5 Signs Your Fraternity is a Thick Organization

"Some organizations are thick, and some are thin. Some leave a mark on you, and some you pass through with scarcely a memory."
- David Brooks



It seems to be all the rage right now for campuses to ban, either by administrative fiat or IFC resolution, fraternity activities. The common reason given is for the Greek community to have time and space for soul-searching. So allow me to suggest a framework by which fraternities and sororities can adequately search their souls. 

A fraternity mentor of mine, John Bloom, shared with me an outstanding column by David Brooks of the New York Times. In this article, Brooks defines what it means to be a "thick" organization, mostly as one that leaves a mark on you. He adds other criteria, such as:

• An organization that "becomes a part of the person's identity and engages the whole person: head, hands, heart, and soul."
• One with a set of rituals.
• One with shared tasks, that often involve members looking out for one another.
• Organizations that "tell and retell a sacred origin story about themselves."
• One with a common ideal.
• Possession of an "idiosyncratic local culture" that differentiates them from other organizations.

As I read through his criteria, the idea of fraternity emerged in my mind. Fraternal organizations are ripe to become thick experiences for their members because they inherently have all of those traits listed above. One could say that the longevity of the fraternity movement in this country can be attributed to how "thick" these organizations can be. University administrators certainly know that when they contemplate the future of fraternities on their campuses, they are dealing with very significant entities that can offer thick experiences.

And yet, so many of our members have thin experiences instead. Fraternity becomes something they did for a short while, and their memories get packed away in some box they store in their attic. Fraternity for many is only about the few friendships they've held on to, instead of a deep and holistic values-based and life-directing experience. And because of that, they are less willing to care for these organizations as they experience them and thus are more willing to participate in damaging them.

Why should you care to make your fraternity a thick organization? There would likely be some strong tangible benefits such as stronger alumni engagement and more members inspired to contribute more. The intangibles, such as a richer and more fulfilling experience, would almost definitely show up as well.

Overall, if we can make our fraternities be the thick organizations they are destined to be, then many of the problems that lead to all-university bans and suspensions will go away.

So, take Brooks' criteria as the base for a thick organization, what would be evidence that this base was maximized to build a truly special fraternity? Here might be some indicators that your fraternity is thick:

1. Members discuss the fraternity in terms of how it has become a part of their identity, and not just something they are involved with. The values of the fraternity become a regular part of jargon used when members talk about what fraternity means to them. And, the ideals of the fraternity become included in how members describe their own aspirations for the kinds of individuals they hope to be.
2. Alumni engagement is substantial, meaning their involvement is directed towards ensuring a strong future for the chapter, and not just based in reliving the good old days. Alumni who have experienced a thick fraternity will likely donate more time and money to the organization and see themselves in a mentoring role for the current undergraduates.
3. Involvement of Juniors is strong. I've become convinced that we will never get the devoted attention of Seniors because they are in a period of life transition that focuses their energy elsewhere. I would judge a thick organization by what its Juniors are doing. Are they filling important leadership roles, attending events and activities, strongly involved in recruitment, and finding ways to represent their chapter elsewhere on campus. If interest starts to wane in the Junior year, it shows that the organization is only thick for a short period of time, which means it really isn't thick at all.
4. An observer would label your recruitment efforts are relational. Thin organizations master the art of the sales pitch and the show, since that's all they can rely upon. Thick organizations build their ranks through conversation and authentic relationships. Hardly any training or preparation is needed because members of thick organizations can speak from the heart. When this happens, only those seeking thick experiences will want to join and that benefits us all.
5. Thick organizations are not cyclical. Many fraternities and sororities have peaks and valleys over time - in membership and campus influence. Being so turbulent in success means that the chapter is defined by who members are in specific periods of time, and not by the strength of its rituals and common ideals. Sure, thick organizations can struggle and they are not immune to downturns. However, those downturns are often episodic and mended fairly quickly. While thin chapter A is on-again, off-again over the period of 20 years, thick chapter B is almost always on, with only a few blips along the way.

There are many different ways you can judge the value and strength of your fraternity, especially in its undergraduate form. I really like Brooks' terminology and definitions because you can really feel them - thick versus thin.

Just like a thick sheet of ice can withstand a lot of pressure and weight, thick organizations will remain solid and standing, even when all the bans and suspensions go away.

If You Always Look for Problems, That’s Always What You’ll Find

The time is upon us when thousands of fraternity and sorority members will return to campus and begin another year.  Many of those groups will do the smart thing and have a retreat to plan out the year and set goals.  At the minimum, almost all fraternity and sorority leaders will think about questions like: what do we need to do to reach our potential?  To achieve excellence?

This post isn’t meant to answer those questions, for each situation is unique.  Rather, let me offer you some thoughts on how you get to those answers.

Fraternity and sorority life is a “problems-based” industry.  We are constantly talking about problems.  We seem to always be focused like a laser on what’s wrong with us and what needs to be fixed. 

It can be depressing.  I only have my hunches to back this up, but I think one of the reasons there is so much turnover in campus Greek advising is that individuals just get sick and tired of the constant negativity. 

I don’t believe that we can ignore our problems, especially the ones that could jeopardize our future in an instant.  But, what if we focused on our problems just a little bit less?  You might ask, well what would we focus on instead?

We would focus on what’s working.

Retreats that Work

Man, I love retreats. In terms of team dynamics and organizational flow, there may be nothing better. My staff team probably wishes I didn't love them as much as I do.

In an environment that is constantly shifting and changing, retreats are needed more than ever. They allow us to refocus on our mission and objectives. They can also unplug us from the gadgets that rule our lives. There is something about an easel pad, markers, and honest eye-to-eye conversation that is just simply healthy.
 

Now, retreats can also be a phenomenal waste of time. They require thoughtful planning in order to be effective. Below are five points I’ve learned about retreats over the years, and I encourage you to add your own.

Point #1: The retreat needs to be productive.

A retreat should never be all about play. A retreat can be fun, but it’s a work day. Going to the local amusement park is not a retreat. If your supply list includes bathing suits, koozies, and suntan lotion, it’s also not a retreat. A retreat is a learning activity, and should be treated as such. It’s out-of-the-classroom learning, so it is indeed different in many ways. But it’s still generally an intellectual exercise. 

A brotherhood- or sisterhood-building social activity (such as rafting, camping, theme park, etc.) is fine, but “social activity” describes them accurately. Reserve “retreat” for the times in which participants are focused, ready to roll up their sleeves, and prepared to chart a better future for the organization. This doesn’t mean you sacrifice the teambuilding aspect. Don’t assume that brotherhood or sisterhood is built only through social events. In fact, the greatest teams are forged through collective action towards shared objectives. In other words, your “working” retreat will build greater connections and teamwork than any social activity could.

Point #2: It’s called a “retreat” for a reason. Go someplace different.

Brain science has proven that a change in venue can lead to a change in perspective. Retreats work best when participants feel that it is a special event, worthy of a different level of participation and thinking. A different venue can contribute to this feeling. Stay away from your chapter house, a classroom, or a meeting room in the student union. These are too ordinary. I personally encourage you to consider camps or other settings that incorporate nature. These types of venues can add a layer of calm and peacefulness to the event.

Any of the following are good options: Official retreat/conference centers, Boy Scout/Girl Scout/FFA/YMCA/Kiwanis camps, church facilities, restaurants with a unique feel, state parks, etc.

Cost might be a concern, but planning well advance will give you more options. Camps and parks are typically cheaper. Also consider distance and transportation when selecting a site.

Point #3: Your retreat needs a purpose.

Why do you need a retreat? Why is it being considered? What do you need to accomplish?

• Identify and get problems out in the open.
• Promote communication among all members.
• Establish common goals and objectives.
• Identify and relate the philosophy of the organization.
• Transition new officers into their positions.
• Have the members get to know each other on a deeper level.
• Motivation; re-centering on purpose.
• Discussion of values/Ritual.

Thinking about this beforehand will help you organize a retreat that best suits the members' needs. You could also plan a retreat that concentrates on one critical function of the organization, such as:

• Recruitment Preparation - Educating members on effective recruitment and setting group recruitment goals.
• Values Clarification - Helping participants understand themselves and others.
• Leadership Development - Developing leadership skills to promote better committee members, committee chairs, or officers.
• Risk Management - Teaching, clarifying, and gaining agreement on policies and procedures.
• Scholastic Goal Setting - Giving members an opportunity to set personal and group goals in the area of academic achievement.
• Pre/Post Initiation - Offering an opportunity for members to fully understand the impact of the oaths they are about to or have just taken.
• Alumni Relations - Setting goals for improved alumni relations and programs. Gather suggestions from alumni or invite alumni to participate in this program.

Point #4: Beware the curse of the comfy couches.

Your retreat location should be comfortable, but that doesn’t mean you should sit all day. Full-day retreats commonly suffer from group malaise after lunch and as the afternoon carries on. Do as much as you can to make the retreat interactive, instead of a just a rotation of talking heads. Here are a couple of common tools for adding interactivity to a program:

• The Partner Share: Instead of discussing a question or idea with the full group, ask participants to first talk about it with a fellow participant. This gives the quieter members a chance to share their ideas. After a few minutes, open it up for a larger discussion. You’ll likely get more and better responses.
• The Small Group: Having ideas discussed in smaller groups of 5-8 participants works for many of the same reasons given above for the partner share. However, you can ask the small groups to accomplish more, such as solving one component of a larger question. For instance, if you are discussing academic achievement in the organization, you might assign smaller groups each of the following issues to discuss and make recommendations for: (1) recognizing academic achievement, (b) revising chapter academic standards, (c) utilizing campus resources, (d) programs to encourage academic success. You could also use small groups to teach a big topic, such as risk management policies. Assign small groups portions of the policies to review and teach back to the larger group in creative ways.

Breaking into smaller groups is also a great way to split up pledge classes, age groups, cliques, officers, new members, etc., which can add to the teambuilding element of the retreat.

Although they are often a target of complaints and groans, teambuilders and icebreakers can be effective for setting up a positive learning environment as well. You may get some evil glares from the participants, but weigh that against the boredom and lethargy that comes from inactivity. There are thousands of books and websites with ideas for teambuilders. The NIC resource “Brotherhood Building Activities” is one to add to your library, if it’s not already there. Also, your advisors and headquarters staff likely have a lot of options to share with you.

Point #5: You don’t need to do this alone.

The life of a Fraternity/Sorority Advisor can often be a constant deluge of negativity. They are always putting out fires and reacting to unfortunate incidents. Imagine a chapter leader walking into their office and inviting them to help facilitate a proactive retreat intent on building a stronger future for the fraternity or sorority. That’s the kind of work they want to be doing! The basic point is this – you have several caring individuals who would be willing to help you plan and implement the retreat. All you need to do is ask.

If you have a budget, there also many talented professional facilitators available to you.

I hope this has been helpful in some way. Leading, managing, and growing an organization like a fraternity or sorority is hard work. Going at it every single day can wear down even the greatest chapter. The strongest organizations know that in order to keep up their strength for the fight, on occasion, it’s necessary to retreat. Good luck!

A Fraternity to Believe In

To be or not to be…excellent. That is the question. I invite you to enjoy this classic clip from Wayne’s World 2, featuring the late Charlton Heston, noted for being one of the best actors of all time:

This scene has great lessons for our organizations. We have just become too comfortable with mediocrity. Let’s face it, many of our organizations are striving to just reach mediocrity.

It’s easy to see in movies when actors or actresses are just “mailing it in.” The same is true for fraternities and sororities. It’s those groups that shuffle around from obligation to obligation, seemingly uninterested and lethargic. It’s the opposite of watching a master at work – someone who wants to, who needs to – be the greatest at their chosen craft. It’s whoever that first guy was vs. Charlton Heston.

It begs the question, however, what “being your best” or “performing at peak level” really means for fraternities and sororities.

Is being excellent as a fraternity winning campus competitions? That’s a pretty superficial measure I think. What about winning the highest honors from your national fraternity? I wonder if sometimes that is just a measure of one’s ability to write an application.

How about Ritual? Is living by the teachings of your Ritual achieving excellence as a fraternity? Yes – if excellence is doing exactly what’s expected of you.

Excellence can include all of these things, but they still don’t say enough. There seems to be an intangible quality to excellence, resulting in the old “I know it when I see it” test.

How about if excellence were this: getting others to believe in you. What if it meant performing in a manner that goes so far above an expected standard, that you become an aspiration for others?

Consider three sororities on a given campus. When interviewed about the first one, the university President states: “I like that sorority.” On the second, he comments “I trust that sorority.” On the third, he remarks “I believe in that sorority.” Each sorority is regarded as outstanding, but only one is excellent. It’s the one that changes the President’s perspective from “they simply exist” to “I want them to exist.” Or even, “I need them to exist.”

When someone like Charlton Heston steps in front of the camera, we believe in him. We know that a good performance will follow. In that scene, we wanted him in that role.

If you can get people – ranging from recruits to advisors – to say that they believe in you, then you know that you’re performing at a high level. And by the way, I can believe in a fraternity even if they don’t win a single Greek Week event, so collectively we need to adjust what excellence really means.

So, what are you doing as an organization that would cause someone to say that they believe in you? Is your performance worth watching? Imagine the audience is filled with your founders, great alumni of the past, campus administrators, parents, etc. Would they stand and cheer for you? Would your performance move them to tears? Or, would they rather yank your fraternity and find a better stand-in?

When you believe in something, you protect it. You share it with others. It becomes a rock for you. It’s the same for how we cherish our own Rituals. What if others regarded fraternities as the “Ritual books” for the rest of society? As the place to turn to for leadership, scholarship, service, and other values.

That’s more than taking home a trophy. That’s knowing that you matter. Undeniably.

How much better would the fraternity movement, our organizations, and our members be if we no longer sought to just be tolerated, or liked, or accepted? What if we sought to be an aspiration for others? To do so much good that those around us could not avoid the desire to believe in us and what we’re doing. That would be, as they say in Wayne's World, excellent!

Do Strong Fraternity Stuff

I am a big fan of Dave Ramsey, who is a financial management guru famous for his radio show and bestselling books.  His style is to give tough love to people, not allowing them to make excuses for their financial situations.  His message is well-received because it’s simple: get debt-free, live debt-free, build wealth slowly, and after you’ve succeeded, give lots of it away.

One of his primary messages is a principle that is so simple, it’s profound:  If you want to be rich, do what rich people do (do “rich people stuff” as he says).  If you want to stay poor, keep doing what poor people do. 

Here is a great quote from his website:

If you are broke, you will become rich when you do rich people stuff with your money. Find out what the habits of rich people are and do them, and you will become one of them. How do I know this?  Seventy-eight percent of America's millionaires are first- generation rich. They started with nothing and became millionaires. If you do poor people stuff with your money, you will become poor people. If you are rich and you do poor people stuff with your money, you will become poor people. "Rich" isn't an amount of money; it's a mindset in how you live. I've been broke, but I've never been poor because when I was broke, I just had no money. It wasn't that I had no hope. It wasn't that I didn't believe I could win. It wasn't that I was unwilling to sacrifice.

What is “rich people stuff?”  He shares many examples that come from research and studies about millionaires.  They work their tails off to get out of debt, and then pay cash for everything.  They invest wisely and patiently.  They buy used cars with cash instead of new ones with loans.  And they live frugally.

This goes against conventional wisdom, doesn’t it?  Rich people either inherit their money or lie and cheat to get it, right?  Not according to the research.  They have very distinct behaviors and make very thoughtful decisions.

Stuff that poor people do includes things like living by credit cards, payday loans, adding debt upon debt, not saving, and frivolous spending. 

So, while our emotions may say that it’s unfair that rich people are that way, our logic should tell us that if we make the right choices and behave in a disciplined way, we can join them.

The same is true for fraternity success.  If you want to be a strong fraternity, do “strong fraternity stuff.” 

But, like rich people, we tend to demonize strong fraternities.  We hate them for all the awards they win, all the recruits they get, and all the attention they receive.  Instead of learning from them, we dismiss their success (yet secretly hope we have the same).

Let go of your envy or jealousy about the highly successful fraternities, and start observing what they do.  You can be right there with them.  One of the benefits of a Greek system is that we see several examples of how to do fraternity happening at once.  In any given Greek system, we see the range of success, from chapters that are failing completely to those that are knocking the ball out of the park. 

There is no cap on how many successful fraternities there can be.  The problem is, too many of us choose to just be mediocre, because like many people, we’re just waiting to win the lottery or for some other stroke of ridiculous good luck.  Wealth isn’t built that way.  Neither is organizational success.

It’s an old but true quote – don’t wait for your ship to come in.  Swim out to it.

So, what is “strong fraternity stuff?”  We don't have very detailed studies on this, but based upon years of observation, awards judging, and common sense, here are a few things to consider:

• Strong fraternities are extremely discerning in recruitment.  So much so, that they have a very low pledge dropout rate.  They pick the right guys from the start.
• Strong fraternities are quick and nimble.  For example, when a natural disaster strikes, they have tables set up within hours to collect donations and a van full of members heading towards the relief efforts.
• Strong fraternities practice and perform the Ritual ceremonies with precision.  They treat membership initiation with the same reverence that new colonies do.
• Strong fraternities care about presence.  They strive to look impressive and act confidently when showing their public persona.
• Strong fraternities have high chapter GPA’s because they recruit high academic performers.  They realize that recruiting a low performer and thinking they can change him/her is unrealistic.
• Strong fraternities do not take shortcuts in recruitment.  It’s person-to-person, time consuming, focused work.  They know it’s their lifeblood as an organization and they prioritize it that way.

The list goes on.  The main point here is that a strong fraternity is not something to ignore.  Or complain about.  Or hate.  It’s something to observe, study, and possibly emulate.  Fraternity success is not by accident.  Nor is fraternity failure.  Choose your examples wisely.

This essay was originally posted in August 2012 and has been updated.

The Best Fraternity on Campus! For Now.

There is a great book by Jim Collins (of Good to Great fame) called “How the Mighty Fall.” In this book, Mr. Collins describes how businesses that were once the top of their industry lose their footing and fall quickly to rock bottom. From his research, he frames 5 stages that seem to be consistent among these businesses:

Stage One: Hubris Born of Success

Organizations that reach a high level of success can fall victim to the arrogant notion that they will always be there. For these organizations, success becomes an entitlement, forgetting the hard work, tough decisions, chance, and lucky breaks that were needed to get there.

Stage Two: Undisciplined Pursuit of More

The hubris of stage one leads these organizations to feel that they can take undisciplined leaps into areas where they cannot be great. Instead of disciplined initiative, strategic planning, and thoughtful creativity, they overreach.

Stage Three: Denial of Risk and Peril

Whereas some external signs may still signal success, there are growing internal warnings that disaster is near. However, these warnings are ignored. The blame game also begins – with organizational leaders making excuses for mounting problems.

Stage Four: Grasping for Salvation

Now that decline is evident, leaders begin searching for a miracle cure. According to Mr. Collins, such cures include: “a charismatic visionary leader, a bold but untested strategy, a radical transformation, a dramatic cultural revolution, a hoped-for blockbuster product, a ‘game-changing’ acquisition, or any number of other silver-bullet solutions (p. 22).”

Stage Five: Capitulation to Irrelevance or Death

If the direction cannot be reversed in any of the preceding stages, it’s over.

I found many of the lessons and stories in the book to be relevant for Greek-letter organizations. After all, we spend a lot of time focusing on who is the best. We also all know fraternities or sororities that gloat or are cocky about their success. Success in fraternity and sorority is often like a roller coaster. The successful chapters on any given campus were not the same ones 10 years ago.

I encourage you to read the book and draw your own conclusions, but here are the primary lessons I found:

Arrogance and Entitlement
Are you the best fraternity or sorority on campus? Are you the best national organization? Why? What justifies you declaring that? How do you prove that to potential members? Being the “best” in anything is tough to measure (except for perhaps athletic competitions or awards). Oftentimes, it is left to the eyes of the beholder. I actually love it when Greek organizations tell me that they are the “best,” because now that they’ve declared it, they need to back it up. There is nothing wrong with having confidence and striving to be your definition of the “best.” Just beware of hubris. Beware of the level of arrogance that makes others root for your demise. Those who gloat the loudest on the way up often shriek the loudest on the way down.

There are certainly times in the course of a fraternity or sorority’s life when things are going very well. Those are times to celebrate. Cautiously. Almost every Greek-letter organization that has a precipitous fall from grace once felt indestructible; once thought the good times would last forever; once felt that they were the best.

At the same time, you shouldn’t lead with panic or fear that the end is near. Nobody wants to follow a doomsayer or join a negative organization.

The key is to avoid the arrogance that leads to an entitlement mindset. Your success was earned – most likely by the hard work of leaders before you. Luck and chance probably played a role too. Stay humble about your success, and keep searching for more.

Arrogance can lead to complacency as well. Once we start believing that we are entitled to our success, we stop working for it. We stop expecting it in our new recruits. Consider these two statements and the type of individual that would be attracted to them:

• Join us – we’re the best!
• Join us – we want to be the best!

Both messages would likely get quality men and women. However, the second message would get quality men and women who want to work; who want to leave their mark; who want to build the ship, not just ride on it.

Reaching Too Far

Most of the companies profiled by Mr. Collins drifted away from their core purposes and missions. They felt so entitled to their success, that they felt anything they touched would turn to gold. By shifting attention away from their core, they let their most important aspects atrophy.

In fact, almost all of the organizations that reversed the downward spiral did so by reclaiming their core purpose. For example, Xerox experimented with all sorts of new services (such as financial services), but soon found themselves falling. When they returned to their core business – printing and copying – they started to see success again. They experienced the danger of overreaching.

In the fraternity/sorority world, we see overreach in different ways. For example, groups that taste the success of being the biggest organization on campus may suddenly feel the need to focus only on numbers. They begin bidding members that they would have denied in their growth stage.

Some national organizations fall victim to the “keeping up with the Jones’s” mentality. The growth of membership development programs are an example of this. Sigma Phi Epsilon’s success with The Balanced Man program was met with a flurry of “we’ve got to have one too!” statements in board rooms across the country. Many of these efforts have failed. What if these organizations spent time focusing on what they do best, rather than spend their energy on what others do best?

Don’t Get Radical

The case studies and examples Mr. Collins uses in the book signal something very important: when an organization is in a vulnerable place, radical change is NOT a good idea. Those companies that pulled themselves out of their decline did so by incremental change, tough decisions, and by honoring the past. Like these organizations, fraternities that face a decline should avoid redefining themselves, and rather, rediscover themselves.

There is a great principle from Appreciative Inquiry: in every human situation, something works. The key for leaders is to keep the best from the past, and change the rest. Something is working. Don’t flip everything upside down. A radical, transforming kind of change will most likely speed up the decline.

Be a Survivor

This passage from the book caught my eye:

“The point of the struggle is not just to survive, but to build an enterprise that makes such a distinctive impact on the world it touches, and does so with such superior performance, that it would leave a gaping hole – a hole that could not be easily filled by any other institution – if it ceased to exist (p. 112)."

Does this describe your fraternity or sorority? Would there be a gaping hole in the universe if your organization was gone? The work of a leader is to build a culture of continuous excellence in your chapter – so that it can survive downward turns. I need to think this through some more, but here is an initial list of what I believe is needed for an organization to be a survivor:

• Constant care for the Ritual and how it is taught and practiced daily. 
• Relentless focus on financial solvency. 
• A culture of continuous, year-round recruitment. 
• The elimination of hazing practices, dangerous drinking, and other risky behaviors. 
• Working hard to change the belief that a house for the chapter is essential (after all, if it burns down, could you carry on without hesitation)? 
• Anything you would add?

I recommend reading the book, or reading other summaries at least. We try so hard to learn from those that excel in our world, and sometimes the best lessons come from those who fall. You may be the best on campus. But, when will it be your turn to ride the downward slope? What will you do when that rocky bottom is approaching fast?

Source: How the Mighty Fall (2008), by Jim Collins

This post was originally published July 1, 2010 and has been updated.

How to Survey Your Fraternity

 
In the last post on this site, I advocated for officer teams to do an assessment of their chapter in order to get a well-rounded view of member attitudes and perspectives. One of the best tools to use for this purpose is a survey. With online tools like Survey Monkey, it’s easier than ever to build and conduct surveys. However, you need to be thoughtful with your approach and the questions you ask. You probably will only have one chance to get good data (most people don’t like receiving multiple surveys on the same subject). In this post, I’ve provided sample survey questions, but first, some tips:

• Keep it short. 10-15 minutes is probably all you can expect someone to give to a survey like this.
• Consider your questions carefully. For each question, ask yourself “would responses to this question on one extreme or the other cause us to change what we’re doing?” If the answer is no, then there is really no point in asking the question.
• Likert-type scale questions are better than yes/no or true/false questions because they provide a wider range of responses. Likert-type scales are those that ask respondents to rank a response from 1 to 5 or 1 to 10 based on the degree of their opinion. See below for examples.
• Allowing respondents to be anonymous will likely give you better and more honest results. 
• You do not need 100% response rate or even close to consider the data useful.  I would suggest if you get a majority of members to respond, you are in a strong position to interpret the data as valid.  A good way to look at this is to ask yourself if the percentage that didn't respond had, would the the results be radically different? In most cases, they probably wouldn't be.

By the way, I’m a few years removed from my Masters degree, so I’m writing this as a practitioner who uses surveys for very practical purposes. A phD student might have more to say about design and methodology, but my advice to you is to not make this harder than it needs to be.  You aren't using the data for a white paper or a journal article, but rather to help your officer team make determinations on priorities for the year.

As an example, I've listed below a series of questions that on the whole, would give you some really good information by which to judge the current effectiveness of your chapter and help you make decisions for the future.  The first set of questions use a Likert-type scale.  This set of questions can be used to start conversations on the general health of the organization.  Say that a majority of respondents "disagree" that they are proud to call themselves members of the fraternity (question #6). That reveals a serious concern that should be addressed.  

The second  section includes open-ended questions that require a sentence or two. The best way to sort through these responses is to put them all on a single sheet, sorted by similar answers.  Read them through as an officer team and look for themes or ideas that really stand-out.

The final section provides an opportunity for the members to help prioritize the chapter's issues.  Reviewing these results should indicate a top-tier, middle-tier, and lower-tier of issues according to the membership. 

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SECTION ONE
Choose your response to each statement below based on this scale:

1=Strongly Disagree    2=Disagree    3=No Opinion    4=Agree    5=Strongly Agree

1. This fraternity is having a positive impact on my academic performance.
2. I feel connected with the values and purpose of this fraternity.
3. This fraternity effectively deals with adversity.
4. I am pessimistic about the future of this fraternity.(NOTE - Mixing in a couple of negatively-framed questions keeps people from rushing through and choosing the same answer for each question)
5. This fraternity is a high-performing fraternity compared with others on this campus.
6. I am proud to call myself a member of this fraternity.
7. This fraternity receives strong support from alumni and campus advisors.
8. For the most part, this fraternity adheres to the values expressed in our Ritual and creed.
9. I am satisfied with my contributions to this fraternity.
10. I can freely share my opinions about the direction of this fraternity.
11. Members are held accountable for their actions if they violate our standards.
12. The officers are ignoring some significant challenges facing this fraternity.
13. My college experience has been better than it otherwise would have been without this fraternity.
14. My experience with this fraternity has met my expectations.

SECTION TWO
For the questions above, do you have any comments to more fully describe your answer?


If you had the opportunity to change one thing about this fraternity, what would it be?


In what aspect(s) do you feel this fraternity excels the most?


Complete this sentence -  If I were to give the officer team one piece of advice, it would be:


Identify at least one member of the chapter (not an officer) who you think deserves praise and recognition for their contributions to the chapter and the reasons why.


SECTION THREE
Which of the following issues should be top priorities for the officers and chapter to address this year (choose up to 5)?

1. Recruitment
2. Public Image 
3. Effectiveness of Chapter Meetings
4. Relationships with other Chapters
5. New Member Education
6. Athletic competitions
7. Achieving Campus and/or National Awards
8. Risk Management
9. Chapter House 
10. Cliques / Divisions in the Chapter
11. Member and/or guest safety
12. Alumni relations
13. Academics / Chapter GPA
14. Service and Philanthropy
15. Camaraderie and Fellowship
16. Social Life
17. Member Apathy
18. Drugs / Alcohol
19. Other_________________
20. Other_________________

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There are plenty of other directions you can take with this kind of assessment.  And, we haven't even discussed focus groups or other methods of getting input.  Your campus Greek life office can help you with survey design and even analysis of the results.  No matter what, as long as you take the time to try and get member opinions into your planning process, you will see stronger results than if you go it alone.