Hosting an Educational Leadership Consultant

Guest Blogger, Mandi Wise Evans, Director of Membership Services

The Educational Leadership Consultant (ELC) visit can be one of the most informative and rewarding experiences for a collegiate chapter. Every Delta Zeta chapter will experience a consultant visit at one time or another.

Our ELCs are recent graduates who have been hired by Delta Zeta to serve as ambassadors for the National Organization. ELCs are well versed in all areas of chapter operations including recruitment, membership education, risk management, Panhellenic, programming, alumnae relations, philanthropy and every other aspect that makes up Delta Zeta. They are full of excitement, new ideas and, most of all, love for Delta Zeta! After all, they too are Delta Zetas. Below are some tips and thoughts to consider when the ELC arrives on your doorstep:

1. Create a schedule for the ELC. It is helpful for the ELC to know who she is meeting with and when. Meetings should be planned with Executive Board and Chapter Officers, the CCD and any other member who may wish to meet with her. Sometimes chapters have an ELC Coordinator who is responsible for coordinating the ELCs schedule during the visit. Other times the President or other Executive Board member handles this. Whatever works with your chapter! Psst…it’s also useful for her to have a phone number or email address for each person she is meeting with in the event that a meeting runs late or someone no shows.

2. Build in meal times for the ELC. Some chapters will assign specific members to eat with the ELC or schedule meetings during meals. Make sure she has some sisters to eat with. If you have a chapter house, make sure she is aware of the meal times in the house so she doesn’t accidentally miss lunch or dinner. It’s also helpful if the ELC is told where the chapter keeps snacks or where snacks can be purchased so that she can have some brain food even if it’s not the scheduled lunch or dinner. Want to go above and beyond? Consider providing your ELC with a welcome basket that includes some snacks that she can have during her visit and possibly pack in her carry-on once she departs. She will thank you for it if she accidentally misses dinner!

3. Provide her with transportation to and from the airport and to and from any off campus meetings. Remember, she won’t be familiar with your campus as it is probably her first time being there, and more than likely she won’t have a car. Be sure someone is designated to make sure she gets from A to B on time. Oh…and she will need towels, a place to sleep and a meeting area so don’t forget those things too!

4. Include the ELC in daily chapter activities. ELCs LOVE to see all the fun and unique things that chapters do. If you are hosting a COB event be sure you let the ELC know, if you are having a sisterhood event include her, if a group is going for some FroYo let her know, if a philanthropy event is happening make sure she attends. One of the best ways for an ELC to get to know a chapter is to hang out with them. After all she is a sister too! Want some major bonus points? Plan an event specifically during the ELC visit so she has the opportunity to meet and interact with as many chapter members as possible. Simply having a sisterhood event during her visit would work!

5. Pick her brain! ELCs have the opportunity to visit many, many, many chapters. They see lots of ideas both within Delta Zeta and within Panhellenic systems. They are full of all types of knowledge! When they are visiting your chapter, take advantage of the opportunity to tap into all of the things that they have seen and learned through their travels. It will be totally worth your five minute conversation!

6. Show off! Have a cool campus tradition? Know where to get the best burger in town? Have a place where many celebrity sightings have happened? Know something unique to your campus or college city/town? Have a cool campus event happening? Show them off to the ELC! The ELCs are full time travelers so they enjoy learning about all the different things that make up your campus, your community and your chapter. You never know-the idea she sees on your campus may end up as the next big thing at her next visit.

So there you have it! Six different ideas of ways to maximize your ELC visit. Remember your ELC is visiting your chapter to provide feedback, offer new insight and ideas and provide you with a link to the National Organization. Use her expertise to your advantage. She will appreciate all the courtesies extended to her during her visit. Who knows…maybe she will impact you just enough so that you will be one of the next road warriors? You just never know!

Membership Status Updates in Chapter Inc.

With the January 16 memo to College Chapter Directors announcing the updated membership status process, this is the perfect time to review the Membership Actions in Chapter Inc. Before going to Chapter Inc. to complete the action for the first time, we suggest reviewing the Membership Actions Guide in the Chapter Inc. Tools Container on DZ Metro. It will walk you through the different types of membership changes you can make with the Membership Action – Manage Members in Chapter Inc.

Any changes in membership need to be reported through Chapter Inc. when they happen.  The Chapter President, Secretary, Treasurer, Vice President of Membership and Vice President of New Member Education all have rights to manage members in Chapter Inc.  You may make the following membership changes through Chapter Inc.:  New Members - Initiate or Depledge; Collegiate Members - Graduate, Suspended/Severed, Fifth Year Alumna Status, Temporary Collegiate Status, Temporary Alumna Status, Left School or Affiliate.  

When a member depledges, is suspended/severed or affiliates, immediately change the member's status through Chapter Inc. and complete the appropriate paperwork.  Please note:  Initiate, Depledge, Fifth Year Alumna Status, Temporary Collegiate Status, Temporary Alumna Status, Suspended/Severed and Affiliation changes must be approved and processed before they become effective.  Until the changes are approved, the member will have a pending status.  When a member is on a pending status, the chapter is responsible for all financial obligations incurred for that member.

The updated process for approvals can be found in the Chapter Officer Resources Container – Collegiate Resources – Status folder.

You must input the following information to complete a membership status change:

• Effective date of the status change.  Effective date should correlate to the ceremony or resignation date.
• For initiations, you will be prompted for badge and guard selection for each newly initiated member.  

Updates on membership actions can take up to one hour for the system to process.

If you have questions on using Chapter Inc., please contact the support team at ChapterInc@dzshq.com.

Running an Effective Meeting

We attend lots of meetings – meetings with our academic advisor, group project meetings, chapter meetings, student organization meetings, and maybe Delta Zeta Executive Board meetings. We have all experienced meetings that were great and those that were just very, very bad.

Think back to both of those experiences. What were the common characteristics among them? During a great meeting, you most likely felt the organizers were prepared, your time was respected and your concerns were addressed. In a not so great meeting, you may have experienced disorganization, participants talking over one other or the meeting lasting 20 minutes past its end time.

In Delta Zeta we value our sisters’ time and opinions, so it is crucial as a chapter leader, to be prepared to run an effective meeting. Reflecting on the questions below can help you succeed, whether this is your first new member meeting as the VP of New Member Education or your final chapter meeting as President.

• What guidelines/structure am I expected to follow, if any? Some meetings require use of a specific structure or procedure. For example, formal chapter meetings must use Robert’s Rules of Order.
• What is the purpose of the meeting/What do you want to accomplish? Knowing exactly what the meeting is for will help clarify the agenda, the audience and the intended outcomes.
• Who needs to be there? If you want to work on a specific project, must the whole committee be there? Are you having a brainstorming session where it would be helpful to include your advisory team as well?

 

After reflecting on these questions, it is now time to plan your agenda, prepare your materials, and execute the meeting. Here are some tips to succeed:

• Set time limits for the meeting and agenda items. During the meeting, this can help focus the discussion and demonstrates to participants that you respect their time.
• Designate someone to record minutes and distribute these minutes within a reasonable time following the meeting. You may choose to use Google docs, a Yahoo group or email to distribute your minutes. Know what works for your members and use it. Recording the decisions made during the meeting will help in the creation of to-do lists and help those who were not able to attend stay connected with the organization.
• Consider creating a “parking lot”. If something comes up in the meeting that is off topic, but should be discussed later, put it in your “parking lot” and then figure out the best place for discussion following the meeting.
• Encourage and expect civility. Disagreement during meetings is inevitable and, contrary to popular opinion, positive. Thorough discussing agenda items from all points of view can only strengthen your decision and your organization. No matter how different the two points of view, you should always encourage and expect civility and respect among participants.

 

Additional Resources

• For more information about running a formal chapter meeting, please consult your Ritual Manual.
• For more information about running other Delta Zeta meetings, please consult the President’s Manual, found on DZ Metro > College Officer Resources > Collegiate Resources > Manuals.
• For more information on Parliamentary Procedure, visit http://www.rulesonline.com/index.html.

A New Year, A New Plan, A New Chapter

Guest Blogger – Ashley Patton Anderson, National Recruitment Chairman

A Special Message for Vice Presidents of Membership

I absolutely love this time of year!  Finally, a time for New Years resolutions and a chance to wipe the slate clean from the year before. It’s almost like when you were a kid playing games with your friends and you could count on there being a “do over”.

So why do I love New Years so much?  After much thought I came to the conclusion that I love it because it’s a time to take stock of where I am in my life. I always ask myself “what did I do well in the past year and what do I want to change in the New Year?” I take time and reflect on my current goals and then work on setting some new, fresh goals. Some of my goals and plans stay the same while some parts change.

Now you might ask yourself: what does this have to do with my chapter and my role as the VP of Membership?

When you consider areas of improvement, what goals are you setting for your chapter? What goals are your fellow sisters setting with regards to recruitment? What about yourself? Maybe you recognize that you need to improve your listening skills. The Membership Manual has great information about improving many of the communication skills you use every day and especially during recruitment.

Section 4 of the Membership Manual has information on recruitment communication.

When the Recruitment Committee published the new manuals last year we also included a road map of how to develop a year-long marketing strategy for your chapter. Part of developing this plan is to evaluate your chapter’s marketing and public relations plan. Take a look at what your chapter does well and identify areas in which your chapter can improve. You should work with your chapter, your CCD, and your RCD to develop this plan.

Section 2 of theMembership Manual has more information for you on evaluating and developing amarketing strategy for your chapter.

The new membership manual is full of great ideas to help you in your role as VP of Membership. Be sure to take a look at the manual and get started on your 2012 Membership goals today!

 Best of luck with your existing and new goals for 2012…what an exciting time in Delta Zeta!  

Chapter Operations: Academic reporting in Chapter Inc.

It is the start of a new term, and along with that comes the responsibility for entering your academic information from the previous term in Delta Zeta’s Chapter Inc. reporting website. It is the responsibility of the Academic Chairman to make sure this action is updated within two weeks of when your campus provides you with your chapter’s academic information. To access the form, first log into Chapter Inc. and go to Academics – Actions – and select Update Academics.

The first screen gives you an overview of the action, click Continue to move to the Selection Screen. This screen provides you with the blank forms to complete. Please choose the form by selecting the box to the left. Click Continue to move to the Enter Information step.

The Enter Information step is the actual form to complete on your chapter’s academic information. Please refer to the screen shot of the form for the information you must submit. If you do not have all of your chapter’s information when completing the action, please select the SAVE AND EXIT button in the RED BOX on the page to save changes to the form. You can then come back at a later time to complete the information.

If you have finished entering all information asked on the form, click Continue to move to the Verification screen. You should verify that all of the information is correct and sign the form with your electronic signature. Click Continue to move to the Receipt screen which verifies that your form has been sent to Delta Zeta.

You may view your academic reports by going to Academics – Reports – Academic Report

For more tips on completing the Academics Action on Chapter Inc., please review the postings in DZ Digest under Academics. In particular, the Academics Committee posted a tips sheet which you can access here which answers the most commonly asked questions on the Academics Action. You can also review the Chapter Inc. Actions Guides in the Chapter Inc. Tools Container on Metro for step by step instructions on completing actions on the site. If you have questions about  your academic program which cannot be answered by your CCD or RCD, please contact the National Academics Chairman, Carolee Followill.

What Do You Mean We Have to COB?

Tips on getting a chapter to buy into Continuous Open Bidding by guest blogger, Lauren Orr, Educational Leadership Consultant

Many sorority women have negative connotations of the continuous open bidding process Why has maximizing membership through informal efforts become such a recruitment faux pas? Any Vice President of Membership needs to be equipped with an arsenal of techniques to get her chapter to "buy into the COB process" and get her chapter on the right track to positive growth.

Before embarking on continuous opening bidding process, general knowledge of what COB is and what value it can bring to your chapter is crucial. Extensive information on continuous open bidding can be found in the new manual located on Metro, Delta Zeta's private social network in the Chapter Officer Resources Container, Collegiate Resources link, but a defining snapshot of COB is listed below:

· Continuous Open Bidding Defined: The process by which a chapter continues to recruit new members informally until it reaches the campus's selected, maximum number of members.

· Continuous Open Bidding is Considered Informal Recruitment: During COB, contact with potential new members is often seen as being more casual. Unlike formal or structured recruitment, COB allows each chapter to manage their own recruitment schedule, distribution of invitations, and issuing of bids rather than the Campus Panhellenic. Informal recruitment is typically more personal than formal or structured recruitment and promotes one-on-one interaction between active members and potential new members.

· Continuous Open Bidding Timeline: Informal recruitment occurs mostly after quota or total is not reached during formal or structured recruitment. It can last throughout the academic year depending on the number of members needed to reach maximum membership.

· Continuous Open Bidding has Value: Although, COB can be seen as negative by a few, it has been proven for years that COB can not only bring value to a chapter, but can save a chapter from losing the value it already has as well. Selling the value to a chapter can be tough at times, but will in the end outweigh the concerns that may come up in discussion.

Any successful Vice President of Membership needs to be prepared to explain COB to her chapter. During this time, chapter members can challenge even the most prepared Vice President of Memberships and ask tough questions that are not easily answered. The following tips will help answer the most common questions:

1. Be excited: Excitement is contagious. Get the chapter members pumped up about the idea of COB and explain what great benefits in can bring the overall state of the organization in order to get them to buy into the idea.

2. Present materials in an organized manner: Knowing the facts about COB, having informative hand-outs, and facilitating positive and constructive discussion with the chapter are ways to get the chapter members to buy into continuous open bidding in an organized way.

3. Put all information out there: Being open about the continuous open bidding process and keeping the members informed of the progress will help member buy into COB and stay motivated as recruitment efforts continue.

4. Enlist the chapter to brainstorm ideas: There is no better way to get a group of women to buy into the idea of continuous open bidding then to let them voice their opinions and ideas. Allowing members to actually feel like they are contributing to the continuous open bidding planning will help them buy into the idea of informal recruitment as a whole. Hosting a continuous open bidding brainstorming workshop or simply taking ideas for events at a chapter meeting can get members to buy into COB.

5. Formulate a plan: Have a plan of attack for informal recruitment, not only so members can schedule themselves to be in attendance at COB events, but so they can be prepared for what is coming up next as well. Presenting a schedule and a plan for continuous open bidding from the beginning will get women to schedule participation in COB events and give members something to look forward to on their calendar.

6. Implement an incentive and rewards program: Like any other incentive program, it is important to reward the women who are actively participating in the chapter's continuous open bidding efforts. Making continuous open bidding fun and rewarding the members who are continuously participating is a great way to get women to buy into COB and keep them motivated to proceed throughout the process.

7. Celebrate successes: During COB when the chapter hits an important milestone, celebrate! Continuous open bidding is not always easy, so when a major accomplishment has been achieved, have fun and celebrate the success of the chapter.

Getting a chapter to buy into continuous open bidding is not always a simple task. Once a Vice President of Membership and other chapter leaders decide that COB is necessary for a chapter, having a plan that promotes excitement, organization, and contribution will help members buy into the idea of informal recruitment. Remember, with a little preparation and effort, a Vice President of Membership can motivate a chapter to positively participate in COB with great success.

Good luck and have fun reaching maximum membership!

New Year Goal Setting

Happy New Year! It is officially January – a month of new beginnings and New Year’s resolutions. For collegiate members, it is also the beginning of a new semester/quarter, new courses, new professors, and many times new Delta Zeta officer positions. Or in other words, the perfect time for goal-setting. We all set goals, whether they be academic, personal, health and fitness, professional or for the success of an organization with which we are involved. Unfortunately, most of us have experienced instances where we have not met those goals or felt we plateaued in our progress towards them because we just didn’t know what to do next. Some purposeful work on the front-end, using the SMART goal-setting method, can help us all achieve what we wish in 2012.

SMART (or sometimes SMARTER) is a mnemonic for objective-based goal-setting. While there is no standard definition for each letter, it is commonly interpreted to mean:

• S – Specific – Goals should be clear and precise. It can be helpful to think of the 5 W questions here.
• What do you want to accomplish exactly?
• Why is that important?
• Who will be involved?
• Where will this be achieved?
• Which requirements/constraints should be articulated?
• M – Measurable – Identify criteria by which you can gauge progress. This can help you, or your group, stay on track and meet your target dates. This can also assist with motivation. We all love to check things off to-do lists.
• A – Attainable – Goals should be achievable. Goals that require you to stretch and think big are appropriate, but goals that are out of reach or are below your typical performance are not as meaningful.
• R – Relevant – Goals should be worthwhile and important to you. Make sure you are willing and able to work towards this goal.
• T – Time Bound – Set a target date for each goal. This will help you set incremental goals to track your progress. It also helps prevent this goal from being lost in day-to-day activities.
• E – This “E” can mean several items based upon your goal-setting environment. For example, ethical, ecological, evaluate, enjoyable, engaging. If one of these words resonates with you and your goal-setting, be sure to incorporate it into your goal-setting.
• R – Reevaluate, recordable, rewarding, reaching, reassess. Use as appropriate in your goal-setting environment.

What are some of your SMART goals for the coming year? Do you want to raise your chapter GPA by .1 points? Do you want to put an extra $200 in savings each month? Do you want to run your first marathon? Share with us what goals you are setting by leaving a comment on our Facebook page or tweeting them to @DeltaZetaNatl using the hashtag #DZGoal. Or use the Facebook comment feature on this blog.