Leadership Practices And Effectiveness Among Greek Student Leaders

College Student Journal, June, 2000 by Todd C. Adams, Marybelle C. Keim

Process, 23.26 for Inspiring Vision, 23.41 for Modeling the Way, 24.85 for Encouraging the Heart, to 26.04 for Enabling Others to Act. The SLPI scores showed that the women believed they had the most leadership skill in Enabling Others to Act and the least amount in Challenging the Process.

Posner and Brodsky (1993) investigated the relationship between leadership behaviors of Resident Assistants (RAs) and their effectiveness as assessed by their constituents and supervisors at six public colleges and universities. RAs were asked to complete the SLPI and then were asked to distribute copies of the SLPI-Constituent survey to five people living in their housing unit. Altogether 333 RAs (35% response rate) and 1,304 constituents (78% response rate) returned the SLPIs. The scores of RAs ranged from 20.66 on Inspiring a Shared Vision to 25.20 on Enabling Others to Act, while constituent scores ranged from 22.42 on Challenging the Process to 25.59 on Enabling Others to Act. RAs who engaged in the five practices most often were found to be more effective leaders than those who engaged in them less often (p [is less than] .001).

The SLPI was administered by Posner and Brodsky (1992) to one national fraternity on 100 college campuses. National headquarters officers invited chapter presidents to participate, and presidents were asked to distribute a copy of the survey to five executive committee members. Sixty-five chapter presidents (65% response rate) and 239 executive council members (48% response rate) completed inventories. The researchers confirmed that effective student leaders varied from less effective leaders in their leadership practices as measured by the SLPI. In a later study, Posner and Brodsky (1994) surveyed fraternity and sorority presidents and their constituents. One national fraternity and one national sorority were chosen and asked to have its chapter members complete the SLPI. Sixty-five fraternity presidents (65% response rate), 96 sorority presidents (71% response rate), 239 fraternity executive council members (48% response rate) and 389 sorority executive council members (59% response rate) completed SLPIs. The more effective presidents engaged in the five leadership practices more often than the less effective presidents (p [is less than] .001). There were no differences in leadership practices between male and female student leaders.

Purpose of the Study

The purpose of this study was to examine leadership practices of Greek-affiliated student leaders at three public, midwestern universities and to measure their effectiveness as determined by presidents, executive council members, and general members of on-campus fraternities and sororities. Since no previous studies included general fraternity and sorority members, it was thought that including these two groups would add to the research literature.

The first research question guiding this study was "What were the characteristics of respondents?" The second was "What differences existed in the leadership practices of men and women as measured by presidents, executive council members, and general members of fraternities and sororities on the Student Leadership Practices Inventory?" The third was "What differences existed in the perceptions of leader effectiveness among presidents, executive council members, and general members of male and female Greek-letter organizations?"