Many may only see collegiate Greek life as a cultural group who hides their partying behind community service hours and charitable donations. However, I would like to challenge that stereotype by emphasizing the professional development and self-improvement opportunity that is presented to Greek life members - especially those that hold leadership positions. Currently, I serve my one-hundred member sorority as chapter president and work with other officers to maintain a well-balanced, structured, and involved organization.
Fraternities and sororities must operate as a business first, and a socialite Η Ελλάδα σπάζοντας νέα σήμερα second in order to be successful. I would like to indicate some key concepts that report the relation between Greek organizations and businesses.
Greek organizations:
• Divide officers into teams to work with specific aspects of the chapter
• Must operate on a strict budget, fueled solely from member's dues
• Must market themselves well in order to continue steadily to recruit new members
• Have mission statements and values to hold their members to and gear their brand
• Must follow rules from, and report to, their national headquarters
• Have insurance to cover their organization and its members, as well as many policies and procedures in area for holding events
These are just a couple points that report how Greek organizations are ran as the greatest business, combining friendship with professionalism and offering members a good opportunity for private development.
As president, I see all sides of managing a Greek organization and must help every officer no real matter what team her position is just a part of. My days are full of constantly making decisions and weighing the consequences. I have learned to make fair decisions that benefit the more good, while remaining unbiased in the process. I also reply to everyone's questions and concerns while problem solving when an unplanned event takes place. For instance, we'd a tiny crisis with flyers which were made to promote an event we were having. Once they came in, we noticed the contact email on the flyers was spelled wrong. After some deliberation, we decided to use the flyers we had and made a new current email address with the typo included.
A massive part of running a successful organization is effective and professional communication. Our main forum of communication between officers and the advisory board is emailing. I have discovered how exactly to properly send and answer emails in a professional manner. My communication skills have improved substantially since being truly a leader of my chapter. I have discovered to communicate concisely and format information in the very best way. I have found providing information in bullet lists is the greatest way to get members to read messages fully. All of our officers must hold team meetings and get reports of progress in different areas on the team. Officers are responsible for organizing their own meetings and taking minutes to record that which was discussed. Greek organizations teach members to effectively and professionally communicate through emailing, holding meetings, and dealing with others.
One of the most valuable traits that I am still learning through my presidency, is ways to get comfortable with hard conversations. I work closely with this Director of Standards and Ethics to make sure our members are holding themselves to our high ideals and values. When someone is falling behind, it's our job to have conversations using them about why this is happening and what we are able to do to be sure it doesn't happen again. These tough conversations become even tougher when remembering that the members of our chapter will also be our friends and sisters. As a leader of a Greek organization, I'm learning how to have these hard conversations while staying in control of myself and the conversation.
Greek life has so much more to supply than the social part of the business, and can truly prepare adults to join the professional world. Through developing members personally, and developing officers professionally, Greek organizations could possibly offer life-changing collegiate experiences that can't be found elsewhere.