Matthew

ATLANTA — As Theta Xi enters 2024, the Fraternity is focused on providing leading recruitment solutions to help each chapter attract more quality men to join our Brotherhood. Theta Xi, in partnership with Phired Up, has created a holistic culture of growth around a system approach.

In reviewing the research on college student enrollment provided by the North American Interfraternity Conference, all universities will face a dip in enrollment in the coming five years. This is fueled by multiple factors that has led to overall population decline in the United States, thus fewer young people coming up through K-12 education, as well as fewer of those teens choosing to attend a university. All fraternities will be impacted by fewer students attending college, and this dip in attendance can cause our membership to remain stagnant or decline. The Grand Lodge built into their strategic plan a goal to navigate this trend, and charged the Headquarters staff to find solutions to combat this impending situation.

In talking with Phired Up, they helped Theta Xi see how Growth Systems and repeatable success will help our Fraternity outlive the one-year term of our chapter leaders who are elected on an annual cycle. Vice President of Business Development at Phired Up, Woody Woodcock, believes that successful recruiting organizations won’t rise to the level of their goals but will fall to the level of their systems. Through our partnership we will be giving more access to more members and alumni to help drive repeatable growth for Theta Xi.

How will this benefit each chapter and our alumni volunteers?

It has never been easier than right now to learn how Theta Xi grows. From our newest members, active members, and volunteers to be able to learn at a scale faster than ever is a WIN. Woody also shared these key components of the partnership, which are:

• Through the Certified Recruiter course our members and our advisors will gain year-round access to a certification, so that all members can speak a common language on how to grow our people pipelines, and simplify the joining process.
• Theta Xi will centralize our lead prospects through the leading CRM in fraternity recruitment called ChapterBuilder.
• Theta Xi members will receive important skills training multiple times annually at in person gatherings.
• Theta Xi members can engage with monthly partner exclusive content that is solely focused on building relationships and getting more people to join our fraternity.
• Theta Xi HQ staff will meet quarterly with the Phired Up Customer Success team to gain real-time insights on how successful our members are advancing growth goals.

How has this partnership impacted members so far at their chapters? What have you heard?

Chapters are reporting that the technology is helping them to organize their list of prospective members, hold Brothers accountable for follow-up and contact with potential members, and target men who show promise for a future in Theta Xi. The in-person education at the Newell Officer Academy also showed our recruitment chairmen how to think differently about their approach to the joining process, how to meet men in a more organic way, and how to sustain relationships that will create a stronger Brotherhood.                                           

How do you see the partnership between Theta Xi and Phired Up shaping the future of fraternity life?

With the enrollment cliff on the horizon, Theta Xi needed a more predictable way to systemize how we help chapters see their leads, engage with those leads, and close the gap between our chapters and prospects who should be choosing Theta Xi.

The Phired Up team will be present at the 160th Anniversary Convention in August to continue to educate our undergraduate, advisors, and alumni association volunteers on this new Theta Xi Growth System.