NS Out of the Country

Brothers,

I will be in India for 2 weeks, starting next Thursday, December 11th. I am not bringing a laptop, and I do not anticipate that I will be checking my email much. One of my best friends is getting married in Chennai (formerly called Madras), and I will be attending her wedding, then traveling around the southern part of India. I arrive back home in Roanoke on December 26th.

Thanks for your patience! I will be sure to post some pictures when I return.

Thanks!

Julie

NS

Name Changing

Hi everyone.

Now that Andrew and I are married, I will be going by Chrissy Fleming. Since I've known many Brothers for almost 8 years, I won't be surprised (or at all bothered) if this adjustment takes a while to sink in. Don't worry if you've got my old last name on your pledging info sheets or other materials, or if you slip up in what you call me for a while. I'm just now starting the very large task of changing my name legally and in all of my various accounts, and I'm finding it's more of a slow process than an instant change. This suits me just fine since, after 26 years of being Chrissy Bischoff, I tend to slip up too! Just wanted you all to know.

NEC Meeting Minutes

Brothers,

You may not realize this, but every time I compile meeting minutes from the transcripts of our online meetings, it takes me about 2 solid hours. Even though I have word-for-word transcripts of everything that was said and everyone who came and left during the course of the meeting... still, 2 hours.

Another thing you may not realize is that reading the minutes of the National Executive Committee (NEC) is actually very interesting an informative. Here's why: Every National Officer and every Chapter submits a report, and I compile these in the minutes of our meeting. What better way to stay informed than to read what your NOs and chapter MALs have written about? We often have vigorous debates during NEC, and I try to capture the essence of these debates in what I put into the meeting minutes.

Our latest meeting was at the end of August. You can read the minutes here:
http://intranet.mubetapsi.org/portal_mods/knowledgebase.php?page=file&aid=505&gid=82&kcat=Minutes (need to login to the intranet first)

Our next NEC meeting is on Tuesday, October 21st at 8pm in the chatroom.

The next meeting of the Board of Trustees is coming up in a few days: Tuesday, October 14th at 8pm EST in the chatroom.

Anyone may attend these meetings, as lurkers or as participants. We encourage you to join us.

Don't forget about deadlines that are coming up in 4 days. I just sent an email to the National Listerv, the MAL listerv, and the BOT listserv with details. You can also contact me directly at secretary at mubetapsi dot org.

That's all for now..... Enjoy your weekend!

Julie
National Secretary

The True Cost of Vacation, and other Musings

Sometimes going on vacation costs a lot more than just what you shell out.

In my case, it's coming back that tells the tale. No matter how much I prepare to be absent, inevitably there are a slew of last minute (or after last-minute) questions and problems that need to be addressed.

This week, my first back after 2 weeks in Australia, I've been absolutely buried. Even before the jet lag dissipated, problems with email delivery to roanoke.edu addresses on the national committee distribution lists sprung up. I've contacted the Roanoke College helpdesk to try to obtain their assistance with this. In the meantime, if you're sending mail to any of our email lists (mubetapsi.org addreses with a "-l" in the name), be sure to also CC the Omicron folks. You can find a listing of reps and aliases on the intranet at http://intranet.mubetapsi.org/aliases.php.

The new public relations campaign for that alias list has also resulted in a number of alias update requests. I'm happy to receive these and implement them. It sure beats waiting for an address list! And speaking of address lists, I'm currently testing a system to allow MAL's better access to updating the actives list for their Chapter. The completed system should allow us to keep the intranet profiles up to date with respect to Chapter activity, while also providing one-click submission of address lists to the NS. This should be ready in the next few weeks.

In other news, I've uncovered a couple of big bugs in the user profiles this week, with the help of a faithful helpdesk user. The first involves users not being able to manage subscriptions for their email addresses -- the fix for this one has been written and will be implemented soon. The second involves captions for uploaded images not being stored. I'm still working on that one, but hope to have a fix soon.

The helpdesk remains the ideal resource for bringing problems such as these to my attention. That said, it also helps to CHECK BACK periodically for updates to your ticket. Sometimes the automated email about updates doesn't get sent for whatever reason, or it gets sent and missed. There are several tickets open right now that are waiting on feedback from the requestor. Please, if you have a ticket open, take a peek and see where it stands.

One thing upon which you can be sure: Unlike the airlines, when you get your ticket from me, I won't lose your luggage.

Chapter-Specific Intranet Content

With the launch of the new Alumni Association website, a new capability becomes available to Chapters -- customized intranet content specific to your Chapter. To see how it works, click on the Members link on the Alumni homepage and then click Login. If you're logged in to the intranet, it will take you to a page which includes both static information and a subset of the Knowledgebase specific to the Alumni Association. If you're not logged in, you'll be prompted to do so.

While this is a minor example, it is representative of the types of content that can now be done. Chapter-specific Knowledgebase folders, Brothers Galleries, even Who's Online or specific message board forums could be compiled to form a "mini Intranet" that's specific to a Chapter. I'm also open to other ideas to help Chapters customize content.

If your Chapter is interested in doing something similar, let me know. The user validation tools are quite easy to implement, and you can be up-and-running quickly, depending on what level of restriction you're looking for (the fastest to set up is the Alumni model, which does not restrict viewing ONLY to active alumni).

Yes, We're Open!

It's summer time, when a young man's fancy turns to thoughts of......well, anything, really, as long as it's not school or work or Fraternity. Right?

Maybe not. Believe it or not, the National Office IS open over the summer. (No, really!) The Brothers Intranet is open. The Maintenance Wikka is open. Heck, even the Alumni Association is open -- we're adding people to our LinkedIn group every day!

The reality is, with all of the collaborative tools available to us, the Fraternity does not need to go completely dead just because it's summer. We can now focus on the more fun aspects of Brotherhood -- interacting with and learning from (and about) our Brothers nationwide.

Make it happen!

Clerical Error: DOIN THE BOT -- forever

Brothers,

I regret to inform you that due to an unfortunate loop-hole in our Constitution, it appears that one of our long-standing fun traditions has caused considerable havoc.

Each year, as many of you know, the Legislative Council votes to re-name the Board of Trustees. All in good fun, of course, and it has no lasting consequences.

Wrong.

It seems that Article XVII, Section 4.2 stipulates that no vote of the Legislative Council may have any time restriction appended to it. This is to prevent motions being passed at Convention purposefully set to expire between LC sessions when no one can do anything about it. Therefor, the motion the LC passed at this latest Convention is binding.

Our Board of Trustees is, officially, now named "Delightfully Orthodox, Impressively Nuanced, Tremendously Helpful Entity: Board of Trustees" or DOIN THE BOT.

With the end of the semester soon upon us, and the collegiate Brothers scattering across the country for the summer break, it seems unlikely that we can convene the LC until the fall semester to reverse this decision. I have asked C-NITC Britton to correct all of our online documentation, and NS Lyon to begin amending all national documents in which DOIN THE BOT is referenced.

I have not yet heard back from C-DOIN THE BOT Zander on whether there will be a mid-year meeting for DOIN THE BOT.

It seems we'll be stuck DOIN THE BOT for quite a while.

Convention Minutes are Almost Complete

Brothers,

I've been working hard on the Convention minutes, and they're almost complete. If you're interested in seeing any of the following items, please sign in to the intranet first, then click on the links below.

I'm still working on the NEC and NCCM minutes. These should be out shortly.

LC Minutes
BOT Minutes
NCE Minutes
NFC Minutes
'08-'09 Budget
NHAC Minutes
NITC Minutes
Updated History and Archives Policy Manual
Updated Expansion Policy Manual
Updated Colonization Procedures
Updated Executive Committee Policy Manual

See previous post for links to items that are due on April 30th!

Take care,
Julie

The Chapter Maintenance Reference Library

The Chapter Maintenance Reference Library has expanded again! I've replaced the lost books and bought a few more for us to
use as an organization. All Chapters may request photocopied sections of these books for their use, or may request that I bring
them anytime I visit. Here's a list of the books in the library:

"The Everything Fundraising Book" by Rich Mintzer

"The Everything Project Management Book" by Rich Mintzer

"Publicity for nonprofits" by Sandra L. Beckwith

"The Big Book of Team Building Games" by John Newstrom and Edward Scannell

"Quick Team-Building Activities for Busy Managers: 50 exercises that get results in 15 minutes" by Brian Cole Miller

"Dealing with People You Can't Stand: How to bring out the best in people at their worst" by Dr. Rick Brinkman and Dr. Rick Kirschner

"Strategic Planning for Nonprofit Organizations" by Michael Allison and Jude Kaye


I also have quite a few articles and other materials that have been clipped or sent in to me. Donations are always welcome. I hope every Chapter can find some of this information useful!

The Post-Convention Wave

Hi Brothers,

Like Kevin, I have been enjoying a surge of questions and contact from Brothers at many different Chapters. Unfortunately, that cold I was trying to keep at bay during Convention with all the orange juice only got worse when I got home, and so my email response time has been slightly slower than usual. I'm happy to report that I'm feeling much better now--just in time for the majority of Spring Breaks to be over!

A lot of Chapters are inquiring about the potential for hosting a colony. My advice to all of you is to make sure that you can take on this responsibility without weakening the strength of your Chapter. Now is a great time to be doing extra recruitment, fundraising, and Brotherhood building to shore yourselves up for a potentially exciting year next year. (Spring is a good time to be doing all those activities anyway!).

On a side note, I left my cell phone charger in North Carolina, so until I receive it in the mail, email will be the best way to contact me. I look forward to hearing from you!

Chrissy
NVPCM

Viral Networking

Julie has invited me to participate on the blog, so I thought I'd share a little bit with what's been happening on the electronic frontier.

Intranet Profiles

The new intranet profiles were a big hit at Convention. In fact, I gleefully took notice of the fact that even during Legislative Council there were several people online playing with their profiles.

By far the most favorite feature is the family trees. I think we scored a big hit with how easy it is to navigate the trees, and how (relatively) simple it is to add people to your tree. It's gratifying to see them getting so much use so quickly. In fact, we went from just under 1500 "sibling" records to over 1800 just since last Friday! That type of viral networking builds on itself -- I think we're well on the way to seeing an uptick in interaction via the Brothers Intranet.

Just when you thought it couldn't get busier...

I spent the week before Convention frantically finishing all the features required to make the profiles work. The whole time, I thought of how nice it would be to sit back and watch it work afterwards. Silly me.

With the upsurge in intranet usage comes an upsurge in user questions, which means the Helpdesk has really been hopping lately. As a result, I had to put that little laurel resting on hold -- not necessarily a bad thing! All the support requests have motivated me to write a tool for merging duplicate accounts (now complete), and next I need to work on new tools for registering placeholder accounts and activating placeholder accounts.

I'm very grateful for all the suggestions and bugs that have been identified -- I want the intranet to be as useful to everyone as possible, and your feedback only helps make it more so. Keep it up!

Work/Life Balance

The next month is shaping up to be just as busy as the previous few have been. I'm out of town on business next week, my last graduate class (woo!) is winding down, and the dedication date for the parish center project I'm chairing at my church is rapidly approaching. One of these months I need to find time for an actual vacation!

Convention Reflections

Brothers,

I really enjoyed convention this year. I thought things ran smoothly for the most part, and I'm already excited about next year's convention.

Today, I will be working on compiling the minutes from Convention. I will nag you if I still need reports from your chapters. I'm hoping to get the minutes completed ASAP so that I can focus on the end of the semester rush.

Upcoming Deadlines

April 30th is the next big deadline. Log in to the intranet in order for the links below to work.

• Chapter By-Laws in electronic format due to NS (I currently do not have any electronic copies of your By-Laws, so this is very important)
• Chapter Informal Initiation Rituals due to NS (The informal initiation rituals that I currently have are pretty out of date. Please send me your current practices.)
  
• Alumni Reports (Spring graduates) due to NS
  
• Initiation Reports (Spring initiates) due to NT
• Summer Address Lists due to NS (Download the address list and make any changes)
  
• Link to Academic Calendars for 2008-2009 due to NS (Just email me the link to your college/university's academic calendar)
  
• NCCM Quarterly Report due to NVPCM
• Quarterly Pledging Report due to NVPCM

If you have any questions or concerns, please let me know by shooting me an email. Secretary at mubetapsi dot org.

Convention is Coming!

I've been working on MBPsi business lately, and I thought I should keep you posted.

Convention 2008 Schedule
NP Andrew and I have been working on the schedule for Convention 2008. We have created a joint to-do list on google docs, and we have a lot to prepare before Convention. You will be hearing a lot more from me in the coming weeks as we begin the preparations.

National Officer and BOT Reviews
I will be posting the National Officer and BOT reviews in an online survey format this year (using Zoomerang). We will be reviewing all officers not up for re-election as well as one of the BOT members. Your feedback is critical to improving our performance.

Shingle Orders
Alpha and Omicron had a little bit of a backlog of shingle orders, so I handled that over the break, and shingles should be in Brothers' hands by now. If your chapter has missing shingle orders, please email me at secretary at mubetapsi dot org, and I'll get it straightened out.

Work-Life Balance
We started classes this week. I'm teaching two sections of Organizational Behavior and one section of Team Dynamics. I'm also the new advisor for SHRM (Society for Human Resources Management), and I'm trying to help Omicron chapter as much as possible. Finally, I'm planning a wedding--I'm getting married this summer.

That's it for now. Hope you have a great semester.

Deadlines!

Brothers,

It seems like I only write when I want to remind you of some deadlines, but I guess that comes with the territory.

Next deadline: February 15th

1) NCCM Quarterly Reports, due to Chrissy
Chrissy is tweaking this form and will let NCCM reps know via the NCCM-listserv when its available to complete. Please check to make sure that your NCCM reps are receiving emails with the subject line [nccm-l].

2) Initiation Reports, due to Abra
One check from each chapter, covering all initiates, is due along with an initiation report, which can be found at (must be logged into intranet to view): http://intranet.mubetapsi.org/portal_mods/knowledgebase.php?page=file&aid=26&gid=9&kcat=National%20Documents
The fee is $34/each = $20 national dues + $10 initiation fee + $4 shingle fee

3) Updated Address Lists, including new Brothers, due to me
I have a format (.xls) for submitting the updates. Please email me (secretary at mubetapsi dot org) if you would like the latest version I have for your chapter. Alternatively, you can download the most recent address list from the knowledgebase, make changes to your chapter's info in excel, and email me the attachment. It's your call! Here's the latest address list:
http://intranet.mubetapsi.org/portal_mods/knowledgebase.php?page=file&aid=313&gid=1&kcat=National%20Documents

4) Alumni Reports for Fall 2007 Graduates, due to me
If any Brother (active or inactive) at your chapter graduated in Fall 2007, please submit an Alumni Report to me. The Alumni Report can be found at:
http://intranet.mubetapsi.org/portal_mods/knowledgebase.php?page=file&aid=25&gid=9&kcat=National%20Documents
We use information from this report for our database of Brothers as well as to remind newly graduated Brothers of the opportunity to participate in the Alumni Association.

If you have questions about where to mail these reports, please consult the master address list (available on the knowledgebase section of the intranet) or me.

Thanks!