Find Leaders on Your Campus
INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. - Finding leaders for your chapter or colony is a difficult task. To build excellence, you need to find leaders who do not command excellence, but rather construct excellence. Excellence is defined as being all you can be, within the bounds of doing what is right for the organization. To reach excellence you must first find leaders of good character. They must do everything they are supposed to do. An organization will not achieve excellence by figuring out where it wants to go, having leaders do whatever they have to in order to get the job done, and then hoping their leaders acted with good character. This type of thinking is backwards. Pursuing excellence should not be confused with accomplishing a job or task. Excellence starts with leaders of good and strong character who engage in the entire process of leadership. And the first process is finding a person of honorable character.
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"Waste no time arguing what a good man should be. Be one." - Marcus Aurelius
Character develops over time. Many think that much of a person’s character is formed early in life. However, we do not know exactly how much or how early character develops. But, it is safe to claim that character does not change quickly. A man’s observable behavior is an indication of his character. This behavior can be strong or weak, good or bad. A person with strong character shows drive, energy, determination, self-discipline, willpower, and nerve. He sees what he wants and goes after it. He attracts followers. On the other hand, a person with weak character shows none of these traits. He does not know what he wants. He is disorganized, indecisive and inconsistent. He will attract no followers.
A strong person can be good or bad. The leader of a gang is an example of a strong person with a bad character, while an outstanding community leader is one with both strong and good characteristics. A chapter needs leaders with both strong and good characteristics, people who will guide them to the future and show that they can be trusted. This is not always the Prytanis, but often is an executive board member.
“Courage - not complacency - is our need today. Leadership not salesmanship.” - John F. Kennedy
To be an effective leader, your fellow Fraters must have trust in you and they need to be sold on your vision. Korn-Ferry International, an executive search company, surveyed organizations on what they want from their leaders. According to the survey, respondents said they wanted people who were both ethical and who convey a strong vision of the future. In any organization, a leader's actions set the pace. This behavior wins trust, loyalty, and ensures the organization's continued vitality. One of the ways to build trust is to display a good sense of character composed of beliefs, values, skills, and traits.
Beliefs are what we hold dear and are rooted deeply within us. They could be assumptions or convictions that you hold true regarding people, concepts, or things. They could be the beliefs about life, death, religion, what is good, what is bad, what is human nature, or more.
Values are attitudes about the worth of people, concepts, or things. For example, you might value a good car, home, friendship, personal comfort, or relatives. Values are important as they influence a person's behavior to weigh the importance of alternatives. For example, you might value friends more than privacy, while others might be the opposite.
Skills are the knowledge and abilities that a person gains throughout life. The ability to learn a new skill varies with each individual. Some skills come almost naturally, while others come only by complete devotion to study and practice.
Traits are distinguishing qualities or characteristics of a person, while character is the sum total of these traits. There are hundreds of personality traits, far too many to be discussed here. Instead, we will focus on a few that are crucial for a leader. The more of these you see exhibited in a new member, the more likely they will become a leader in your chapter.
Traits of a Good Leader
Honesty - Sincerity, integrity, and candor in all actions.
Competence - Their actions should be based on reason and moral principles. They do not make rash decisions based on emotion. What does that mean?
Forward-looking – They have a clear set of goals and have a vision of the future. They habitually pick priorities stemming from their basic values.
Inspiring – They display confidence in all they do. By showing endurance in mental, physical, and spiritual arenas, they will inspire others to reach for new heights.
Intelligent – They read, study, and seek challenging assignments.
Fair-minded – They show fair treatment to all people. Prejudice is the enemy of justice. They display empathy by being sensitive to the feelings, values, interests, and well-being of others.
Broad-minded – They actively seek out diversity.
Courageous – They have the perseverance to accomplish a goal, regardless of the seemingly insurmountable obstacles and display a confident calmness when under stress.
Straightforward – They use sound judgment to make a good decision at the right time.
Imaginative – They make timely and appropriate changes in their thinking, plans, and methods. They show creativity by thinking of new and better goals, ideas, and solutions to problems.
Finding the Right Men
In analyzing the pool of men on campus, three types emerge. First is the type that will always join a group. These men will join fraternities with very little effort. These men are legacies, friends of current members, or acquaintances of alumni, and have been positively influenced by the benefits of Greek affiliation. Often, this group participates in the recruitment process. This pool has dramatically decreased over the past 30 years.
What is the percentage of Greeks on your campus? The number may vary from less than 1% to 70%. Unfortunately, the number of campuses which have a larger system is declining. Look at the percentage on your campus, and those that will predominantly be in the always join group.
The second type is the never-join group. Men in this category philosophically do not agree with Greek organizations or have no interest in campus involvement. No matter what the chapter does, these men will not join the Greek community.
The third and largest group is the maybe-join group, potentially 50-70% of the male population. Included in this group are first generation college students, multi-cultural students, upperclassmen, and transfer students. These students do not have complete information on the Greek experience, nor do they have positive acquaintances in fraternities.
One method for attracting the maybe-join group is "Recruitment Through Scholarship." By offering a "books" ($250) scholarship to incoming freshmen, you can increase the market from which you recruit. This method will attract those individuals who make up between 50% and 70% of students on your campus. Remember, you are marketing to students whose parents were either not in Greek-letter organizations or they are unsure of any affiliation; those who will need to work to finance their education; and who have not had contact with a fraternity and who plan on attending graduate school and may clump you in with the traditional social fraternities.
These ideal candidates do more than just raise the chapter Grade Point Average, they can help improve the chapter's study habits. After all, you are in college to get a quality education and take the skills you learn into a career. A fraternity setting helps you gain many marketable abilities, but one of the most important is the ability to show a potential employer you have sound academic understanding of the field you are entering. Offering a scholarship will enhance the overall talent pool by introducing the organization as a serious commitment. Much like working to obtain your degree, the fraternity offers a proving ground for professional and personal development, invaluable intangibles that give you an upper hand upon graduation. Recruitment Through Scholarship is a great way to get the best students on your campus through your door quickly.
Needs Assessment
A second method is to create a standards sheet to evaluate potential new members. This is more formally called a Needs Assessment. We are often in too much of a hurry. We implement a solution, sometimes, but not always the correct one. But we plan, very carefully and cautiously, before making decisions like what t-shirt to create for recruitment or what the next themed social event will occur. We need to redirect our efforts when evaluating what the chapter needs. When creating standards, keep them articulate and quantifiable. Strong chapters recruit men smarter than the "average" student. Set your GPA standard higher than the all-student GPA for upper classmen and above the average incoming student GPA, SAT, and/ or ACT for freshmen. Tau Kappa Epsilon strives for an outstanding fraternity experience, and is intended for outstanding men. Increase standards over time to ensure the chapter's strength is improved. Be sure all Fraters know chapter recruitment standards.
When planning for recruitment, you should constantly be evaluating yourself as a chapter to ensure certain positions are filled. This is called "GAP" analysis. The first step is to check the actual performance of the chapter and the members against existing standards, or to set new standards. There are two parts to this:
- Current situation: You must determine the current state of skills, knowledge, and abilities of our current and/ or future Fraters. This analysis also should examine the chapter goals, climate, and internal and external constraints.
- Desired or necessary situation: You must identify the desired or necessary conditions for organizational and personal success. This analysis focuses on the necessary job tasks/ standards, as well as the skills, knowledge, and abilities needed to accomplish these successfully. It is important that you identify the critical tasks necessary, and not just observe the current practices. You also must distinguish the actual needs from the perceived needs, your wants.
The difference, or "gap", between the current and the necessary will identify your needs, purposes, and objectives. For example, if you have a senior class full of intramural athletes, then you should be looking for individuals who are good athletes to replace them. This is not to say they should not also meet the other criteria, such as a good GPA or community service hours, but sometimes potential new members excel in some areas and struggle in others. This is where a well-balanced chapter can help a man become a better overall individual.
In order to help put this in perspective, think of the chapter as a football team. Each position on the field is vital to either the success or failure of the goals planned. No single team member is more important than the other, conversely without the entire team working together nothing will be accomplished. A committee can plan the perfect event, have every concern solved, and without members showing up, it will be a complete disaster. Similarly, a chapter that has no prytanis will have no direction or decision-maker. That said, not every potential new member will have all of the tools necessary to be a leader within the organization. It's okay. Don't panic if you can't find the perfect man to replace you when graduation comes. Try to think back to when you were a new member. You didn't know anything about the chapter or what it needed. However, over time you were able to learn what the strengths and weaknesses were and how best you could help achieve success. This is the key to unlocking the potential of your chapter. Find men that are willing to learn from the members and develop their skills, so when you cross the stage and accept the diploma, new Fraters will continue to carry the torch you helped light.
No matter what standards you come up with as a chapter, the TKE Cornerstone Principles of Leadership, Character, Teamwork, Brotherhood, Scholarship, & Service should always be on the forefront. Men entering college, and even upperclassman, will not always be fulfilling each standard, but that is why the TKE experience is so important. As a chapter and TKE Nation, we all step in to help make each man better for having joined.
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