Chapter officers are often looking for the silver bullet to solve the big problems. Bad grades? Just craft the perfect scholarship plan with the right incentives. Low numbers? Develop a year-round recruitment plan using Sigma Nu’s Recruitment Bluebook. Poor meeting attendance? Implement a complex points system with fines and rewards. So why do these expertly-crafted plans often fail to show visible results? Could it be the group culture?
What is group culture? The Washington Post’s leadership blog explains:
Corporate culture is the system of beliefs, norms, practices and values that guide an organization – determining how people act, make decisions and govern their affairs. It represents the way things really work, how decisions are really made, how emails and communications are really composed, how promotions are really earned and how people are really treated. (emphasis mine)
Announcing change and a new culture is easy. Making it happen is hard.
So how do you change group culture? It’s simple, really. There’s a reason Jim Collins wrote an entire chapter about ‘getting the right people on the bus’:
First, align your recruitment practices with your chapter’s vision. If you don’t want a chapter full of deadbeat partiers then stop using parties and alcohol to recruit new members.
Second, expel the members who don’t uphold the values of Sigma Nu. Period. Not next year, not next semester, and not after they’ve promised to change for the seventeenth time. Pick up the phone, call your Leadership Consultant to learn Trial Code and make it happen. Now.
Serve in the Light of Truth 