapter where we talk about what in the chapter is driving us nuts and what we are doing well, also "Cross the Line" where you ask the members who have done or experienced something to step forward--some of the experiences are funny and some are really emotional like abuse and rape. This would be a way to show that these are the kinds of things we can talk about as sisters. My theory is that if we take care of our sisters and our sisterhood, everything else will fall into place--grades, reputation, etc. Are there any more activities like this that would really help us build our already wonderful sisterhood?

We had the "cross the line" type of discussions at our retreats. Chapters don't tend to be a time when everyone's ok with doing that.

We did a gavel pass regularly that was simply a time to say anything you wanted, but it was always good. I do recommend that you use something like a suggestion box because people may not feel like they can speak up honestly about issues they're having. But as president, letting everyone know they can approach you with issues is a good thing. At the same time, be willing to delegate those issues when appropriate. You can't fix everything.

Only YOU will know your chapter and what is going on (and they will all bring their "stuff" to you because they will want you to be on their side.

As far as having a Pass the Gavel bi-monthly, I personally think that is a bit much. Trust me, you will instinctively KNOW when the time is right. I think once you get through your first one and sisters feel comfortable sharing, more will speak up the next time.

The suggestion box is good, but who will be responsible for reading all the suggestions? I guess it all depends on the size of your chapter. But for a large chapter with 100+ women, you may not have the time to read all the suggestions.

Another suggestion I would make would be to create a Yahoo Group for your members to join. This way, you only have to send out one e-mail.

As far as a box, I've not seen everyone put suggestions in the box. It's more of a "if you have questions/problems feel free" thing. And if everyone IS putting something in there, you probably have issues to address anyway.

Just out of curiousity, do you currently hold an office that is currently part of the Exec. Board?

What is the size of your chapter?

I am not currently on Exec. I was studying abroad last term and couldn't run for an office, but I was PanDel the year before. Currently we are at our largest membership in about 20 years at 95 women.

many times the president's duty is to supervise and to make sure that the other officers are doing their job. sometimes the inclination is to "just do it yourself" because the person who is supposed to complete the task is dragging her feet-don't fall into that trap, or you might find yourself doing your job and theirs! a good president is on task and makes sure that the other officers are too.

delegate.

don't be afraid to ask for assistance when you need it.

engage your advisors-they're not paid for their time, are there because of the love they have for their organization and truly do have the chapters best interests at heart.

My comment about a sorority not being like a business is focused on this point that Alphafrog and I both agree on. I agree with her comparisons that sororities ARE like businesses in other ways.

My main point is that in business, if someone isn't carrying their weight they get fired or disciplined. I tried to instill increased accountability as chapter president and it backfired into lowering morale and in the end, the same people were accountable and the same people were unaccountable. Unsuccessful ways of doing this were: not letting officers add last minute things to nightly agenda meetings because it is supposed to be pre-approved by executive council; refusing to fax paperwork for an event to headquarters because an officer ALWAYS turned in the paperwork at the last minute (2-3 days before the event) instead of weeks in advance so that HQ can review it; refusing to delay a committee meeting 10-15 minutes because half the committee shows up late. Positive reinforcement (recognizing the people who do their job well) only worked so much... so as chapter president I initially thought that if you just refused to cooperate and clean up after others' irresponsibility that eventually people would learn to be punctual and responsible. I wish that instead I would have focused on other things entirely during that first semester of being President because it zapped so much of my energy putting out the hurt feelings it caused and I doubt it improved the chapter at all.

If you (or AlphaFrog) can think of ways to get people to be more accountable without doing lowering morale, that is great -- please share because I'd love to pass anything on to the chapter now that I am an advisor.

I think the point of having more frequent meetings is so that there is good communication between the two offices. Many years it seemed like the Pres. and Recruitment chair were operating on different wavelengths with very different ideas about how to achieve certain goals. Think how much stronger two dedicated officers can be when you're focusing and prioritizing the same things! Is the priority goal to have more publicity about the chapter for the next recruitment? Is the priority goal to have better events planned? Is the priority goal to have a better recruitment workshop to help make chit chat less awkward? In an ideal world, we'd do everything, but the reality is that there need to be priorities and I think that the recruitment chair and president should make sure they are supporting eachother rather than zapping steam and chapter involvement from what the other officer sees as important, too.

[QUOTE=skylark;1534774

My main point is that in business, if someone isn't carrying their weight they get fired or disciplined. I tried to instill increased accountability as chapter president and it backfired into lowering morale and in the end, the same people were accountable and the same people were unaccountable. If you (or AlphaFrog) can think of a way to get people to be more accountable without doing this, that is great, but I couldn't ever do it.[/QUOTE]

putting them in charge of planning and implementing an event can sometimes get thru to them. they begin to understand how much work planning and event takes and how good it feels when people participate in an event that they have planned(or how bad you feel when you do all this work and participation is minimal).

Our chapter didn't hesitate to pull people out of postions (including Exec) who were not doing their job. Yes, those people probably got pissed, but we were a small chapter and couldn't afford to have officers not pulling their weight. Also, it IS the President's job to designate, but that doesn't mean that those officers can't designate further down the line. Not to say that you should get someone to do your job FOR you, but if you're the Rush chair, and you need to cut out 200 Dove nametags by tomorrow, and you've also got a physics test and an english paper due, it IS ok to pass the task on to someone else, rather than screwing yourself or it just not getting done. That would be a suggestion for the President to bring up at exec, or with a person privately who's not getting their job done. Something along the lines of "Rhonda Rushchair, why was there no maroon punch? If you don't have time to go to the store, it's OK to ask another sister to do it for you. We are all here to help you.":)

So this portion was an added edit a couple minutes ago.. I assumed that my edit would copy before the last two people read the comment or responded... sorry! Next time I will just respond again instead of assuming no one is reading the post yet.

I think this is an excellent point. How small of a chapter were you? I think the reason we never did this was because we had too many officers for the amount of people in the sorority and most had at least 2 offices already and so electing to remove people from office would have meant someone else in the chapter would have had to pick up a 3rd office. Just one more problem in chapters that is solved by having good numbers... (sigh)

We were around 30. And yes, at some point we had people in 2 exec offices AND a chair or officer position. But, that's where the designation comes in...one person doesn't have time to do all of that themselves, but most could get the sisters who weren't responsible enough to have the postion themselves to do things to help out.

ETA: SigKapChatter - it sounds like you DO have good numbers, so DO NOT let a sister sit in a postion and not do her job. Yes, that girl will probably be pissed when she gets kicked out of office, but it's better than letting the rest of the chapter get pissed at her for things not getting done (and you for letting her not do her job). Her pride will heal faster then the rest of the chapter's resentment.

Passing the gavel can cause a lot of problems.

While what is said is to stay in the room with no hard feelings is not true.

The Human ego will not let that happen and it can fester into a bigger problem than is wanted or needed.

It is true, that if a person is not doing thier job, then sit down with them and discuss it with them. If that doesn't work, the total chapter knows and it will become a hardship on the chapter. If that is the case, they need to be removed for the betterment.

When I was talking about regular short sisterhoods, I didn't necessarily mean one as intense as pass the gavel every time. I think that would be overkill. And pass the gavel is not intended to solve person-to-person problems but rather air out some issue that is weighing down the whole chapter.

I don't just want to be a maintainer president that keeps the chapter from going down hill. I think we're really strong as we are, but that of course, we could use some improvements. I want to build people up, especially the officers.

Some issues that I see in the chapter are:
1. Respecting officers.
2. Participation in chapter events--whether philanthropies, community service, school pride events, everything except social events
3. A few officers not living up to their responsibilities.
4. Helping each and every member to be a better person than they were before they became Sigma Kappas.

I think these are pretty typical life issues that will never be completely solved. My girls are wonderful just as they are, but how can we make each other better? Do you have any advice for these issues?

I love the feedback I'm getting and I can really see how a lot of it will apply to our specific chapter. Thanks for the help!

Future Chapter Presidents: Rely on your adviser. You won't always have all the answers. Neither will she, but she can help you find them and the sooner you clue her in, the more quickly a disaster can be averted.

Hold Chapter-Wide Town Hall style meetings once a semester. This is an opportunity (timed -- keep it to one hour!) where everyone can speak up about issues bugging them and propose solutions that are in accord with chapter bylaws.

Be confrontational. Don't pick fights, but if someone acts inappropriately, address it.

If someone isn't pulling her weight --> pull her aside and tell her what she can do to improve. If the officer is not responsive and continues not to do her job --> take it to a standards hearing where she will have the opportunity to resign or complete a probation where she requires extra supervision to conduct her office duties. Should she fail the probation requirements, she will be removed from her office. This process allows the officers a chance to be put on notice, to get any back-up or help they need and a reasonable chance to do their job as they are expected.

Make a good impression on the new members. They see you as the ultimate ABC --> they will model your behavior inside and outside the chapter house. It's not cool for the chapter president to be carried home by a fraternity member because she got sick and embarrassed herself at a party. Get good grades. They are watching you. Act like a lady. They will follow you. Encourage them to get involved on campus and to become a sorority officer. They will listen if you follow your own example, and you will help ensure that all your hard work leaves a lasting legacy.