Chris Collins speaking at Eisenhower H.S., Houston, TX

Flava Flav (before reality TV got a hold to him) was in a group called Public Enemy. In one of their hit songs, he belted, “don’t believe the hype!” Unfortunately, some of us didn’t listen. Some of us still fall for the Oke-doke and believe the lies about leadership. And not just any lie, but the biggest lie “THEY” ever told about leadership. When I facilitate leadership retreats at different schools, the same question always rears its ugly head and is typically followed by similar if not identical answers. It goes a little something like this:

Student Leader A: What type of person makes the best leader?

Student Leader B: The best leaders are type A personalities, outspoken, public speakers, you know the Zack Morris kid. They are just natural born leaders.

Me: DON’T BELIEVE THE HYPE!! The best leaders are type A personalities or that people are natural born leaders. These are the BIGGEST LEADERSHIP LIES ever told!!

Take a moment to think about your ideal leader and you might notice that your image is not far from the above student’s image. It’s because of the image of leadership portrayed in media, from cartoons and comic books to movies and autobiographies. Leadership is normally portrayed as a handsome white male, with muscular features, great speaking ability, and generally loved by all. Even though these characters don’t wear t-shirts that say leader, it’s obvious they’re in charge.

They say art imitates life, well sometimes it’s the other way around. Because most of society has become comfortable with this image of leadership, we tend to look toward and vote for people that closely line up with this universal ideal of leadership. It’s no different on our college campuses and sometimes we get it right – we elect leaders with a passion and ability to get the job done. But DON’T BELIEVE THE HYPE!!

There is no one type of person that makes for a better leader, unless you want to call accountability a personality trait. There is no such thing as a natural born leader. We are born with a few abilities and I’m sorry but leadership is not one of them. Our experiences and conditions shape who we are as people and as leaders.

“We are the sum of our reactions to life challenges.”
(that needs to be in somebody’s fortune cookie)

Just because you are not the most outgoing or outspoken person in a group, doesn’t mean you are not best suited to lead. The qualifications of leadership differ from group to group, but there are some traits great leaders have in common. Here are a few in no particular order.

• Passion – not the outwardly showing ‘let me give you a rah-rah speech’ kind either, but the intrinsic motivation that fuels your drive.
• Accountability – most leaders make the most of their ability and the abilities of those around them. They hold themselves responsible for striving towards excellence and make it easy for others to do the same.
• Vision – the ability to look at the present with the future in mind. Great leaders are able to forecast where their organization needs to go and just like your favorite meteorologist they make it plain so you can adjust accordingly.
• Thick-Skinned – great leaders welcome criticism, both constructive and destructive, they take it and roll with it. They sift through it and find the things that can help them and their group and move on. It’s not easy taking on a leadership role and you will never please everyone. If you take every negative about you to heart you’ll be in trouble.

The list of attributes for a great leader is a mile long and being outgoing or outspoken certainly makes the list, but they are nowhere near the top.

Leadership is not an adjective. It’s not something that describes who you are. Leadership is a verb, it describes what you do.

The next time you think you are too quiet to lead, or too young or any other limiting thought……DON’T BELIEVE THE HYPE!!

Listen to Dave discuss this topic on
The College Speaker Series
on the CampusTalkRadio Network.

“The program designed to teach you 3 things in 30 minutes. Guaranteed!”

As a former student leader myself, and as a long-time college student leadership trainer, I have run more than 100 recruitment tables at campus activities fairs and club days and have seen what works and a lot of what doesn’t. Something that I do not think works is for members to sit behind a table waiting for students to come talk to them. Unless your club’s name really jumps out at a student, they will not come to talk to you if you are sitting behind the table. Plus, it is very easy for you to not convey interest, excitement, and energy about your organization while you are sitting.

Get rid of your chairs! Give them to one of your competitors and let them sit. Push your table back a little and then get in the flow of traffic by standing in front of your table. This puts you out where the students are and gives you a chance to make eye contact with them and approach them as they go by. These simple steps can dramatically improve your recruitment efforts and give your organization the members that it needs to be successful. Use your organization defining statement to get students to come over to your table and then show off your organization to them. Get rid of the chairs and get ready for an influx of new members!

Click here to see — > What your recruiters should say once they’re out  front… Hear Dave discuss this topic on “The College Speaker Series” on CampusTalkRadio

The great motivator and orator Zig Ziglar once said that it is our “attitude that determines our altitude.” The first step in moving from ‘Practically There’ to ‘There Practically’ is realizing your thoughts and attitude towards your pursuits have a tremendous impact on your results. Why are there so many people talking about improving, enhancing, or changing your attitude? Why is the Self-Help and Personal Motivation section packed in your chain bookstores? It’s because if we are honest, most of our attitudes, at one time or another, could use a tune up. As great as our vision may be, it is in our nature to not only think critically but also be critical of the vision.

To fully realize your potential as a student leader you must first adopt a grateful attitude. I say adopt because it requires you to take something, not naturally yours, by choice into a relationship, just like adopting a child requires you to CHOOOSE take on the joys of parenting a child that is not your own. Adopting a grateful attitude signifies an intentional endeavor to get happy with yourself. Part of being a responsible and practical leader is choosing and defining your attitude, if not others will do it for you. I know you’re human and that you have bad days, but a grateful attitude can help make those days suck less! As a college student you have so much to be grateful for (I know I sound like your parents right now, but work with me!): 16hr of class a week, parties every other day, greek life, Single Ladies/Basketball Wives watch clubs, it’s likely the sweetest gig you’ve had so far.

Now don’t get too caught up in the sweet life! We must WORK to reach our potential and move from Practically There to There. With Facebook, Twitter, DVR, and other modern marvels, we sometimes forget what it means to do certain things. I can’t remember that last time I looked up something without using Google or Wikipedia. Technology has made things more efficient and readily available. Technology makes publicity more streamlined, but nothing beats good old pubbing in the quad with flyers or going out in the community for a little shaking hands and kissing babies.

We have such great intentions and expectations and we don’t understand why after posting the vision for where we want to take our organization on the Facebook page and tweeting it, the entire campus doesn’t get fired up and fall strategically into place bumrushing our events and knocking down the door to join.

Maybe people are just not into that bottlecap collection club you started! Or maybe they don’t know you’re collecting them for a charity to donate money for cancer research. Practical leadership is easy; it simply requires elbow grease and clear communication. We can’t rely soley on our vision and intentions to lead for us. We have to inject our vision with work ethic and convey our intentions with passion, to inspire others to work along with us.

Also, as cool as technology is, it’s still just a tool. Just the other day I was complaining about how long it took a webpage to load on my iPhone. Really!? I was watching a movie yesterday and saw someone talking on a black brick with a green screen and lunch box with a shoulder strap connected to it. Complaining about how long it takes a webpage to load on my phone. It’s ridiculous.

As student leaders we sometimes get caught up in the same trap. We ask why can’t we submit proposals online, why is tweeting the meeting time not enough to get a good turnout, or my favorite…I texted you to do it!! I’m not bashing technology but networking and socializing are still best done in person. Leadership is still best done face to face, building one relationship at a time. It takes effort,dedication, and more importantly passion!

Your orginization will not run the yard just because you say it does. You have to efficiently guide your org into a position of influence through strategic programming, thoughtful community service, and providing solutions to meet the needs of the students on your campus. Leadership is work, it doesn’t matter if you’re a student, administrator, or CEO.

So today, adopt a grateful attitude, work hard, work smarter, and most importantly…work RIGHT! And you will move from Pratically There to There, Practically!

If we are defined by what we do and what we do is shaped by our goals, the process of goal-setting is vital to our path to greatness. Often we set goals and don’t know what they look like. We say things like “I will do better next time,” or “everyday I’ll get better.” But what does better look like? How do you know when you’re better, and how much better is good enough?

Before you huff and puff about the goal setting acronym you think is on the way, save it!! I am going to propose a different way to think about goal setting. I propose that we take the time to visualize our goals. I mean really see them. I’m talking HD, 3D, Blu-Ray see them. Imagine the hard work, the right work, the setbacks, and the achievements.

So often goals are simply notches on our belt, or necessary evils for us to live a certain lifestyle. Aside from our END LINE FOCUS, goals are simply items on a to-do list. Normally, when we set goals, we concentrate on the quantitative aspect (one more thing checked off the to-do list) of reaching new heights. This sets up the structure or bones of our dreams and aspirations. It provides a decent outline, but when things begin to fall apart and “it” finally hits the fan, you need more than an outline or skeleton! The visualizing I’m suggesting we do is how you put the meat on the bones! Something you can sink your teeth into when you are forced to regroup.

The next time you set a goal for yourself, I want you to know what it looks like. I want you to be able to close your eyes and see it, take a deep breath and smell it, lick your lips and taste it!!

The process works by engaging your imagination and your quantitative thought process. Normally, these two thought processes occur separately. By combining these two opposite ways of thinking, we are able to balance them both while formulating a more complete idea.

Think about it. When you are planning an event, you have a different thought process for coming up with the budget than coming up with ideas for a social activity. And sometimes, that budget planning thought process will kill a couple of big ideas you have. That’s because you have two opposing thought processes going on and we have always been taught that prudence wins out. However, through the process of visualizing your goals, you can combine both processes and achieve bigger and better. Instead of letting your budget kill your big ideas, let your big ideas fill your coffers and grow your budget.

When visualizing your goals beware of the “tiara and crowns” trap! It’s important that we paint an accurate picture of our success. Often we hear of musicians that dedicate so much time to “making it” only to lose it all. They didn’t think about everything that came along with making it, they just saw the tiara and crown. Don’t let the smooth taste fool you; reaching our personal greatness is a stubbornly difficult process. Paint that part of the picture too!

Great Action:

♦ First, write down your goals the way most people do, in sequential list form.

♦ Then take each goal and write a brief 3-5 sentence paragraph about how you will achieve the goal. Include things that may be an obstacle to meeting the goal.

♦ Then come up with solutions, no matter how off the wall they may seem, as long as they’re feasible…list them! This is the visuliazation/defining process.

♦ Last, work right, work smart, and work hard. See what happens when you define your goals instead of listing them.

Stop viewing your goals as task on a to-do list and start seeing them for what they are, building blocks on your path to personal greatness.

Whether you are richer or poorer, in the penthouse or the projects, running the yard or getting run off of it, we all want to GROW! We all want bigger and better. Indiscriminate to our inspirations, all of us want to experience growth; as it is a key element to doing bigger and better. It does not matter if you are working your way back from financial ruin like Dave Ramsey (Google him, his story is amazing), relinquishing your wealth to help save the world like Bill Gates & Warren Buffet, a student leader trying to capitalize on a great event, or an organization trying to bounce back from a poor year, our sights are set on bigger and better. Regardless of where we stand on the totem pole, growth is difficult, and that is why everyone is not doing bigger and better. However, the strategy for growth is the same for those enjoying the view from the top or facing insurmountable odds from the bottom; expand your horizons and stretch your abilities to fill in the gaps.

Growth usually requires the right set of conditions at the right time, with the proper stimulus. The stimulus is really the key, it is what jump starts the expanding of your horizons and fuels the stretching of your abilities! I was trying to grow some plants in my garden (actually I was having them planted, but I digress) and I could not figure out why they would not grow. My neighbor on the other hand had a yard that looked like it belonged in Bush Gardens. When I asked him his secret, he told me it was Miraclegro. It was how he was able to have bigger and better flowers than the rest of the block. He mixed it in with his soil to provide the stimulus needed to initiate and sustain the growth of his plants. For those of us seeking new heights in our careers, on our campuses, or family life, we need to find this same stimulus to start and sustain our personal and organizational growth. Here is a formula for your very own MiracleG.R.O.W.

Goals

We have all heard of S.M.A.R.T. goals, but they can only get you so far. Exapanding your horizons requires you to reach for the stars. Set a goal that is only attainable if you operate at your maximum capacity and effeciency. Picture yourself the master of your craft, your commuity a thriving utopia, or any other flowery suprelatives you can come up with. Set a goal of greatness. NO MATTER HOW GRAND, SET GOALS, without them you will never now how close you are to your destination.

Reality

After you set your goals, align them with reality. If you want to be a top executive or graduate at the top of your class (which are not as closely related as people make them seem), do some dang research!! Figure out how the people doing what you want to do did it and pattern (not copy) your plan accordingly. You want to have the most community service hours on campus (even though you only have 10 members/4.6 that show up to service events), figure out what your campus counts for community service hours and figure out how your group can maximize the parameters of the system. REALIZE GREAT GOALS REQUIRE A GREAT DEAL OF WORK!

Options

Keep your options open. It is perfectly fine, and incredibly intelligent, to adjust your plan/focus to maximize your current conditions. Some of the greatest comebacks happen after halftime adjustments are made! Don’t be too proud or arrogant to believe that your original plan was so gangsta that it was bulletproof!! Situations, “people,” and you have one thing in common….they all change! And your goals and plans should leave room to accommodate those changes. Also, educate yourself on the resources that are available to you; are there any partnerships or special assistance offered by your school or job that can help reach your goals? ALWAYS HAVE OPTIONS.

Will

This is the most essential part of the G.R.O.W. strategy. You can set all the goals in the world and have all of your options open and primed, but if you never START the process, it doesn’t matter. As a leader, it is your responsibility to inspire and ignite the WILL of your group. It is your WILL that provides the catalyst to achieve your aggressive goals. Your WILL can reshape your reality and create options that you never expected. Your WILL can motivate you to conquer your failures and drive your successes. Your WILL will when your dreams can’t! Your WILL puts the Miracle in your G.R.O.W.!!!!

No matter where you are on your college journey, the start of the fall semester is a busy time. Some of you are celebrating a return to freedom after a summer bid at home with your parents (just know they are just as ready for you to leave), others taking a deep breath before they start college for the first time, and then you have the seniors exhaling because it’s their last time enjoying fall on campus. One common theme in starting a new school year is the unexpected. And today I want to deal with a few of he most common issues faced and how avoid drama in the future.

Class is FULL!!

“What!? You have got to be kidding me, I can’t believe that my class is full, I need this class to graduate or stay on my degree plan.”

Calm down, your procrastination may not doom you this time. First look and see if the class is offered at a different time or with a different prof. If that fails, pay a visit to your favorite advisor, in person. Have your story ready because they’ll want to know what took you so long to sign up. With some luck your problem is solved here.

For those still facing closed doors it’s time to go straight to the prof, it never hurts to ask (unless your school policy prohibits it). If the prof is feeling generous you’re set. If the final answer is no and the class is not urgent, use the opportunity to take an elective or double dip in you major/minor reqs – always find the silver lining. In the future, plan ahead of time and sign up for the popular classes first. It’s best to have at least two versions of your schedule prepared in case a class fills before you get to it.

LAST YEAR WASN’T SO GREAT, do I belong here?

First, breathe! It’s okay, we all make mistakes. Heck I had a 1.5 semester and if I can overcome that, you can overcome anything! Mistakes will make reaching your goals more challenging but not impossible. Take the first few days before classes start and evaluate where you got off track, then WRITE DOWN SEMESTER GOALS FOR:

• Amount of time you will spend studying
• Amount of time you will spend meeting with prof’s in difficult classes
• GPA
• How you will celebrate once you meet your goals

Next, post these goals in a place where you can see them everyday. It is also a good practice to share your goals with a mentor or peer you feel will hold you accountable to the goals you set. Having an accountability partner was my greatest asset in college and has helped my tremendously in life. In the future, remember that you are a student first, the main goal for attending college is to graduate!! Everything should be planned around your academic focus, not the other way around.

MY ROOMMATE SUCKS!!

I think most students have had an “issue” with their roommate at one point or another. It’s bound to happen so don’t fight it. How you deal with the “issue” should be your focus. Before you go to your RA and demand a trade, try actually speaking to your roommate. Whatever the issue is, it can normally be resolved in a win/win situation that requires minimal compromise from both parties involved.

Sleeping habits, boo-thangs (aka significant others), food, and privacy are the most fussed about issues amongst roommates. Taking the time to actually discuss and fill out the Roommate Contract that most Residence Halls give students will save you time, headaches, and walking in on your roommate playing world of war craft in full armor. Set guidelines early and review them as often as needed, especially when there is change of life status; i.e. Getting boo’d up, joining a fraternity/sorority, starting a job, etc.

In the future, don’t be quick to room with your best friend and don’t leave your living arrangements up to chance either. If you can, try to room with someone who has a similar major, social life, or study habits.

I JUST MISS MY MOMMY … I’m mean I just missed my KNEE

Being homesick happens, stop fronting and embrace it. Call your parents and let them know you miss them; they might drop a few dollars in your account.

*Note to readers: please do not manipulate your parents love for a few dollars in your account. If you are broke get a job!!*

Whether you are a freshman or a 6th year senior, missing your parents is a natural and healthy emotion. Don’t tell anyone, but I would shed a few tears every time I left to go back to school, me and my family were just like that. It is important to deal with your emotions in a positive and effective way. Joining an organization, participating in study groups, and organizing a pot luck, are great ways to get a sense of family and community on your campus.

In the future it’s good to plan your trips home for the semester. Not too often but once or twice is just right. This way you know when you will see them. It’s all mental and this trick works every time! Also, get your parents to make your favorite meal and then freeze it. When you are really missing home, thaw it out and eat it in front of your roommate. It won’t be exactly the same but it will give you a quick fix until your next visit home.

The answer is a resounding,“YES!”

I spoke at the New Jersey Institute of Technology in late March of 2011. Daniel Hastings is a student at the school who was unable to attend my student leadership presentation. He emailed me with some questions and, after I responded to him, gave me permission to share his questions and my answers in this blog.

Daniel Hastings: What suggestions would you give in leading a work group or team?

Dave Kelly: I try to instill leaders, whether students, employees, managers, etc. with this concept: Don’t think about what’s in it for you, think about what’s in it for them. If you can meet the needs of your fellow students (or employees) and accomplish the objective of your projects or organization, then you are going to have more motivated people who will strive for success in whatever you may be undertaking. Also, try to find a way to get team members to know each other on a personal level. It is easier to work with people that you have a relationship with and a little harder to “get in a snit” when you have a personal connection.

Daniel: How do you keep people involved in a school or work project. Examples for myself would include creating a retail game, starting a business or designing a aircraft.

I’ve always found myself wanting to lead the group and I’ve really started to enjoy being in that kind of position, but sometimes I find that the group I’m interested in doesn’t want to put in the effort that I do and I end up doing a good majority of the work. How do I get people more involved and more excited to work on the projects that I share with them? And how to I get them to stay on the project?

Dave: My answers for both of these are linked, so I have combined them into one question. To get people involved, first of all make sure you know exactly what your goal is for the project. An unclear vision or vague objective will either turn people or way, or they may sign up but will fall away before the desired result is achieved. Once you have defined this, then determine who would like to involve or recruit to the project. This way, they clearly understand what they are being asked to do. If you know your team members on a personal level, as I discussed above, then you will be able to use their “hot buttons” to solicit their involvement. “Hot buttons” are those things they are interested in, their passions, what excite them. When you have their involvement, make sure you clearly define what is expected of them and provide resources and training to them for their assigned tasks. Don’t assume they will just know what to do or how to do it.

Finally, never fear “no.” Some people will just not come along with you. That’s OK. This goes to what you wrote about other people not having the same level of commitment as you. That happens many times in organizations and companies. As a leader, you are typically more invested in the projects and/or activities. When I owned a multi-state mortgage company, I knew my employees cared about their work and sought personal success, but they would never be quite as invested as I was–because I had my money on the line! However, never fear a “no” because until you ask someone to become involved or join, they are already at “no.” And if you ask, you may just get a “yes!” And in that, you may find people who are as committed and passionate as you are. Perhaps they will be the future leaders of your group.

Saturday, March 19, 2011 was a beautiful, sunny day in southeastern Pennsylvania. I had spent the night before near the Philadelphia airport and took the short drive to Lincoln University of Pennsylvania, in Lincoln University, PA. As I drove up to the gates of this Historically Black University (HBU), I was impressed with the beauty of the campus and the contrast of the grand, older buildings dating back to 1854 and the newer construction reflective of more current times.

I was on campus to lead the afternoon portion of the Emerging Leaders Conference for approximately 60 outstanding students. They had done group interactions including bonding and get-out-of-your-comfort-zone activities in the morning and I was there to present my “Everyday Leadership” program. We were able to get in depth in a lot of ways and the students had the opportunity to learn more about each other.

Everyday Leadership includes five leadership topics:

1) “Making the Most of Your 24/7” showed them how to get more out of a 24-hour day than even Jack Bauer could by determining their priorities, recognizing their distractions, and not allowing themselves to get into a state of overwhelm by creating an elephant list.

2) In “Public Speaking for Student Leaders” I gave them tips and tricks on how to liven up their presentations, how to handle nervousness, and ways to inject humor into any speech or workshop they may be asked to present.

3) “Conducting Fun and Exciting Meetings for Campus Organizations” gave me a chance to show the students a lot of the cool ideas I have to make club and organization meetings more fun and enjoyable including a magic trick in which I made a fireball appear out of my palm!

4) “Playing Well With Others” is one of my most popular and interactive programs. We talked about interpersonal communication, listening skills, dealing with conflict, and defining and defending your own personal values. I love all of my programs, but I get an extra jolt of energy every time I present this one!

5) “Play To Win” was the final piece of this program and gave the students the opportunity to create a blueprint towards the achievement of a personal or organization dream/vision. I encouraged the students to use the experience to make that day, March 19, their “leaf day” (the day to turn over a new leaf) and create a new direction for themselves.

The response was so cool as I was presented a plaque by Ihsan “Ziggy” Mujahid, the Assistant Director for Student Life and Development. The students even gave me a standing ovation! The theatre major in me loved it! Here were some of the comments from that day:

“Dave Kelly is a funny, insightful, engaging speaker who does a phenomenal job in communicating effective student leadership skills. His presentations are fluid and well thought out and prove useful in everyday life.” – Kyle Goggans, student and Resident Advisor Candidate for Student Government

“You were great! Entertaining. Informative. Funny. Great at holding my attention.” – Diamond Austin

The “Play to Win” portion was particularly special for student Terrical Bellamu: “Very good presentation and I enjoyed the stories. The Goal Pyramid Systemsm is something that I will be able to use throughout my entire my life.”

Some students were succinct and enthusiastic in their praise:

“Very inspirational and is worth listening to if you ever plan to be a leader.” – Jamella Smith.

“Your Presentation was really entertaining. DAVE YOU ROCK!!!” – Princess Bambina. (Princess also indicated with a ♥ that she would love to have me come back again!)

And when the Associate Dean of Students speaks, people listen:

“The session was very informative AND educational. Even as a Dean, I feel I have so much more to learn as a professional. Dave’s session had so much info I can use in my journey. As well, his energy & passion are contagious. He is the perfect person for this job!” – Dr. Jacqueline Gibson, Associate Dean of Students

How do you make the “Everyday Leader” within you “rock”? Share your thoughts below!

Justin Core from Treasure Valley Community College as "The Pharoah" and, yes, that's me as "The King!"

While attending the Association for the Promotion of Campus Activities (APCA) National Advisors Institute in Las Vegas this past January (2-4, 2011), I caught up with one of my long-time friends, Justin Core. Justin is the Director of Student Programs and Residence Life at Treasure Valley Community College (TVCC) in Ontario, OR. Ontario is just over the border from Idaho, along the Snake River, about an hour west of Boise. He is also a fellow past Circle K International President and we have had some fun and interesting times over the years!

Justin is a great guy who is very devoted to his students. He is a bit of a renaissance man as well, producing projects in Hollywood and hob knobbing with the elite of the entertainment industry. I have been blessed to come to his school twice before to work with his students. It was a complete surprise to see him at the conference and we quickly caught up.

As we were waiting for a session to start, he turned and asked, “What are you doing in two weeks?” I had nothing planned.

“We do this thing every year called ‘Las Vegas Nites’ and you would be great to do marriage ceremonies as ‘Elvis’. If I got you a plane ticket, could you come out?”

I could!

“Wait, would you be able to stay until the weekend and do a leadership program with our student leadership team?”

I would!

Within minutes, I had typed up the contract on my laptop and printed it off in the business center of the Mirage Hotel. I was going to be Elvis! I bought my plane ticket moments later and the deal was sealed.

My wife researched places to get Elvis costumes. Nothing on the internet could get to me quick enough, so we would have to try local costume shops. We went all over Atlanta, saw some great sequined jump suits, but none of them were made for someone as tall as me. We did find, however, a great pompadour wig that went with a pair of sunglasses we had gotten years earlier when we renewed our vows at an Elvis wedding chapel during a different Las Vegas trip.

Time was running short. I had already planned the leadership retreat with the SGA president, sent the handouts, and prepared the Power Point. But, what would I wear as Elvis? We finally hit on the idea of a white sweat suit that my wife adorned with rhinestones, including spelling out “Elvis” across the front. I was set!

I flew to Boise and made the short drive to Ontario. I met my friend in the student center while the setup was taking place for the show portion of Las Vegas Nites. Students were already in another room with casino games, playing for fun money and prizes while “The Hangover” played on TV screens around the room. Students were dressed as dealers, hostesses, and there were even a few shady types like you might have seen in an “Oceans 11” movie. After students cashed in their winnings for MP3 players, cameras, movie tickets, and other prizes it was time for the entertainment portion of the program.

This included rapper DTox, hypnotist Jerry Harris, DJ TVO, and me as Elvis in a corner decorated as a little wedding chapel. My ceremony script included vows such as pledging to “don’t be cruel,” “always be his/her lovin’ teddy bear,” and to never “return to sender.” I “married” tons of couples, small groups, and even one large horde. It was fun and the students seemed to enjoy it.

Then it was off to a late night breakfast! We laughed and talked about the night, other cool programs they have done, and what goals the students have for their lives. It really showed me the close connection that someone in Justin’s position can have with students and the impact a student life professional can have on the lives of those with whom they work. I also saw an incredible, professional and well done program that brought community college students out to campus on a Thursday night and that had them engaged and participating. The creativity of their leadership gave a something-for-everyone feel. Playing Elvis is clearly one of the highlights of my career.

So was the leadership retreat on Saturday. We started early and worked until lunch. We made Buddy Charts so they could get to know one another, did the Culture Walk to illustrate differences and similarities , and I led sessions on communication and conflict resolution. I apparently had done such a convincing job as Elvis that one of the students who was an organizer of Las Vegas Nites didn’t even realize I was the same person until nearly the end of the retreat! At the end of the day, the students honored me with these comments:

“I thought this was probably the best leadership training I have had the opportunity of attending. It has given me new tools I can use in leadership, at not just this community college, but also other colleges, as well.” – Kasey McFetridge, President, Association of Student Government

“Mr. Kelly, you are not only a wonderful person to have a conversation with, but are also a very talented speaker and educator. Thank you so much for your time & willingness to share & inspire myself along with the leadership here at TVCC!” – Brenda Cleaver, Social Media Coordinator

“I really, really enjoyed this retreat. I am brand new to the team and position and did not know my team well, but after this retreat I now know them more than I thought I ever would. The activities were very fun, and so were the lectures. All-in-all, I had a great time! I hope to see you again next year!” – Seri Kimball, Public Information Officer

“I love how you incorporate activities with your ‘lectures.’ You make everything fun/funny. The listening exercises were so fun and true. You helped me and everyone realize how to step back and evaluate yourself and set goals for myself. You’re Awesome!” – Kylee Holden, Entertainment Coordinator

“I really enjoyed all the interactive activities. I learned some things about our group along with myself that I may not have really paid any attention to before today. Along with that, I also enjoyed the teaching you did. My favorite was probably all the stuff about goals and goal setting! I would love to thank you for working the event Thursday, you were a huge hit! Along with all you’ve taught us!” – Kendra Babcock, Special Events Coordinator

Leadership, fun, programming, and activities can go hand-in-hand. What are you doing to bring these various elements together on your campus? Please share your ideas below!

Honesty is the best policy

If you were a part of your SGA last year, have an open and honest discussion about what worked last year and what didn’t work so well. This should not be used as a time to play the blame game but rather a time to respectfully discuss where you would like to see the organization go this upcoming year. From past experience, I can tell you that nothing will be more important than honesty as you move forward.

Brainstorm, brainstorm

I cannot begin to tell you about the magic that can happen if you use this “slow time” to brainstorm every possibility. As student leaders, you are not just ceremonial leaders—in other words, its okay to think outside of the traditional norms of your school. Sure there will be many things that the administration will require you to do—homecoming, spring fling, welcome week, etc. But it will be in your brainstorming sessions where you will get an opportunity to think of creative ways to improve your campus community and connect students to your campus. So go ahead, no idea is too outrageous not to be considered as you prepare for the upcoming school year.

Your Legacy

One of the most important questions that you will need to ask yourself as a student leader and to a larger extent as an administration is just how you plan to define your legacy. In the best of situations, as leaders, you get to choose how you would like to contribute to your campus. However, in the worst of situations, sometimes events unravel and they define your legacy to campus. For instance, in the case of my administration, our legacy was unfortunately defined by the tragic deaths of three students during that year. As leaders we did our very best to console the campus and bring back normalcy. Our legacy became defined by how we responded to these tragic events. In comparison, our predecessors’ legacy was defined by them taking strong, proactive roles in their involvement with new buildings that were being erected on campus. Your year will be full of surprises—both good and bad, but one thing is for certain, you will have a legacy.

Seek Expertise

One of the biggest mistakes I made doing my time as a SGA officer was not getting trained on how to be a SGA Vice President. Like everyone else, we all assumed that we would learn as the semester moved on. We learned alright. But not the lessons that we wanted to learn. The biggest lesson I learned from this was the importance of consulting student leadership experts to come to our campus and educate us on how to be effective leaders—from running meetings, communicating to the student body, planning events, etc.

Many of the mistakes that we made could’ve been avoided had we taken the opportunity to get mentored by an expert. Nothing is worst then leading a campus when you really don’t know what you are doing. So what about your advisors, you ask? Advisors can certainly give you a level of incite and opinion. However, sometimes advisors can’t give you optimum advice because they are too close to the situation to see it from another prospective. Hire an outside leadership expert; it will be the best leadership development investment of the year. I’ll talk about the top five reasons why you should hire a leadership trainer in a future blog.

Get connected. Stay connected. Graduate.

Tawan

In my years of speaking at leadership conferences around the country, I’ve seen many different ways to create high attendance and many ways to crash and burn. Recently, I spoke at Georgian College in Barrie, Ontario, Canada. They used one of my favorite models for getting attendance and student buy in… the Nomination model. Here’s how it works.

Faculty or staff nominate students who they think are up-and-coming leaders, students who are showing promise/potential. These students aren’t necessarily involved in anything yet. Think more like emerging leader.

For this model, have the faculty/staff do one of two things:

1. Write a letter saying why the student should be allowed to go to the conference.
2. An easier way, but less special, is to have the nominator just submit a name.

Either way, the students feel honored to have been nominated. They have been singled out for doing something good or showing potential, rather than for something negative. This increases the likelihood the student will attend and be excited/honored to participate. And in the end I believe it will boost their self-confidence and get them involved on campus. With one easy to implement model, you’ll also increase your student leader base for the future; and that is a big deal!

Do you have any other ideas? Any other ways to expand on this concept? Let me know with your comments below.

Troy

This is another icebreaker in the “Sure-Fire Icebreaker” series. Below is a full script of an amazing icebreaker. I created such an extensive description because I’ve found that it can be difficult to do a great icebreaker from a three-sentence description. Being a professional speaker and student leader trainer, I’m on college campuses often doing leadership retreats and orientations. Over the past decade, working with tens of thousands of students, I’ve learned the hard way what works and what doesn’t. Most icebreakers flop because the students don’t fully understand the directions or they feel corny or awkward doing it. It ends up being a lot of work and not a lot of play. Follow my script and you can skip the learning curve and move right into awesomeness!

This is a very low risk, low gradient activity that is a lot of fun. I like to have at least 10 people to start. After that it works with any size group you have room for. I’ve done it with 1000 students before. This also works with groups who’ve never meet before and groups who are very close to each other. Have fun!

“How many of you know how to play rock-paper-scissors? Let’s review. Rock beats…scissors.”

I review because 100% of the time I say, rock beats…1/2 of the people say scissors and the other 1/2 say paper. It makes me laugh every time.

“That’s why we review. Scissor beats…paper. Paper beats…rock. There’s no dynamite or nuclear bombs or hand grenades. Just rock, paper and scissors.”

“Here’s how it works. My I get a volunteer please? What’s your name? John. Give John a big round of applause. The object of this activity* is to go from a 1 to a 5.”

I hold up one finger and then five to demonstrate…

“Here’s how it works. Everyone will start as a 1. Let’s say I’m a 1. I hold up my finger and look for someone else who has a 1 up. I introduce myself.”

While shaking hands I say…

“Hi, I’m Troy…Hi, I’m John. You don’t need to tell them your lives’ story. Just introduce yourself. Then you have a duel. Feel free to get intense, maybe do a little sumo thing.”

I get down into a sumo stance and have my partner do the same if they’re comfortable. Everyone usually laughs at that.

“When we have our face-off it will look like this- we say, rock, paper, scissors, shoot.”

On ‘shoot’ you show your rock, paper, or scissors.

“It’s not, rock, paper shoot. It’s, rock, paper, scissors, shoot. Not, one, two, shoot. It’s, one, two, three, shoot. Got it? That’s very important. Okay John, here we go. Rock, paper, scissors, shoot.”

Let’s say John wins.

“Nice John. Since John won, he goes from a 1 to a 2. Since I didn’t win, I stay at a 1.”

Hold up your fingers to demonstrate. This type of modeling helps cement the learning.

“Okay, let’s say I’m at a 3. I walk around holding up three fingers and look for someone else who is holding up three fingers.”

Of course, I demonstrate this. And I look to John and hint for him to put up three fingers.

“Introduce yourself…Hi, I’m Troy. Hi, I’m John. Nice to meet you. And then have a face-off.”

I get into the sumo position again- just for fun.

“Rock, paper, scissors, shoot!”

Let’s pretend I won.

“Oh, I got you John. Since I won, I go from a 3 to a…4. Since John didn’t win, he goes from a 3 to a…2. Right, he goes down one. But you don’t go below a 1. 1 is the lowest number. Excellent. Thank you John. Let’s give John a big thank you for volunteering.

“Remember, the object is to go from a 1 to a 5. If you’re so fortunate as to get to 5, then you come up to this area of the room. You could even come up on stage.”

I like to have all the 5s come to the general area in which I’m setting up the activity. Going up on stage is even better if that’s possible.

“And you hang out with all the other fives and just be cool. You can walk around all cool like. And give high-fives to all the other 5.”

“What questions do you have?”

“Alright, let’s get to it. Everyone hold up one finger. Find someone else with a one up in the air, and begin!”

Playing music is a nice touch here.

When everyone starts playing I’ll usually join in with them for the first couple minutes. Then I’ll head over to where the 5s will be going. I like to get there before any 5s arrive. I go there to greet them with a high-five, big smile and a wahoo! My goal is to keep the energy up and encourage them to welcome the new 5s with a big high-five.

When I notice that just a little less than 1/2 of the group has made it to a 5, I stop the activity. I shut the music off and say…

“Freeze where you are. Hold up the number of fingers you are at right now.”

It may take a little bit longer than normal to quiet everyone down because some people have to finish the round they just started. It’s okay. Be patient.

“If you are at a 3, let me hear you! If you are a 4 let me hear you! If you are a 5! If you are a 2! If you are a 1! Raise your hand if you did not get past a 3? Did anyone not get past a 2? Is it possible that someone didn’t get past a 1?! Amazing! Let’s give them a big hand because that takes talent!”

If no one raises their hand for not getting past a 1 then I say…)

“I didn’t think so. If you didn’t get past a 2, raise your hand again. Let’s give them a big hand because that’s a very difficult thing to do. They’ve got skills!”

There is another version you can do that is much higher gradient. Instead of going from 1 to 5, they act out different things. For example, instead of a 1 they would be an egg. They squat down a bit and waddle around and look for another person who is looking like an egg. The winner goes from an egg to a chicken. They tuck their arms under and flap away while making chicken sounds. Do you see what I mean by higher gradient? This can be quite scary for some people to role-play like this. Only do this with a group that is ready. If they aren’t, you’ll have people walking out of the room or resentful they have to play this “cheesy” kid game. But if they’re ready they will have a blast and become even closer as a group.

Here’s the progression I usually use: Egg…chicken…dinosaur…Elvis…graduating senior.

It helps to have a motion and a sound for each [I’m open to suggestions for a sound for the egg].

Feel free to make up your own progression. Maybe figure out a way to use your school mascot. Have fun, be creative .

*When I do this with groups who aren’t necessarily there for icebreakers I like to call it an activity instead of an icebreaker or game . Some people don’t like icebreakers or games, but if it’s just an activity, then they may be able to buy into it easier. I know it is a little detail but it could make all the difference with some groups.

Every CAB in the land is looking for ways to stretch the student activities budget to its limits. As the country goes, so goes the campus. Believe it or not, your speaker can help. By coordinating a few things in advance and taking a few minutes to work with the speaker or their rep, you might be able to cut a pretty sweet deal. Try throwing a few of the ideas below into your standard negotiations and over the course of a budget year you’ll see the difference.

Book waaaay in advance - The further the better. This has several advantages. Number one, like everyonme else as speakers grow in knowledge and experience they tend to raise their rates from year to year. By booking as soon as your budget becomes available you may avoid next year’s increases. Number two, it gives the speaker a chance to  get the best travel rates. Who knows, you may be able to get them to pass on the savings to you.

Eat the speaker’s expenses – Speaking of expenses, most speakers are going to ask you to pay for their air travel, hotel accommodation, meals, ground transportaion, etc. This is pretty normal and it could range from a lump fee to a reimbursment process. A few ways to eat those expenses yourself and maybe save a few bucks.

1. Put ‘em up in on-campus housing – Many schools have housing designated for this purpose. You can alos book them in a hotel that gives the school a special rate or where you have an account. Make and pay for the room reservation yourself and realize the savings. If you go the hotel route, make sure the speaker knows they are responsible for their own incidental room charges – ordering room service, raiding the mini-bar, ordering the plush robe to take home, etc. If you do allow some expenses, make sure you put a cap on it.

2. Feed ‘em – Speakers have to eat when they’re on the road and they often include that in their expenses. But most speakers appreciate having lunch or dinner with your students, faculty of staff. Include them in any meals associated with your event or invite them to lunch or dinner with your leaders or event planners. Let them know that you’ve pre-arranged meals so their expenses can reflect that.

3. Take ‘em for a joy ride – Okay, not litterally, but you could pick them up at the airport, get them from the hotel to the campus and to lunch and back, thinks like that. Many speakers will find joy in the opportunity to build relationships with you as part of their audience both before and after the event. Time spent in the car is a great way to get to kow each other and save a few taxi or rental car bucks to boot. The speaker will also appreciate not having to deal with traffic, unfamilar streets or that not always so reliable GPS.

Book ‘em twice Danno - It’s called ‘block booking’ and there are more than a few ways to skin this cat…

1. Twice in one day - Many speakers will have a half day rate or throw in a second talk for no extra charge! Don’t be afraid to ask because most speakers love the interaction speaker and will usually make themselves available right up until flight time.

2. Twice in one week - This works well during week long events like welcome week, sexual assault awareness week, etc. You can also partner with another campus organization or department, another campus, or another local school or organization on back-to-back dates. The speaker will offer you a great rate and you may only have to pay one set of travel expenses. You may also be able to share the cost with your partner and spare your budget even more.

3. Twice during a semester or academic year – This works well for events that happen more than once each year… like orientation, orientation training, student leader training, study skills workshops, etc. Book the same speaker for both events and you’ll get a great rate for sure. Speakers love the opportunity to deliver a consistent message to your student body and reinforce their trainings to help you build a stronger campus community. Most speakers have multiple part trainings and will also have the opportunity to vary and customize their message knowing in advance that they’ll be returning.

4. Bring ‘em back each year - Many speakers will give you the same price they gave you the previous year as long as you bring them back for consecutive years. Locking a speaker/trainer in for consecutive years a great way to spread a consistent year-to-year message on your campus as your students matriculate through. You’ll also avoid their inevitable rate increases I mentioned earlier.

Buy one, get one – Try booking two speakers from the same bureau, agency or representative. Often times the speakers are willing to partner and offer special rates through their agent in this manner. Sometime the speakers will work together (like two leadership trainers or two dating experts) but that’s not a requirement. They could be speakers on two totally different topics, for two different events and two different times of the year. But by simply planning ahead for what your needs will be, you can get a better rate by combining seemingly unrelated events.

Cash out early - If your school’s policy and your budget will allow it, pay for your speaker in advance. You may be booking an event for later down the road, but many speakers will offer a discount if you pay in advance. If they don’t offer the discount, ask for it. (PS. make sure the speaker and/or agent has an acceptable refund or substitute speaker policy, just in case.)

Go Green - For the sake of both efficiency and the environment, many speakers will appreciate conducting the entire transaction electronically – that includes agreements, invoices and if possible event payment via credit card or electronic funds transfer. If you can avoid killing any trees and make it happen without paper ever seeing the light of day, ask for a GO GREEN discount. You never know.

PEACE.
Rick

Did you know that the success or failure of new students on campus lies in the hands of your Orientation Leaders?

It’s true. And how they are prepared for their responsibilities will determine if those new students are successful during their collegiate career.

When I arrived on campus, my college orientation consisted of getting handed a Student Handbook with an envelope of coupons from local vendors and about a 30-minute session of going around a circle with 10 new students talking about ourselves. “Assessment” was our ‘orientation leader’ asking us if we met any new people. He was no more equipped to help me succeed as a student than I was as a timid first-year.

The training that you provide for your Orientation Leaders needs to be intentional. It should allow them to bond through fun and invigorating exercises that will not only further develop their leadership skills but enable them to provide more effective representation to new students and their families.

New Student/First Year Experience programs are pivotal in defining the direction new students choose when arriving on campus. Too many times orientation leaders are brought into situations they are not prepared for and they end up giving the wrong information or advice to new students. I had the privilege of spending a day working with the Orientation Leaders at Spelman College in Atlanta helping them to prepare for the next nine days that they were going to spend with their group of new students. Nine days! That’s a long time and the potential for things to not go as hoped is great.

It is important for your Orientation Leaders to help their group of new and transfer students succeed in going from orientation to graduation. With that, here are some areas I suggest you include in your training for Orientation Leaders:

• Sessions that develop your Orientation Leaders’ facilitation skills
• Solutions to handle drama, conflict, and bullying
• Provide personal growth through introspection
• Bust the biases students bring to leadership roles, helping them to understand diversity in its various forms
• Demonstrate how listening and communication skills turn your Orientation Leaders into mentors
• Discover and share the importance personal leadership styles, including their impact on interactions and abilities development

What are some of the things your school includes? Do you have specific goals that you go into Orientation Leader training hoping to achieve? Any other ideas you want to share? Please use the comment space below to create a dialog to improve every campus’ Orientation Leader training!

Because your students sit in classes much of the day, attracting a crowd to your lecture or speaker-based event can pose an extra challenge for your campus activities board. Whether you’re on the student activities staff or you’re a volunteer student leader you can use all the help you can get to make your events worth the fees most college speakers charge.

Even facing this challenge, most activities boards overlook the most qualified expert on their team – THE SPEAKER themselves! Believe it or not your speaker cares whether or not you get a good turn-out for your event. Believe me when I tell you that because a standing-room-only event makes both of you look good many speakers are willing to get involved and help you promote your event to students, faculty, staff and the local community in any way they can. The best college speakers know what draws people to their events and are often willing to devote the extra time and effort to insure your success.

Here are seven ways you can get your speaker involved in helping you recruit your audience.

1. Ask your speaker to design a flyer. Most college speakers who regularly deliver campus programs probably already have a general template designed. They’ll just need to change the date and other details to correspond with your event. If the speaker can’t provide one consider recruiting a graphic design student or artist on campus to design one. Once you have it, post/distribute it all over campus.

2. Blog about it on your school blog. Your speaker can usually make lots of advance information available to your blogger and even make themselves available for a blog interview. This is a good way to talk to your students about the benefits of hearing this speaker. (NOTE: If you don’t have a school blog, with the help of someone on your campus activities board, you can blog about it here at CampusTalkBlog.)

3. Arrange for a newspaper interview. Get your guest speaker interviewed by your campus or local newspaper if the next issue will be out before the event. Speakers love to be interviewed and it can be done by phone so distance isn’t a factor. The speakers should also be able to email any photos or other visuals you might need for the article.

4. Do a radio interview. Get your guest speaker to call into the campus or local radio station. Most radio stations can interview guests by call-in and this can really get your audience excited. They’ll get a chance to hear the speaker’s voice and get a taste of the energy they’ll bring to the event.

5. Get the speaker on TV. If you have a campus TV station or relationships with a local station your speaker would make a great news feature or talk show guest. The speaker might have to arrive on campus as much as a day before the event but often that’s not a problem. If their schedule permits, they won’t pass up a chance to be on TV.

6. Post a promo video on YouTube. Most speakers have the ability to make a short promo video, sometimes even custom tailoring it for your school, giving the date, time and all other important info. Most importantly, the video should stress the benefits of attending and give enough content to generate excitement. Once it’s on YouTube you can embed it in your website or blog, send it out by email and much more.

7. Partner your speaker with a student marketer. Have a student on your activities board or an eager volunteer marketing major assigned to assist you in promoting the event. Connect them with the speaker and the two of them can work together to implement all of the strategies above and brainstorm other ways to promote that will be perfect for your campus.

Don’t be shy in asking your speaker for promotional help. The best of them will have pre-prepared media and promotional materials and will jump at the chance for extra exposure as long as their travel and speaking schedule permits.  Got any other ideas? I’d love to hear them and how to make them work for you, your campus and your guest speakers.

PEACE.
Rick

In the speaking business there’s a school of thought that says you always tell your audience everything three times. How do you do that without being redundant? 1) You tell ‘em what you’re gonna tell ‘em 2) You tell ‘em, and 3) You tell ‘em what you told ‘em! No, that’s not just a clever line in a movie or the punchline to a joke. It really works when you want to drive home your message and make it stick.

If you have access to a student email list on your campus, you can put this same strategy to efficient use. By composing a three-part email campaign to promote your campus lecture or event everybody will get the details about your event in logical intervals. Your message will be remembered without being annoying. Conducting this three part campaign is as easy as 1, 2, 3.

1. Tell ‘em what you’re gonna tell ‘em – A week or so before your event, send out an email announcing your event your upcoming event.  Include the topic in your headline and make sure you include the date, time and place. Include a brief bio on your speaker (or provide a link) if it’s a lecture or workshop. Most importantly, tell them what they’ll get out of attending… leadership skills, study skills, extra credit, free food, door prizes, whatever!. This serves as a ‘heads up’ for those who want to plan in advance.
    
2. Tell ‘em – Three days before your event, repeat the email - including all of the details again - and assure everybody that it’s not too late to attend. You can switch up your headline and copy just a little to generate some excitement and create a sense of growing urgency.
    
3. Tell ‘em what you told ‘em – We know you’ve told ’em twice already but… the day before your event (or even the day of…), send out a final email to bring your event to the forefront of every-one’s mind. Include the details again, ’cause you know they’ll forget! If they did remember about it, save them the hassle of sifting through their inbox to find that email from last week.

The double bonus is that students can just click the FORWARD button and help you get the message out to their friends! You might want to even suggest it in the text. Also designate someone to keep an eye on the return inbox that can answer any questions. If you’ve got a great list, email is an efficient way to communicate details when you’re trying to pack a hall to hear your campus speaker.

PEACE.
Rick

If you are only in it for the free room and board or other perks, it isn’t worth it. However, if you want to impact your campus community in a positive way or give back in ways that you thought unimaginable then this might be your calling. In my opinion, having been both a Resident Assistant and Residence Director, I think it takes a special kind of person to be an RA — much like it takes a special someone to be a campus leader. While it may seem glamorous to have your own room, free room and board, or “boss around other students,” it is indeed a tough job that requires a level of dedication you may or may not be aware of. Before you put in the application, here are some things that you should consider:

Does my schedule allow me the flexibility to take on this responsibility?

This should be your first question before taking on any additional extracurricular activities. As an RA, your schedule is not as routine as you think. In fact, there are more “when life happens to my residents moments” than you think. And, by the way, these moments can happen anytime, anywhere. I remember having to cancel a date (not once but three times) so that I could attend to a last-minute emergency. Does your partner have the patience to deal with this? Do you have the patience to deal with this?

Is this the way I want to contribute to my campus community?

There are many different ways to help your campus community. For instance, you can become a campus leader in the Student Government Association, participate in the Greek life, join clubs specific to your major, do service learning, etc. But becoming an RA is perhaps one of the noblest ways to serve. Unlike other positions on campus, an RA is on 24/7. So what does this mean? This means that if you like to get your party on, this may not be the position for you. Of course, this is not to say that RAs are not allowed to attend parties, but as an RA you’re always under a microscope. Due to the fact that a big part of your job is to enforce campus policy, people are always watching to see if you actually will. So if you don’t mind being under the microscope, this should not be a problem. Just remember that being a RA is not about being perfect; it’s about being a role model. There’s a big difference between the two.

Will this help me in my career endeavors?

This was a question I asked myself before filling out my RA application. Does being an RA look good on your resume? Yes. Does being an RA increase your chances of obtaining an assistant-ship in Residence Life or some other related department in graduate school? Absolutely. Will becoming an RA help me be a better (fill in the blank)? Without question. Becoming an RA will help you better manage your time, give you more confidence, get you connected with your school, help you communicate better and help you build campus morale. As an RA you take on one of the most noble student leader positions on any campus and you gain skills that will serve you for the rest of your life. So at the end of the day, do you really wanna be an RA?

Tawan
Get Connected. Stay Connected. Graduate.

One way to really rev up your next campus event is to get as much support from faculty as you can!  If the topic of your guest lecturer or the theme of your event matches an area of interest for them, you can really be in luck. They’ll pull out the stops to help you spread the word and get people to attend. I’m sure your activities board usually expends lots of effort trying to get students to attend, but what if you got professors, staff and advisers totally on board?! Break down some resistance with these simple tips:

1. Be considerate when you ask for help. Even the smallest amount of time, space, materials and effort that people expend on your behalf is valuable. Be the diplomat in gaining their cooperation, be appreciative of what they can do and understanding of what they can’t. Even if they can’t support you this time how you ask – and even how you handle it if they can’t – could make or break a long term relationship.

2. Ask permission. Some supportive professors may not mind you taking over their lecture hall or giving you a slice of class time to announce or promote your event. They may also be willing to offer their services as a liaison and announce it to all of their classes. Ask real nice first.

3. Match your seminar topic to majors, specific classes and clubs. Contact professors, club leaders and decision makers to let them know your upcoming event is ideal for their students or members. I’ll bet you can get them to work with you to promote the event! If it’s a lecture you’re promoting don’t forget the speech clubs, speech majors, communications departments and public speaking classes. It’s their chance to see a pro in action.

4. Keep them in the loop by inviting staff and advisers to your planning meetings. Especially if they’ve offered support of any kind it’s important to keep them in the loop. If they can’t attend planning meetings send the written minutes or notes to them. Follow up by checking in every so often to get their input and answer any questions.

5. Partner with the staff for promotional activities.Make a list of partners for each kind of event you promote. Professors can announce the event before class. Club leaders can add the date and event information into their newsletter or email blast. Get everybody talking, texting and posting by targeting the partners who are the most interested in the topic.

6. Make the grade by suggesting class assignments based on your event’s topic. If the topic is right, some professors will offer extra credit to their students who attend. Believe it or not, many professors are looking for creative, timely and hands-on ways to drive home the lesson. Let your speaker know this and they often work with the professor to ensure their content is a match.

7. Say, “thank you.” A thousand times say, “thank you!”If you can, mention the professors, staff and anyone else who helped you in the opening to you program. Recognizing their assistance in front of a captive audience is a great way to give them public recognition. (No Academy Awards filibusters please. We have a hook!) Don’t forget a THANK YOU  line in any follow up newsletters, articles, email broadcasts, blog posts or meeting minutes. It’s a nice touch to send a card or note after the event, too.

8. Bribe them. Not as desperate as it sounds, you can bribe your professors with free stuff – and everybody likes free stuff! Once again, if the topic is a good match for the professor’s subject, a signed copy of the speaker’s book is the best idea. You can bribe them with promotional items, but come on… bribery has to involve something of value. Speakers are often eager to share cop[ies of their books, audio programs and more with professors who share their views or their passion for a topic. See what you speaker or act has to offer.

Always keep on the look out for new ways to get faculty, staff, the dean, the chancellor, the provost, the president, the librarian, the janitor, the lawn maintenance guys and everybody else to muster arms. By working together, your event can be an even bigger success – and it’s a win-win-win for everybody. Have any other ideas to endear the faculty and staff? Let me know.

PEACE.
Rick

Working in campus activities, when the outcome is on you, you might feel pulled in a thousand directions dealing with all the details, disruptions, headaches and nightmares of your next campus event. Dealing with the details is necessary, but I’m sure you can do without the ‘disruptions, headaches and nightmares’ part. Instead, I suggest you go for teamwork, smooth sailing, and ‘a good time was had by all.’  You do that by grabbing the leadership bull by the horns and making sure your team functions as a team. Here’s six ways to do that that will make both you and your team stand out.

Include your team in the planning – Have planning meetings early in the process so you and your team can brainstorm all the details. You’ll create a sense of ownership by getting others involved early- and when they own it, they’ll work harder. You’ll get more volunteers, a greater commitment and better follow through.

Tap all of your resources- , Students, faculty, staff, community and parents are all likely resources. Though often overlooked, the professional speaker you hired might be your best resource. Ask the speaker what prewritten promotional or marketing materials they may have. The speaker’s just as interested in making your event a success as you are!

Delegate the details – You can’t be expected to do it all so learn to delegate now. To keep your eye on the bigger picture – and to keep from being exhausted - delegate smaller details to your team members and volunteers according to their job duties. Break the larger event into smaller pieces and delegate others to lead that part of the project. And don’t forget to keep an eye out for skills that you can match with tasks.

Get it done early – Create a master checklist of what needs to be done, who’s assigned to get it done and when it’s supposed to be completed. Setting some checkpoints along the way might not be a bad idea either. Allow enough time to address everything – all of the details and the possible last minute emergencies. It’s easier to be proactive than reactive. (aka ‘ drama-free’)

Follow Up, follow up, follow up- This is a really big part of your job as a leader. Even though you might have delegated tasks and assigned other responsibilities, the buck still stops with you. Have a final meeting a few days in advance of the event to make sure everything’s on schedule. You’ll still have time to fix those few things that will inevitably get screwed up.

Say “Thank You” – AHEM… I said, say “Thank You!” – Still one of the two magic words if you ask me. (…know what the other one is?) A thankful, gracious and appreciative leader is a great leader. Let your team know you couldn’t have done it without them. They’ll appreciate it and might just volunteer again next time!

My last two words of wisdom… Get organized and get it done right… and the measure of a great leader is not how many followers he/she has, but how many other leaders he/she creates.

PEACE.
Rick

It can be hard to get students to come to a speaker-based event – no matter how well you’ve planned it. You’ve got to overcome that fact that they’ve been sitting in class all week and WILL NOT come to another boring lecture. First, don’t pick a boring speaker and secondly, making sure EVERYONE on campus and around town knows about your event can have a huge impact on the attendance. Consider adding these to your Campus Activities Board contact list to help you spread the word.

Student leaders. Contact the leaders in student government and the leaders of  campus clubs and organizations. Ask them to pass the information along their members.

Think majors. Contact all of the majors/departments related to your event/speaker or lecture. Let them know that a topic related to their area of study is being discussed.

Speech! Speech! Invite your speach/public speaking professors and students. If your speaker or lecturer is any good, it’s their chance to see a pro in action. Many speakers will welcome their evaluation and feedback and the students may get some real-world perspective.

Local high schools. Invite high school students to your event. It’s a great way to reach out to the community, while getting prospective students on campus.

Local community organizations. Especially the ones that your school, board or student body support in one way or another. Of course the best match is if the subject-matter is related to or is of interest to the organization. Helping spread the word could be one of the ways they show appreciation for your support.

The school and local newspapers.Write an article or interview with the speaker to be inserted in the school and/or local newspapers or pitch a newsworthy idea to one of their reporters that covers related topics. (business events to a business reporter, social events to an entertainment reporter, etc.) Include the topic, speaker name, date, time and location of the event. Make sure you include a photo of the speaker. Ask for the article to run a few days in advance for optimal results. Using local media is a great way to invite the community, boost attendance and could be great community relations for your school! Check with your school officials on policy.

Campus and local radio stations. Radio is great because of the immediacy. Anyone within earshot could show up NOW if your announcements are timed right! You may not have a budget for local radio commercials, but announcements by the DJ or even a guest appearance by one of the event coordinators is common fare.  Ask them to conduct an interview with the speaker. Most speakers are happy to do an interview and it can even be done over the phone.

Campus and local TV. Hey, we mentioned campus radio but left out the TV monitors all over campus. Post a bulletin, get interviewed, host a show, run a PSA or make it news. Just get on the air! Same goes for your local affiliates or public access cable TV. Pitch a good story, show idea, topic or personality and even TV can’t resist. If you have an on-campus studio or media department you might even be able to make your own video.

School and community bloggers. Bloggers always need something to talk about. You might have a campus blog or event a student activities blog and it’s one you should never forget. Find a local community blog that blogs about local events and activities and it could be a match made in heaven.

The campus social media gurus and addicts. Whether there’s someone assigned to use social media on behalf of your school, activities board or organization – or if you just charge everybody on your CAB to go forth and tweet. Social media is a must. Post it on your individual Facebook pages. Add it to your school or organization’s fan page. Tweet it, tweet it and tweet it again.

Don’t make getting the word out about your speaker or other campus event a one-man show. Keep your contact list up to date, reach out and touch someone and you can pack the house.   

PEACE.
Rick

One of the biggest mistakes many graduating student leaders make is not looking at their position as an opportunity to mentor rising student leaders. Furthermore, student leaders often fall victim to a “do it all myself” attitude. One of the best ways to mentor rising campus leaders is to help them gain experience. If your mentees are not given an opportunity to lead at some level, how can they become effective campus leaders? A leader’s legacy is sometimes defined by what they’ve done when they are no longer present not what they accomplished while they were there.

Although the next administration may have their own ideas about how to lead the campus, your challenge as the incumbent leader is to help guide and nurture future leaders of your organization or campus. This is critical because this will define your legacy. I believe the reason why systems in the world don’t change very often is because the ideas were put in place by great thinkers and leaders. Ideas rule the world not people. So what ideas are you putting in the minds of your mentees? If your mentees adopt your best and brightest ideas, you are sure to have a lasting legacy.

Some ideas to help give peer mentees an opportunity to lead:

1. Give them a chance to run meetings and give them feedback after the meeting is over.
2. Give them a chance to work on a big project. Don’t give them all of the responsibility but allow them to contribute and observe what you are doing. In doing so, they will not feel overwhelmed and this will allow them to stay engaged in the process.
3. Give them “what-if scenarios.” For example, what would you do if a member is not giving 100 percent to the organization or what would you do when you have two members that refuse to work together? Allow them to present their ideas and answers as well as offer insight on how to handle certain situations.
4. If you cannot attend an important event, allow them to go in your absence. This way they get the experience and they know how to conduct themselves the next time around.
5. Help them find their personal leadership style. Ask them questions about how they plan to run the show and why they plan to run it that way.

Implement these ideas and you’re sure to cultivate a leader and leave a legacy all at the same time.

Tawan
Get Connected. Stay Connected. Graduate.

If your Campus Activities Board doesn’t have a Marketing Street Team form one now! With every campus event they should hit the ground running – and I do literally mean get their feet out on the streets of your campus and your community and make sure EVERYBODY knows. Their job is to spread the word, start the chatter, stir up the buzz, get everybody talking and make sure you can’t go anywhere without knowing about this event.

Pick some people for your street team who are enthusiastic, bold, gregarious, outgoing, friendly and fun so they can connect to people places and things without being annoying or obnoxious. They also have to make sure that people feel good about your event and know that if they show up the event will be at least fun and that they might even learn something.

Here’s a short task list of some things you can add to the mission of your Marketing Street Team… should they choose to accept it.

Launch a white board brigade.Hit the classrooms and write the details on every class’ white boards, listing the event, the time, location and details. You might want to check in with the individual professors on this. Wouldn’t want to tick anybody off!

Hang promotional posters or fliers. You may have to pay a few dollars to get them printed, but they should be all around campus and on bulletin boards. You might get them free at the campus printer or through a local sponsor. Check with the speaker, too. Many speakers will have a poster template available for you to use.

The Bathroom Brigade.They gotta go! EVERYBODY goes in there eventually so why not post your fliers or posters on the back of bathroom stall doors and right at eye-level for the guys. Talk about a captive audience!

Toss some Table Tents.Toss them on tables in the dining hall, the cafeteria, the library, the student lounge and, building lobbies and anywhere else you can thing of.

Pass out flyers the day of the event.Make sure you save some of you fliers for the day of the event. This could be your most important marketing time. You’ll get both the impulse buy and the folks who are just plain bored and looking for something to do. Make the rounds at lunch time or in other crowded places both on and off campus and give ‘em out like candy!

Hang door hangers. Go door to door to dorm rooms and class rooms the day before the event. Remember to stick to heavy traffic areas to get the most bang for your buck.

Try Ground-Chalking. Use sidewalk chalk - NOT paint or anything else permanent – to tag campus sidewalks, driveways and parking lots with your event’s details. Sidewalk chalk is very cheap and comes in many colors. It also washes off with water so wait until the day of the event or check the weather. It’s gone with the next rain or a quick hosing.

You probably won’t want to do all of these – that might be a little overkill – but just pick the ones that are most appropriate for your budget, your campus or your event. I know this is a technology-driven world but it’ll always work to get human minds, bodies and souls involved. Get the right crew and your Marketing Street Team can reach out and touch your student body – and pack the house at every event.

PEACE.
Rick

The question is: how was this year’s program different? Much of the direction I gave them previously, they took to heart. For example, they have monthly club advisor meetings, regular programming updates and they also do a program in the fall on recruitment tabling called “The Nitty Gritty.”

This time around I was able to use my time in some new and interesting ways, with team building, practical interactions and leadership material. This is the stuff that the students said they wanted more of, along with the membership retention, fun and exciting meetings, and other campus org topics that I typically do.

Flexibility is a great thing. That’s one thing I love about this job: the ability and opportunity to remake my programs or create something new based on comments I’ve received and the successes of each program. My servant leadership material under the banner of Building Leaders Through Service™ came about because of requests from Valencia Community College and the University of Akron. My program for advisors also came about as the result of a school’s request. I also love it when I find that a school has successfully implemented some or all of my tried-and-true ideas.

What bright ideas do you have? Not just for me, but to share with others. Use the comment section below and share some of your best training programs, leadership efforts and co-curricular practices. You might inspire something new in higher education!

Dave ‘Gonzo’ Kelly
America’s student leadership Trainer™
Building Leaders Through Service™

This is another icebreaker in the “Sure-Fire Icebreaker” series. Below is a full script of an amazing icebreaker. I created such an extensive description because I’ve found that it can be difficult to do a great icebreaker from a three-sentence description. Being a professional speaker and student leadership trainer, I’m on college campuses and at leadership retreats and orientations a lot. Over the past decade, working with tens of thousands of students, I’ve learned the hard way what works and what doesn’t. Most icebreakers flop because the students don’t fully understand the directions or they feel corny or awkward doing it. It ends up being a lot of work and not a lot of play. Follow my script and you can skip the learning curve I had to take and move right into awesomeness!

This is one of my favorite icebreakers. It’s gone over well with every group I’ve worked with. It’s a low gradient activity so it can be done with a group of complete strangers. That also lessens the odds anyone one will feel awkward or think the activity is “cheesy”. What’s also nice is that even though this is an icebreaker, people seem to easily create a lasting and memorable connection with four different people. More than once I’ve come back to a campus and an orientation leader thanked me for this activity because four years later they are still close friends with one of their partners! And it only takes about 15 minutes. Follow this script with a brief pause between each question and you can’t go wrong:

In a moment you’ll find a partner. Someone you don’t know. When you get with this partner, find out at least 3 things you have in common. And go beyond something like, “You’re a student here, so am I!” See how random you can get. Ready, GO!

• Look at your partner. Know them, memorize them, you will come back to this person. They are your high five partner. Give them a high five and say, “see you later!”
• On three, shout your partner’s name as loud as you can. If you don’t know it, find out what it is now. If you can’t pronounce it, just say “blah blah blah” One, two, three! Nice to meet you all.
• Please pause. This partner you are with right now is officially your high five partner. Go ahead and give them a high five.
• What were some random things you found in common with your partner? (This is optional if I feel I have enough time)

What I like about shouting the partner’s name is it helps them remember names. By the time they get to the last partner, you won’t have to give them time to find out the name because they will have already anticipated it. Then quickly, on to the next round…

• In a moment you’re going to find your 2nd of 4 partners. Again, someone you don’t know so well. When you find this partner, find out 3 things that you have in common. Ready, GO!
• Please pause. This partner you are with right now is officially your low five partner. Go ahead and give them a low five.
• On three, shout your partner’s name as loud as you can. If you don’t know it, find out what it is. One, two, three! That’s a beautiful name.
• Look at your partner. Know them, memorize them, You’ll come back to this partner. They are your low five partner. Give them a low five and say “see you later!”

As you’ll notice, each round is almost exactly the same. The beauty of this is they get accustomed to the routine and feel comfortable in knowing what to expect. That helps the focus stay on the people and not on the directions. I do make occasional changes- they are very important, SO PAY ATTENTION. Generally the changes are just to shorten things up because you don’t need as much explanation.

Move into the next round loudly and immediately after they give their partner a low five. You want to keep the energy up and the flow moving quickly.

• Find your 3rd partner and find out 3 things that you have in common! GO!
• Please pause. This partner you are with right now is officially your knee-to-knee partner. Give them some knee love. (Model this by pretending to touch your knee to someone else’s)
• Shout out your partner’s name as loud as you can. One, two, three! Nice, you are getting good at this!
• Look at your partner. Know them, memorize them, You’ll come back to this partner. They are your knee-to-knee partner. Give them some knee love and say “see you later!”

Then quickly to the fourth and final partner…

• Find your 4th and final partner and find out 3 things that you have in common! GO!
• Please pause. This partner you are with right now is officially your toe-to-toe partner. Give them some toe love. (Model this by pretending to touch someone’s toes with yours)
• Shout out your partner’s name as loud as you can. One, two, three!
• Look at your partner. Know them, memorize them, You’ll come back to this partner. They are your toe-to-toe partner. Give them some toe love and say “see you later!”

Now it’s time to pump up your energy and get people excited and cheering if they are up to it…

Are you ready for the next level?

As quickly as you can, when the music comes on and I say go, you’ll find your high five partner, give them a high five and celebrate with them. Ready, GO!

Make sure you are modeling a celebration with an imaginary partner. If you model high energy and playfulness it’s more likely they will follow suit.

Sometimes, to bring their focus back, I do a count down. I’ll say, “5…4…3…2…1.” I do this if the group is large because you’ll have many people standing with their partner waiting for what to do next. While a few others are still trying to find their partner. I usually don’t do this count down with a smaller group.

Did you find your low five partner?!

Now, when I say go, find your knee-to-knee partner, give them some knee love and celebrate! GO!

Did you find your knee-to-knee partner?!

Find your toe-to-toe partner and celebrate!

Did you find your toe-to-toe partner?!

Are you ready for the next level?!! Could it possibly get any better?

In a moment, when I say go and the music comes on, you’ll find your high five partner and give them a high five. Then immediately find your low five partner and give them a low five. But not yet! Stay focused here. Don’t look around yet.

Sometimes you have people start to look for their first partner. This helps keep their focus on you and hearing the directions)

After you find your low five partner, you’ll find your knee-to-knee partner, give them a little knee love and finally find your toe-to-toe partner and give them some toe love. After you find your last partner you will celebrate with them like you’ve never celebrated in public before. Keep it rated PG of course, but celebrate like crazy, jumping up and down, yelling and screaming.

Are you ready? GO!

Are you ready for the next level? Wait for cheering (MODEL this)

Right now go find your high five partner, give them a high five and stay connected up here [hold your hand up as if you’re holding someone’s hand above your head], do not disconnect from them. Go!

Now, without disconnecting with your high five partner, go connect with your low five partner. Go!

5…4…3…2…1 Did you connect with both your high five and low five partners?!

You know what’s coming next. But first, when the music comes on and I say go, you’ll connect with BOTH your knee-to-knee and toe-to-toe partners. Do the best you can. Stay safe. GO!

Let some time pass but not too much. Unless you have a smaller group, not everyone will be able to connect with all four partners. That’s okay. Make sure you end before people get too uncomfortable.

Okay, that’s enough. Let your hands come down. Give yourselves a big round of applause! Congratulate yourself for the biggest round of twister ever played!

Music is so important in this activity. The rule I use is when they’re moving, music’s playing. When I’m talking, music is stopped. Music is helpful on so many levels. It heightens the energy and excitement. It helps control their focus. They will know to focus back on you when they don’t hear any music so you won’t need to yell for them to be quiet and listen.

Troy Stende

“I’m sorry, Dave, who?”

Brian Davis is a golfer on the PGA Tour. On Sunday, April 18, 2010, he was playing at the Verizon Heritage event in South Carolina and gave up a possible win—his first on the tour— when he called a penalty on himself, in a playoff, for disturbing a stray weed on his back swing. [Hitting any material during your back swing constitutes a two-swing penalty].

Davis called the penalty on himself, conceding the victory to Jim Furyk who walked away with $1.03 million for the win. Davis did take second and got a $615,000 check, but more importantly he can hold his head up high knowing he did the honorable thing, the expected thing and the right thing.

Would you have done the same in that situation?

Have you ever been faced with a circumstance in which you could get away with something because no one would know, and you took it? I know someone who regularly takes advantage of items misplaced on retail shelves and then forces the clerks to give the lower price. I am even aware of this individual actually switching price labels on products and they’re proud of this!

When I was a mortgage broker there were many temptations to cut corners in order to close loans. I always felt that no loan was worth jeopardizing my career for so I wouldn’t do it. But, the temptations were there. I had people offer me money to do whatever it took to get their loan complete. I had customers submit false tax returns, W-2s and pay stubs. I even saw appraisals covered with correction fluid!

Do you have an integrity moment of truth? A “Brian Davis” moment? Please send them to me and I will use them in future blog entries. It can be those moments when you pointed out to a server that they missed charging you for something, when you returned that extra $10 given to you with your change by a cashier, or a time when you told an employer or a client that you would not accede to their request to do something unethical.

There are always going to be people who will try to cut corners in order to get a leg up. Don’t be one of them! If you work from a position of integrity, you will always make the right decision.

And, like Brian Davis, you will be a richer person as a result!

I want to write about YOU in a future blog post! Tell me how you have overcome obstacles, achieved goals or surpassed the expectations of others—especially those who may have underestimated you. If you want to tell me your story, but don’t want me to publish your name, I can do that too!

Dave ‘Gonzo’ Kelly
America’s student leadership Trainer™
Building Leaders Through Service™

In many ways, your college journey is only the first of many step that can lead you to a long and prosperous life. Check these 10 real-world lessons for leadership and for life. They are intended to get you focused on your real goals and deal with the rapid-fire changes that college is throwing at you. Stop drowning in the details for a minute, breathe, settle down and take a minute to connect, or reconnect with some things that will keep your feet on the ground.

• Lesson 1: Lead an inspired life.Did you hear that? Let me repeat it. “Lead an Inspired Life!” Whatever your calling, find it and embrace it with passion. Life can be pretty lackluster if you always look to others to inspire you.
• Lesson 2: If you are going through hell, don’t stop to take pictures. Keep moving forward. Keep your focus and stay engaged. Remember, this too shall pass!
• Lesson 3: Pay attention to your intuition. Sometimes it’s your ‘gut feeling’ that trumps your best thinking and logic and you’ll just have to trust it. Besides, it’s the only ‘tuition’ that you’ll never have to pay cash for!
• Lesson 4: When you lock the keys inside your car, just ask for help. If you think about it long enough, that’s a lesson that applies across life. There are times in life when a cry for help is obviously in order. Suck it up and ask somebody… unless you just like ‘bustin’ the windows out your car!’
• Lesson 5: In order to discover new places you have to leave old places. How else will you get there unless you just go? No matter how comfortable your rut, you’re still stuck in it.
• Lesson 6: Each day, try to find what’s right with the world. Don’t expect someone else to tell you. Nope, not even FOX news. Many times in life you’re gonna have to find the silver lining for yourself, so might as well start now.
• Lesson 7: As a leader, set progressive goals. Connect short-term goals with your long-term goals in as many areas of your life as you can by starting with what’s right in front of you. For example… is eating that candy bar really going to help your diet? ….Really?
• Lesson 8: Help others and good things will happen.You can do this by getting and staying connected with your campus resources and student organizations. They’ll get you involved in community services projects, projects to support your fellow students and other activities to satisfy the servant leader in all of us. This also applies if you hit the lottery!
• Lesson 9: Embrace change. No, not the kind that jingles (go for the folding kind!), but the kind that happens everyday. Since it is inevitable, might as well go with the flow, manage your reactions and come out of the other end no worse for the wear.
• Lesson 10: Leave your past behind. Learn from it, but don’t marry it. If you’re already married to it, get a divorce! Your experiences should be a teacher, not a ball and chain!

Making it through college is a step-by-step, day-by-day, year-by-year challenge, but one you can be well up to if you stay connected. If I did it, you can! Keep the big picture in mind – and don’t sweat too much of the small stuff!

Tawan
Get Connected. Stay Connected. Graduate.

Getting people to show up to your campus event, or almost any event for that matter, is an age-old marketing conundrum – on campus or off. But these days, a seven pound computer can turn you into an 800-pound desktop gorilla if you know the marketing steps to take that are right at  your fingertips. A click here and a click there and student, novice or pro, you can have the word streaming to hundreds of desktops near you.

Okay. Here’s where the warning flag goes up! An 800-pound gorilla can be a real nuisance, so he’d better be housebroken. In other words, there’s a fine line between aggressive marketing and spamming so tread lightly – or as light as an 800-pound gorilla can be anyway. After all, our goal is to put butts in the seats, not to be one. Get your activities board, club or organization leadership working together on these!

1. Send a campus-wide email. Send  the details of your event to every campus list available. Students, faculty, staff, alumni and even local supporters and parents should all be included in the email loop depending on the activity. Send more than one to make sure they didn’t miss it.
2. Send a special email to professors. Ask them to announce the event before, during or after their classes. This works especially well if the event relates to the professor’s subject matter, it’s a topic that’s been discussed in class or it’s an area of personal interest for the professor.
3. Send a personal email to people you know. Never underestimate the power of this step. It takes a little more time than the mass email, but can be as easy as forwarding one of the messages above or doing a cut and paste job. Add a personal note or request and you’ll be surprised at how responsive people will be.
4. Get it on the campus website calendar.This is a no-brainer that gets overlooked all too often. The campus calendar is often a last-minute, go-to resource when students are bored and looking for something to do. And unlike e-mail it won’t get deleted or hung up in the junk filter.
5. Make a custom Screen Saver. Have it installed on the library computers, in the computer labs, or anywhere else there are computers used by students, faculty or staff. Send it to your board, committee and your friends for their personal computers.
6. Text message your event details to a campus cell phone list.Yes, although it’s not the desktop you were thinking of, it’s still referred to as a desktop – and just about everybody has one, right in their pocket! Access to this list and permission to send a mass text is a gold mine. A brilliant use of this list is to send out the text within the hour before the event. It works better than a volunteer and a sandwich board out front. 

With a little ingenuity and resourcefulness, each of these ideas can be executed pretty much for free. Don’t forget to get somebody with a brain on your team to make sure the writing is decent and the details are correct. Grab a laptop and a banana and start marketing.

PEACE.
Rick

Here’s the next edition in the Sure-Fire Icebreaker series. This is a quick icebreaker that is very low gradient and an easy way to meet a lot of people you don’t know and learn random information about them. As a bonus, I often use this icebreaker to get large groups into smaller groups in the last round.

Set up

Have them stand up and get into a large bunched up group.

“I’ll say a number and a category. I might say the number is 4, and the category is ‘people born in the same month as you.’ The music will come on and you will go find 3 other people to make a group of 4 who were born in the same month as you.”

You might get people starting to talk and look around for people born in their same month. If that happens I say;

“I might say that, but I’m not right now. But I might.”

“So, when the music comes on you might put two fingers in the air and start yelling, ‘February!’ if you were born in February.”

Make sure you model this by holding up your birthday number on your fingers and by saying it loud.

“When you find 3 other people to make a group of 4, stand in a circle and get to know as much about the other people as you can while the music is still going. Please remember that a group of 4 is 4, not 5, not 3, but 4.”

“What questions do you have?”

How long you let them look for their groups is important. You’ll need to find the balance between too much and too little time. You want them to be able to form some groups and get to know a little about the people in their groups. But you have to remember that some people aren’t going to be able to find a group so you need to end quick enough that they don’t start checking out or feeling awkward for not being in a group. This is a judgment call and you’ll just need to figure that out in the moment keeping in mind that that timing will vary depending on the group size and participants.

When I feel the time is right, I pause the music and get their focus back (refer to “Getting the focus back” for ideas on how to do that without yelling).

“If you are in a group of exactly four let me hear from you now (If the group is not comfortable with yelling yet then I might just have them raise their hands)! If you don’t have exactly four in your group, raise your hand. Everyone else look at them and say, ‘We still love you’”

I find that most any group I work with is fine with saying “We still love you.” However, I usually only do this after the first round. I don’t acknowledge the people who didn’t get into a group after that round. It just seems to flow better.

Often times I ask questions about the category we just did to have more fun and include people in other ways. If we did a category about the same number of brothers and sisters, after everyone is in the groups, I’ll ask who has the most brothers and sisters. They yell out loud how many they have. I usually say, “Wow, you’ve got your own committee.”

If I want people to get to know others in the group I add an additional category: “People you don’t know so well.” That way they’re not always in the same group with the people they are comfortable hanging out with.

To get into the next round I simply ask them to come closer to me or to come gather around. Sometimes people are hesitant to move closer so I say, “It’s okay to come closer. I showered a couple weeks ago, it should be fine.” Then I say the next number and category.

Some examples of groups I might form…

• Form a group of 5… The category: People who have the same number of brothers and sisters as you
• Form a group of 4… The category: People who have the same number of pets as you
• Form a group of 3… The category: Form yourself in the shape of the letter “H” [I usually need to repeat this two times so everyone understands]
• Form a group of 3… The category: People whose phone number has the same last digit.
• Form a group of as many as you can… The category: People who were born in the same month as you

Bonus

I often use this activity as a smooth way to get them into smaller groups. On the last round I’ll say:

“This last round is a little different. The number is 8 to 10. No less than 8, no more than 10. The categories are (with emphasis on the plural) people you don’t know so well- do the best you can- and forming yourself into a circle, linking elbows, jumping up and down. You only link elbows when you have exactly 8 or 9 or 10 people. Ready, GO!”

Once they start, it might take a little time for all the groups to form. People are usually very good at making it happen but you might need to jump in and help after awhile. While they are forming I like to have the groups that are jumping already turn in a circle as they are jumping…and then reverse directions. That amps up the fun factor and gives other groups more time to form.

When I’m doing large icebreakers at a college campus I usually have orientation leaders in the group too. I’ll change up what a say a little.

“This last round is a little different. First of all, just the orientation leaders, please move yourselves to the outside of the group and spread yourselves out to make a circle around the group. So, the number is 8 to 10. No less than 8, no more than 10. The categories are (with emphasis on the plural) you must have at least one orientation leader in your group. Form your groups with people you don’t know so well – do the best you can. When you have exactly 8 or 9 or 10 people and only 8, 9 or 10 people, get in a circle, linking elbows, jumping up and down. Ready, GO!”

This is great for orientation, leadership retreats, new students and returning students. What’s the point? Everyone has a blast! When a group has fun together, magic happens. And at the same time it creates connections and strengthens your campus community!

Troy

To start this icebreaker, split everyone into two groups. Have them form two lines facing each other in the center of the room with their team standing shoulder to shoulder.

Your instruction to the two teams goes as follows:

“Welcome to a new planet! On this world there are only three creatures and they are at WAR. Let me introduce the creatures. First, there is the giant. It looks and sounds like this, ‘ROAR!’ Do this with me, 1,2,3, ‘ROAR!’

“Then there’s the wizard. It looks and sounds like this, ‘SSSSS!’ Do this with me, 1,2,3, ‘SSSSS!’

“And finally, there are the elves. They look and sound like this, ‘WeWeWeWe!’ [done with a high pitch] Do this with me, 1,2,3, ‘WeWeWeWe!’

“These creatures are at war! Here’s how it works- it’s kind of like rock/paper/scissors. The giants, ‘ROAR!’ Do this with me giants, ‘ROAR!’ Beat the wizards, ‘SSSSS!’ Wizards, ‘SSSSS!’ beat the elves, ‘WeWeWeWe!’ And the elves, ‘WeWeWeWe!’ Beat the giants, ‘ROAR!’

“An easy way to remember this is the big [do the giant without the sound] beats the medium [do the wizard without the sound]. The medium [do the wizard without the sound] beats the small [do the elf without the sound]. And the small [do the elf without the sound] beats the big [do the giant without the sound]. See! Just like Rock/Paper/Scissors”

Now that everyone has the sounds and the rock/paper/scissors idea, you continue your instructions. Make sure you’ve already set up the safety zones behind each group with a marker to show where it is. Use a backpack or a chair or something to mark the zone. I usually place the zones about 10 feet behind each group.

“In a moment each team will go back to their safety zones, which are right here for this team, and right here for this team. (Point to show where the zones are marked) You’ll go back and huddle up and come up with the one creature your whole team will be. Everyone on your team will be the same creature. Then both teams will come up to the front line — to the battle zone — and one person will yell, ‘Are you Ready?!’ and everyone will scream, ‘Yes!!’ Then another person will yell, ‘3, 2, 1’ and both teams will show their creatures!

“So let’s say this team is the giants and this team is elves – who wins? Right! The elves. So the elves will chase the giants and attempt to tag them. The giants will run from the elves and try to get to their safety zone before they get tagged. If they make it to their safety zone first then nothing happens to them. But if they get tagged before they hit the safety zone then they get to be on the other team for the next round. Both teams go back to their safety zones to come up with the creature they will be for the next round.”

“What happens if there is a tie? Actually, what you will do when you are huddling with your team in the safety zone is come up with your plan AND your backup plan. They can be the same or different. If, when you are at the front line, both teams are giants, then you immediately go into your backup plan. You don’t stop and talk about it when you tie. You just go right into your back up plan. If you tie on both rounds that would be just ridiculous — like you’re psychically linked. Then you’ll just go back and come up with another plan and backup plan.”

Have everyone go back to their safety zones and come up with a plan and backup plan. After they come back to the front lines, quickly review which creatures beat which.

Before we start I pick out the volunteers who will be yelling “Are you ready,” and “3, 2, 1”. I like to do this to get more people involved. I’ll ask for 2 volunteers who have loud voices. Then I tell the first volunteer to yell as loud as they can, “Are you ready?!” after I point to them, and the second volunteer to will yell, “3, 2, 1!” right after everyone responds to the “Are you Ready” with a very enthusiastic, “YES!”

Your final instructions:

“Before we start — a couple of things. Please remember this is not a full contact sport. If the only way to not be tagged is to run over someone else and step on their face – then please, just get tagged. It’s not that big of a deal. Please take care of each other and have fun. When you are tagging someone, it is a simple, non-aggressive touch. You don’t need to smack them in the kidney. Also, make sure no one is behind you in the shoulder-to-shoulder line. If someone is right behind you and you happen to be on the losing team you might turn around and run smack into someone on your own team.”

You, as the facilitator, need to make sure there is enough room for everyone to be spread out shoulder to shoulder. Make sure they are all lined up on the front line, shoulder to shoulder. I like to have the two teams about 4-6 feet apart. Then I point to the first volunteer who yells, “Are you ready!”

Once the first round is done I remind them that if they were tagged they go to the other team, if not, they stay on the same team. Then have them go back to their safety zones to brainstorm their plan and backup plan for the next round.

Don’t let the game go on for too many rounds, but make sure they get in at least four rounds.

After I announce the last round I like to play a little trick with them. I go to the smaller team’s brainstorm huddle and discreetly tell them that since this is the last round, they will all be donkeys — and donkeys beat everything.

I generally do a donkey sound and you can make up a look that isn’t like any of the other three, “Yell, ‘Heehaw!’ and then you just run at them!”

They definitely have a great time with this last round. After it’s over the other team will say things like, “What was that? What happened?” I just tell them they were donkeys, and donkeys beat everything. Then we have a good laugh.

This is great for orientation, leadership retreats, new students and returning students. What’s the point? Everyone has a blast! When a group has fun together, magic happens. And at the same time it creates connections and strengthens your campus community!

Troy

Let’s do some quick math based on a real-life example of a 1.6 percent increase in student retention at Maryville University in St. Louis, MO. Thanks to Dr. Beth Triplett & Dr. Jennifer McCluskey for supplying the numbers.

The Numbers:

• Number of New Freshman: 310
• Sample Retention Rate: 78.4%
• Number of Returners: 248
• “New” Retention Rate: 80.0% (1.6 percent increase)
• New Number of Returners: 253 (an increase of five students)
• Annual Net Tuition: $10,000 (Student tuition minus any institutional financial aid)
• Annual Additional Revenue: $50,000 (Five more students at $10,000 tuition each)
• Total Additional Revenue: $150,000

This example uses freshmen and assumes that your retention efforts keep them enrolled to complete their 4-year degrees. If the freshmen are on-campus residents, this will lead to additional room and board revenue. Focusing on retention often yields retention results with students becoming upper-class alumnus and that generates additional revenue as well. A reduction in expenses is also realized when you consider that it costs on average five times more to recruit and admit a new student than to retain a current student.

So my question – especially to the orientation staff – is, “What can you do this year to help increase retention rates by a mere one percent?”

Because if you do, and you can track it, that’s not only more job security, that’s ammunition to go have a talk about that raise. And don’t feel you need to wait for the economy to get better because this is exactly what the administration wants to see in any economy – someone with their eye on the bottom line.

I’d love to hear what your better ideas have been to increase retention rates. Also, what have you done to track this? I’ll continue this conversation on other blog posts about ideas to increase retention and possibly what you can do to track it.

Troy