In 2009, Phi Kappa Tau endorsed the 5-step recruitment process for use in chapter recruitment. This 5-step process is supported by sales gurus Jeffery Gitomer, Zig Ziglar and Brian Tracy. The process is made up of steps that can easily be tracked, modified and used to build on the next. The process also allows for self-evaluation and helps the chapter realize the importance of planning and then executing. The chapter is “selling” the benefits of our organization to potential members, therefore, if our chapters follow this sales process, they will have a higher chance of success because the process has been proven to work in other markets.

Step 1: Identify prospective members

Step 2: Introduce potential members to your chapter

Step 3: Engage with prospective members

Step 4: Invite prospective members to join

Step 5: Affiliate with the members

This brief manual will be a guide to walk you through the process and how officers can help improve their process. For each step we will include reflection questions, required action items, available resources and best practices.

Recruitment will take effort and planning. However, it is not just the recruitment chairman’s job to do the recruiting. It is up to the whole chapter to be successful in recruitment. Therefore, the recruitment chairman should focus on training the chapter how to be better recruiters, challenge members to improve and provide members opportunities for success. This is the same for any manager of a team in the real world.

Men are joining fraternities because they meet someone and build a relationship or make a connection. These men will not simply come find you. Therefore, the first step is to get out there and meet as many people as possible. The biggest issue that chapter’s face here is they get bogged down by their campuses ‘recruitment structure’. At this point you are just identifying men that display your values and making friends with them. You are not discussing the fraternity with them or even the concept of joining.

• Does my chapter have open conversations about the quality of men my chapter is recruiting?

• Do my chapter members feel comfortable introducing themselves to a stranger and having a

conversation with them about something other than Phi Kappa Tau?

• Does my chapter market themselves by doing or through materials?

• Does my chapter actively ask for recommendations for prospective members?

• Does my chapter utilize PKTConnect to track and monitor recruitment?

• Utilize PKTConnect to manage your chapter’s names list

• Train members how to have a conversation with prospective members

• Have an open discussion during a chapter meeting about the quality of men you would like to recruit

• Participate in campus activities, sorority functions, university programs, etc. to market your chapter

• Require member involvement in other clubs and organizations

• Utilize available resources to grow the chapter’s names list

• Tips for Tabling

• Cold Calls

• Club and Organization Presentations

• Sorority Presentations

• Chunking

• One-on-One Meetings

• Sample Individual Expectations

• Standards Based Selection Criteria

Create recruitment teams that are in charge of a subset of the names list. Their job will be to divide the prospective members and introduce themselves to them. The teams may also be in charge of using a specific tactic (i.e. sorority presentations, tabling, dorm storming, etc.) to get names of prospective members for the names list.

The chapter actively participates in the University’s academic resource center. When faculty, staff or other students ask about Phi Kappa Tau their response is geared towards academic excellence.

All chapter members are required to be in one additional organization that relates to their major. The member will gain networking experience as well as being in contact and building relationships outside of fraternity and sorority life.

All chapter members are encouraged to ask faculty members to have a short presentation at the beginning of the class about participating in fraternity and sorority life. They inform them about upcoming recruitment events for all organizations in hopes of growing all the fraternities and sororities on campus.

Before the fall the chapter sends a letter to all alumni asking if they know any quality men that will be attending their University for the upcoming academic term. They also include a brief list of the expectations of membership. This shows that the chapter is focused on growth and ensuring they have quality men in the chapter.

The chapter actively participates in all student life programming. This way other students can see that they are enjoying not only the fraternity experience, but the experience of being a student on campus.

The chapter hosts a commuter bag lunch. This allows commuter students a chance to interact with the fraternity members during the day. All commuter students (male & female) have to sign in with their phone number and email address. The chapter follows up with these students to invite them out to an upcoming event or add new names to the names list.

Members of the chapter tabled during the first week of school. However, they didn’t sit at the table. They helped all incoming students find their classrooms.

A handful of brothers from the chapter stood in the quad with a sign asking “how do you study?” They interacted with passing strangers to see how they studied, gave them advice for utilizing campus resources and re-enforced their focus on scholarship.

The chapter added to the end of every meeting time for brothers to add new names to the name list. Each brother is expected to add at least one including their phone number. The brother who has the most names added to the names list at the end of the semester gets $100 gift card to the book store.

One member of the chapter never eats lunch with us. He always eats lunch with someone sitting alone.

At this point you have met a new friend and have had some meaningful conversations with them. As an individual of the brotherhood you think that this man has the potential to have the qualities to be a brother of Phi Kappa Tau. Therefore, the next natural thing to do is introduce him to the other brothers. Remember, making this prospective member feel comfortable is key. He is not yet making a commitment he is still making new friends.

• Do my chapter brothers feel comfortable introducing their friends to other chapter

members?

• Does my chapter host small group activities that allow more one-on-one interactions?

• Do chapter members have a good understanding of other member’s interests, major or backgrounds?

• Do chapter members have a hard time limiting their conversations about Phi Tau to new prospectives?

• Host small group activities multiple times a week

• Move prospects from step 1 to step 2

• Gather information about each prospect

• Train members how to have meaningful conversations

• Interest meetings

• 99 Small Group Activities

The chapter hosts a book club that meets monthly. Anyone is welcome to attend and the chapter makes sure the prospective is aware of the meetings.

Members of the chapter play basketball every Saturday. They always invite prospects that are into sports and basketball.

Chapter members get $50 gift cards for Starbucks every semester. They are to buy prospective members coffee and have conversation with them. If a member doesn’t use it properly he loses the gift card the next semester.

The chapter hosts a presentation during recruitment week on campus. The presentation is focused around utilizing campus academic resources. Prospective members are highly encouraged to attend and meet older people from their major.

A group of members volunteers once a month at an animal shelter. They always try to bring prospective members to come on out. Almost every prospective they brought has later joined Phi Kappa Tau.

A member once brought a friend from high school over to the house one night when we were playing video games. The member found out that a couple guys are members of the rock climbing club. He went with them the next week to climbing. He later became an associate because of those guys.

The chapter has a weekly dinner at the campus cafeteria. It has quickly become the thing to do on Tuesday night. Lots of sorority girls come, girlfriends, friends, etc. Eventually all prospectives were invited; it is a great recruitment tool.

The chapter officers noticed that members were focusing on a select few guys during recruitment events; the ones that already were friends of the chapter. The recruitment chairman decided to enlist the potential new members in their recruitment efforts, and encouraged them to meet new people. Recruitment efforts doubled that semester.

The chapter gave bids to 10 guys at the end of formal recruitment. Instead of associating them right away they helped them plan a couple events for them to invite their friends. They ended up bringing in 5 more associates that week, their friends from their dorm.

At this point, the chapter should have a good read on the individual. The chapter should know if it wants to introduce the young man to the Fraternity. You can start this conversation by simply asking your new friend if he has ever considered joining a fraternity, suggestion that he would make a good fit for the chapter, or why he never joined a fraternity. His response should give you some idea of where he stands. From here you can gauge what message would be the most powerful. Be sure to talk about all the benefits of membership in Phi Kappa Tau.

• Am I confident in my chapter’s ability to have a good conversation about our chapter?

• Can my chapter members adequately combat issues the prospect would have with

joining? (i.e. finances, paying for friends, etc.)

• Do my chapter members understand the policies for both IFC and the University when it

comes to inviting membership or “bid promising”?

• Which members of my chapters are good “closers” (people who can seal the deal)?

• Review the quality response guide with the chapter

• Answer questions your chapter may have about IFC and University recruitment policy

• Bring the member to an event if you have not already

• Introduce prospect to the purpose statements of the fraternity (creed, mission, vision)

• Introduce some the expectations of membership to the prospect

• Pre-close Response Guide

• Pre-closing

• Individual Expectations

• Standards Based Selection Criteria

Members of the chapter were struggling with recruiting guys with good GPAs. The recruitment chairman trained everyone to have specific conversations with potentials to judge their scholastic performance without getting their grades. For example, “How do you normally study for a big test?” works much better than knowing their high school GPA.

The University as a whole struggles with people having money to do extra-curricular activities. This is because we are a commuter campus with a lot of first time college students. We open our financials for every prospect to see. Then we can show them what their money goes to for dues and they end up feeling more comfortable paying dues because they know they are doing more than they were before they joined.

The chapter focuses hard on being a non-hazing and supportive chapter. However, we were keeping our membership orientation process a secret. So we posted it online and let prospects and their parents have access to it. Now everyone knows we don’t haze and that our new member’s process is focused on personal development.

As a struggling chapter it has been hard to recruit quality guys because our guys are apathetic. We sold our prospects on the idea that they can make a fraternity experience that they want. Now that they are members they are great leaders and are doing much more than our other members.

The chapter should feel comfortable extending your new friend a bid if he is the right man for membership in Phi Kappa Tau. At this point, all questions on both sides should have been addressed, and you should extend him a formal bid to join Phi Kappa Tau as an associate member. Let him know what you expect from him and what he can expect from the chapter so that everything is clear and both parties know what they are getting into financially, time-wise, etc.

• Does the chapter understand the bid extension policy from the University or IFC?

• Does the way our bid extension process work make others feel uncomfortable?

• Do we pressure prospects to sign a bid on the spot?

• What do the members extending the bid say during the presentation of the bid?

• Are prospects handed the individual expectations form with the bid?

• Do we utilize a bid card? Should we?

• How long does our bid voting sessions last?

• Do we use our standards based recruitment criteria during the bid voting?

• Simplify your bid voting structure by only utilizing the standards based recruitment

criteria

• Ensure that your bid extension process is in line with the University and IFC policy

• Ensure that your bid extension process is personal and non-intimidating

• Brothers that the prospect knows best should deliver bids

• Give each prospect the list of individual expectations with their bid

The chapter used to encourage prospects to sign their bid on the spot. Now only a few guys deliver the bids and have a script to use. We don’t want them to make a poor decision.

After we started using individual expectations during bid extension the quality of our men has improved greatly. Now when members they go to standards board the board can refer to the list of expectations and find out why they are not meeting them.

The chapter has been in trouble before for not following University policy. Now the first thing the recruitment chairman does every semester is ensure the chapter is following the rules. We haven’t had any issues since.

The chapter relies heavily on the individual expectations now. In the past there was trouble with members not meeting financial obligations. Now we make sure those prospects have time to make a good decision before joining. Sometimes members work with our good prospects to find them a steady job to help pay dues.

Prospects of our chapter mainly are involved heavily on campus. After defining the time commitments of both being a brother and an associate prospects are making better decisions about when they want to join. Some have even stepped back in other organizations until they are initiated in the chapter.

When voting on bids members would constantly say, “If I don’t know the guy he is not getting in.” After we started voting based on the standards based recruitment criteria everyone set our bid voting meetings lasted only 20-30 minutes.

The chapter had problems with recruiting guys that had bad GPAs. Now we don’t let anyone in without a 2.5 minimum. If a prospect has poor grades we allow them to participate in our scholarship program to get their grades up.

To affiliate the member, you need to welcome him into the chapter. Let him know that even though he’s not initiated, he is still a member of your chapter. You must follow your approved MO program. Make sure a new member’s MO period is consistent with honor and reason, as your chapter said it would during the associate ceremony. One of founding fathers’ core principles is “innate self-worth of the individual.”

• Does our chapter preform the associate ceremony publicly?

• Where would be a good place on campus to hold the associate ceremony?

• Who should we invite to the associate ceremony?

• Does our chapter follow the Mark of Distinction new member program to the letter

without deviation?

• Are there things that we are hiding from our new members? Why?

• How quickly do we start a new associate class? Right away? After the current new

members are initiated?

• Can we do more than one new member class per semester?

• Invite parents, faculty members, administration, alumni, prospects, etc. to the next

associate ceremony

• Hold your associate ceremony in a quiet but public place

• Review the chapters membership orientation program and ensure that it is the Mark of Distinction program

• Make the new members feel welcome and allow them to attend meetings and

participate in all chapter events

• Figure out a way to run more prospects through the 5-step process in a shorter amount of time

The chapter has installed a process to have multiple associate classes every semester. If a new member joins part way through the process he has two options

1) work with the MOO to catch up on the missed material

or

2) wait to be initiated after the others.

The chapter follows a strict 4 week associate process, as per University policy. So we have two associate processes a semester, with approval from administration. We don’t condense the process either. We have designed the process, with approval from the Executive Offices, to have some things taught to them after they are initiated.

Once the chapter started inviting parents to the associate ceremony we have seen a huge increase in numbers. Parents actually want their son to join Phi Tau, because they know what we stand for and the expectations of membership.

The chapter recently did the associate ceremony in the student center on campus. We even invited the five or six guys that decided to sit on their bids. All but one decided they wanted to join after seeing the ceremony.

It was custom to not allow our new members to the meetings because of the rituals that take place. Now we let them in after the ritual and let them leave before the ritual. They all know what is going on in the chapter and most have decided to already start sitting on a committee