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Well, I must have barked a little louder than I realized. My apologies. I do appreciate everyone's perspectives, dedication and passion.
KEPike, it's great to hear about these regional recruitment seminars. That should help provide some much needed grassroots horsepower.
Firehouse, to you accurate observations of the demise (or lack of success) at flagship institutions, I tend to believe the cause is a lack of local alumni support. And I don't need the number of alumni in a particular area, or their willingness to volunteer. Most important is their ability.
Building, maintaning and enhancing our alumni assets is a shared responsibility - but HQ is the party best equipped to lead. I'm not sure if it's HQ lack of success or a true lack of quality prospects, but I believe our alumni assets are in dire straits. This, I believe, speaks directly to your campus observations. No where have we been able to maintain success without able alumni leadership. No where. This, of course, isn't the appropriate forum to engage in an analysis of individual campus and alumni groups, but I firmly believe our troubles are related to a lack of competent and consistent alumni support. (I'm not pointing fingers at alumni, I'm just saying that they ain't there! It's up to chapters, HQ and other alums to find 'em, train 'em and reward 'em!) Just like with chapters, it's not all about numbers. We might have 200+ chapter advisors, but how many really fit the bill? And, why does HQ and some of our chapters tolerate that?
I believe we have and will again kick some real ass in the interfraternity world. As we engage in that battle for supremacy, we have to take stock of our assets. My view is that we have several investments to make if we're going to win this battle and then protect the hill.
I would be very interested in seeing chapters share their recruitment plans in some type of confidential or consultative manner. Maybe inCircle is the way. Do we have a template that we give to chapters to help them build a plan? If so, maybe we could create some way of giving rush chairmen feedback on their plan along with customized solutions. Sort of a recruitment consulting function.
But... all the information in the world isn't going to advance IIKA until we are ready to 1) challenge assumptions and 2) work our rears off!
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