"Illinibucks"

I think that the implementation of “Illinibucks” would take a lot of planning to make sure that all the logistics of the system would run smoothly. Thinking closer about what rules could be in place for this hypothetical situation, I have tons of questions for how it would even work. It seems like a very simple scenario at first, the University just allocates some of these “Illinibucks” to students to use when they deem fit. I would wonder if every student gets the same amount of “Illinibucks,” or if incoming freshman or transfer students would receive different allocations based on things like incoming GPA or what college/major they were in. Using the example of “Illinibucks” being used for class registration, I think it would only be fair to have each student be allocated the same amount of bucks. Since the concept of the “Illinibucks” is to move you ahead in the registration period, it would in a way defeat the purpose to give people who are already earlier in the registration period more “Illinibucks” than those who are farther back in the period who actually would make good use of the “Illinibucks.”

Another issue with this system would be finding a variety of options for students to use these “Illinibucks” with. While I think that using them to “move to the front of the line” for class registration would be an amazing use, if this were the only opportunity of use, each student would opt to move to the front of the line which is impossible, making the system completely worthless. For this reason, I think that the University would have to come up with many things that would be candidates for the use of “Illinibucks.” I was struggling thinking of things that would qualify, since it was explained that the sole purpose of the “Illinibucks” would be to move to the front of the line of said situation.

Ultimately, I was able to come up with a few additional uses other than class registration. One use would be to have the ability to move to the front of the line at the Illini Union Bookstore during syllabus week when every student is trying to buy his or her books. In this case, the line can get outrageously long and discouraging to students, making it a great candidate for using “Illinibucks.”  Another use I thought of would be to skip the line to pick up their cap and gown for graduation, which many students wait in for a substantial amount of time, similar to the bookstore scenario. Lastly, a use I thought of would be to skip a line at a student’s respective career fair. While this might not be applicable to all students since career fairs aren’t applicable to everyone’s major or future plans, I think that many students would like the opportunity to do this. Specifically in terms of the business career fair, students can find themselves waiting in very long lines for companies that many students are interested in, and might only have time to talk to a few companies because they spend so much time in line waiting. I know that if I had this opportunity my junior year, I would’ve used my “Illinibucks” to skip a line at the career fair to give me the chance to talk to more companies, especially one I was really interested in.

Logistically speaking, I think that these “Illinibucks” would be kept track of by the use of the student’s iCard. I think this would be the simplest way if at each designated opportunity to use the “Illinibucks” there could be somewhere for the student to swipe their iCard and the data could be kept electronically for the University have.

Lastly, the price of all these opportunities would have to be set very strategically. Similar to if there weren’t enough situations to use the “Illinibucks,” if the price was set too low, everyone would jump at the chance to skip the line, therefore making the use of the “Illinibucks” meaningless since it wouldn’t be possible for everyone to skip the line. Alternatively, if the price was set too high, students might become hesitant at using their “Illinibucks” too early, which may result in them waiting too long and having some “Illinibucks” left over, being inefficient.

What Makes a Team Successful

A successful team that I was a part of was my high school cross country team. The team was comprised of around fifty girls ranging from freshman to seniors, and the distribution through grade I would estimate to have been pretty equal. Our coaching staff was made up of one head coach, an older male teacher at the high school, who did most of the delegation of workouts and rules. We also had an assistant coach, a newer and younger female teacher at the high school, who would often times run with us. I think that our coaches complimented each other very well and created a welcoming atmosphere that encouraged success, even though we were often pushed to our physical limits.

One of the reasons our coaches pushed us so hard was because the competition was pretty tough in our area. Stereotypically speaking, Illinois is a very competitive state for running and produces many successful runners. I know this because when I was in high school, I was very curious about where Illinois stood in relation to the rest of the country and would look up top times from other states. I’m not sure where this success was first derived, but since competition drives more competition, there are continuously very successful runners, and therefore fast times, coming from Illinois female high school students. That being said, my school was a pretty competitive and accomplished cross country program.

During my three years on the team, we won conference championships and had members run in regionals, sections and state competitions every year. However, it isn’t the accomplishments, in terms of times and awards, that I would attribute my team to being successful. I would say that I was a part of successful team due to our demonstration of reliability and commitment to one another, willingness to help and use of constructive communication from top to bottom. I think that the structure of my team had a lot to do with this.

Relating my team’s structure back to chapter five of B&D, I can see relations to multiple of the basic structural configurations mentioned, but most closely to the simple hierarchy. I think the simple hierarchy best matched the structure of my team because there was in a sense a hierarchy of powers with my coach having the most power because he had the most experience coaching high school girls cross-country. The next one in power was the assistant coach, who, although didn’t enforce rules, was still a superior and had great experience as a high school and college runner and afforded us the opportunity to learn from her experiences. When I envision a simple hierarchy as explained in the chapter, I see one person at the top, being my head coach, then stemming down to another boss or superior, being my assistant coach, and then stems down to multiple people, which would be the girls on the team. I think it’s a perfect representation of how I remember my team being structured as a whole unit.

Additionally, another structure that I think my team resembled was the circle network. Something I haven’t mentioned yet was that beyond having a head coach and an assistant coach, my team also had five team captains, all of which were seniors. This subgroup of captains I believe were structured more as a circle network, because they ranged in leadership styles, personalities as well as performance on the team. Together, the captains functioned more in a circle network structure, all exchanging their opinions with one another, and were seen as one cohesive unit to the rest of the team.

Finally, I mentioned that I thought my team was successful because of characteristics, including commitment and communication, from top to bottom. By that, I mean that every girl on the team was an integral part of the group. My coach made it very clear that whether you were running world-class times or were just happy you made it through the race without walking, your spot on the team and your voice was important and it was all of our responsibilities to keep one another in check to being a good teammate beyond just the times you ran. Because of this, I would say that this idea of check and balances from top to bottom would resemble the all channel network

Finally, I think that the reasons I described to be why my team was a successful one fell rather in line with the six distinguishing characteristics of high performing teams that Katzenbach and Smith's discussed in the chapter. Two of these distinguishing characteristics outlined are a common commitment and that everyone is collectively accountable, which are both attributes that I mentioned already that I believe my team possessed. Another characteristic is having the right mix of expertise, which I also think we possessed due to having an older, more experienced coach with a lot of wisdom as well as younger coach who was relatable and could share her experiences as a high school and college runner, which I believe was a perfect complement.

Opportunistic Behavior Analysis

The first instance that came to mind when I thought of a time that I didn’t act opportunistically was back when I was a sophomore in college. A couple of my friends and myself had all applied to some jobs on campus, one of which we had all wanted pretty badly. After going through the interviewing process, I was the only one of my friend group that got an offer for the job. While I was thrilled to receive that offer and would have the opportunity to earn some money on campus to help with living expenses, in a way I was also feeling guilty that I was the only one out of my group of friends that had gotten the job that we had all wanted. I easily could’ve taken the job and attributed it to way that the system works, but sometimes we feel like we can’t or shouldn’t act opportunistically to be a “good citizen.” I felt guilty that I had been given an opportunity that my friends had wanted but didn’t receive.

I don’t think that this is as extreme of a case as others might define as opportunistic behavior, in the way that I wouldn’t think that by taking the position that it would be unethical. I honestly did feel guilty, however, which made the thought of taking the offer unethical. I think that in my case, the reason that I didn’t act opportunistically, and by that I mean taking the job that I was offered, was based simply upon the sympathy that I have for people that I cared about. I felt awful listening to my friends talk about how upset they were about not getting the job that I didn’t want to tell them that I had gotten it over them, or for that matter would take the job which would take time away with them.

In my situation, I would fully attribute my actions to the morals that I was raised upon that you always think of others before yourself. My mother is this exact way, always making sure that others are well and happy before she thinks of herself, and with her being my biggest role model, I find myself being the same way. I don’t find myself to be as aggressive in these situations or in others and do believe that good things come to those who wait. I know that many believe, especially those in the business world, think that you need to make things happen by yourself and that things won’t just fall in your lap, but personally I don’t think that it is right to step on another ones’ toes for your own personal benefit.

Thinking about all of the explanations for why I personally didn’t take the job because I felt guilty that I got it over my friends, I think that all the explanations played pretty in line with the morals I had installed in me by my parents, but I can see where other explanations for different scenarios may stray. In some instances, the action of acting so opportunistically may fall in the direction to being illegal or far beyond many persons’ morals. I have had plenty of people, especially those in my family, tell me that I should have taken the job because it was obvious when my friends and I had all applied that we weren’t going to get it and that I should’ve been grateful that I did receive it, but still, because of the empathy that I have, I felt that it wouldn’t have been the right thing to do and I wanted to be the “good citizen.”

In hindsight and upon reflection, I think that acting opportunistically wouldn’t have been the worst decision for myself and I do believe that I have good enough friends that they would’ve supported me, but I still stand by my decision. I ended up still getting a job on campus that I enjoy, which holds true to my belief that good things come to those who wait. I don’t look down upon those who do act opportunistically in many situations, as it is the values that are instilled in you that dictate your actions.

Changes in Greek Life and my Experience

Today, I would like to talk about an organization very important to me that I have been a part of since the beginning of my freshman year: my sorority. Now, I know that sororities, fraternities and greek life as a whole has a bad reputation at times. This bad reputation and the changes it has made to greek life is exactly what I would like to talk about.

My sorority itself hasn’t gone through any drastic changes in my last three years of membership. We are still our own RSO, we haven’t been on probation or had any negative media coverage, which is something that I am very grateful for as a member and a former executive board member. That isn’t always the case though, and often times most members of a greek organization will endure a probation period, negative media coverage, and consequently some changes to the organization because of such actions.

More often, fraternities are the ones getting the negative media coverage in terms of misuse of alcohol and hazing practices, which come with very harsh consequences. However, sororities often endure scrutiny for these actions as well as being conceived as superficial and filled with fake, paid friendships. Regardless of the light the media is trying to shed on greek organizations, in my experience it is always the negative. This negative, dark light is what has changed greek life as a whole, and a light that will continue to do so until greek organizations completely disappear, or so I believe.

Growing up, I watched the news a lot with my parents. Getting ready for school my parents would always have the news on, the same goes for before and after dinner. To my recollection, I can’t remember one time hearing greek letters or hearing about greek organizations on the news, positively or negatively. I honestly had no idea what a sorority or fraternity was until I was probably halfway through high school. Flash forward to 2016, and that’s all a completely different story. Greek life, fraternities in particular, is constantly scrutinized for certain practices in the media. This media coverage has casted a very dark, negative shadow on greek life and the organizations as a whole.

As I mentioned previously, during my membership of my sorority I haven’t witnessed any drastic changes, but that doesn’t mean that this media coverage across the country hasn’t shaped my organization. We are constantly reminded by our organization leaders to be conscious of what we put on social media and the consequences that could come if we don’t obey the ideals because we aren’t just representing ourselves; we are representing our sorority and greek life as a whole.

I can’t imagine this same strictness was in place ten years ago, possibly even five years ago. Being a part of a greek organization feels like a constant struggle so legitimize ourselves, because the media doesn’t care and won’t broadcast about all the money organizations make for their communities and philanthropies through the years.

Now, I’m not trying to say that greek life and all of its organizations are perfect, and I do think that those organizations straying away from the ideals of their organizations should be punished. What I am trying to say, however, is that the actions of one organization, or one person, should set the image for the thousands of others a part of greek organizations. Regardless, the growing media coverage greek life has drawn in the past five years has definitely changed greek life and its organizations as a whole.

In some ways, there are some transaction costs to being in greek life. In many ways, this can draw connections to one another. I actually met and shadowed a woman at my internship this summer who turned out to be a member of my sorority of the same chapter. In other ways, being a member of a greek organization could be a gamble. Think about if you were a member of an organization that has negative media coverage recently when you are applying to jobs, especially if you were in a position of authority in that organization. It would most certainly be a setback in the process.

Overall, I have had a great experience being a member of my greek organization, but I can see that changes that my sorority has gone through to adapt to the media coverage and social stigmas that come with greek life. In a way, this media coverage may be a good thing for greek life because it’ll make the organizations honest and safe, and if they aren’t, I don’t think the media will let them get away with it.