Term Lengths, while being rarely talked or even thought about, have a major impact on your student organization and its legacy. But how do you determine if your organization is setting the right term lengths for its officers?
The writers here at SOS have thought about and debated the pros and cons on different term lengths and have written this guide for your organization to make an educated decision!
Annual Term Lengths
Recommended for: Most Executive Positions
One year is almost the perfect time frame for any executive position because it’s long enough for officers to grow into their roles but short enough to create turn-over for fresh faces and ideas.
Pro: Gives Officers a Chance to Adjust to Their Roles and Perform
The saying goes, it takes anywhere from three to six months to learn a new job, and a new officer position is no different. An officer’s first semester will be an adjustment period. They will be tasked with learning new skills and their organization’s structure while completing their responsibilities.
Sometimes, this can lead to a rocky start for a new officer, but by the second semester, the officer will be more confident in their position and might even tackle new projects or old obstacles for their student organization.
Pro: Turnover Leads to Innovation and Fresh Ideas
As members get inspired by their student organizations, they start to think of new ideas based on their internal and external experiences. Internal experiences spring from what people have seen within the organization (i.e. meetings, socials, events, etc.) while external experience comes from their personal background and expertise (i.e. culture, major, work, hobbies, etc.).
By changing out officers every year, these inspired members can bring their new and diverse ideas or backgrounds into a decision-making role, thus growing the organization in ways that past officers couldn’t conceive.
Think about: Staggering Officer Term Start Dates
Rather than starting off each academic year with a whole new crew of officers, try staggering their term start dates. Have an election for half the executive positions at the end of the Spring semester and have these newly elected start leading in the Fall semester and continue into next Spring. Have another election for the other half of the executive positions at the end of the Fall semester have their term lengths be from the Spring going into the next Fall.
By doing this, you are ensuring that there are always people with at least one semester of experience. As we have stated before, officers start feeling more productive and confident going into their second semester of leadership.
Semester Term Lengths
Recommended for: Temporary or Short-Term Assignments; Officers That are filling-in, Chairmen, or President-Elect
While I wouldn’t suggest semester term lengths for your higher officers such as President or Treasurer, I would absolutely recommend a semester term length to the smaller but still very important roles such as chairmen of standing committees.
Chairmen are typically students dipping their toes into officer positions and learning how the student organization functions. After a semester applying themselves as a chairman, they could be ready to take a position on the executive board. Their work as a chairman gives them experience working with current officers and a history with the organization that other members wouldn’t have by the time of elections.
The President-Elect should also be eligible for semester term lengths since their primary job is to learn the functions and duties of the president so they can later take over the role.
Lastly, if your organization has open positions mid-semester due to officer resignations, the newly elected students should only fill-in as officers until the end of that semester. Once Elections are open, these temporary officers can run again for a full term if they would like.
Pro: Gives students the ability to be an officer/chairmen for a semester
By creating a shorter term length, more members may step up to take on the responsibility of a chairman or temporary assignment (aka fill-in for an executive position). Rather than committing for a full year, these members can test the waters before taking on a longer term.
Also, members who only have a semester to volunteer, such as a graduating senior, can still get involved in their organization!
Con: Hard to Surpass Learning Curve
As mentioned before, the first semester of leadership is usually an adjustment period. By only leading for a semester, a student could be leaving their position once they had finally started getting a hang of things.
Con: High Turnover Can Stifle Innovation
By having too many officers fulfilling a semester term length, your organization risks changing over leadership too fast.
Term Lengths Longer Than a Year
Recommended for: New or Large Organizations
Starting a new student organization takes a lot of legwork. Older organizations have historical data, experienced leaders, student awareness, organizational structure, and long-term advisors, which can help new officers pick up where the former officers left off.
Getting a new organization on par with the long-standing organization doesn’t happen overnight, and many times, not even within the first year. It could be beneficial for new organizations to have officers lead for longer than a year. Especially the officers with a vision for what the organization could be. After all, these initial officers are in charge of creating the foundation that the organization needs to run for many years after they graduate.
On the other end of the spectrum, large organizations (with over a couple of hundreds of members) may need leaders that are more experienced than their mid-sized counterpart. These large organizations normally have more events, need and spend more money, and require more detail long-term strategic planning.
Con: Positions held for too long could create a lack of innovation, diversity, and new ideas.
While keeping a few experienced officers on the executive board could help student organizations accomplish long-term projects and grow member base, having some officers or a whole team of officers keep their positions for too long can do more harm than good.
By keeping the same officers year after year, they might become stuck in their ways. Members want to get elected because they want to help offer something to their organization they don’t currently see. By limiting the ability for members to become new leaders, your organization and it’s members miss out on electing people with fresh and exciting plans for the future of the group.
Pro: New officers and members can learn from experienced leaders
Having an experienced leader on the team can be a viable resource in training new officers and giving advice based on their own historical knowledge of the organization. An experienced leader should be knowledgeable about preventing group-think and promoting new officers to become self-motivated in their positions while being available to help new officers if needed.
Think About: Instead of having officers stay the same position, have them run for higher office or become mentors!
If your organization is relatively large, a good course of action for keeping some experienced officers on the executive board is to allow them to run for a consecutive term in higher office. For example: In my own student organization, Women in Business, our officer for marketing and officer for event planning were extremely good at their positions. When they ran as a team for President and Vice President, members didn’t think twice before electing them.
By making a rule that officers can only rerun for a higher position, this keeps officers from just switching roles and staying on the executive board. If previous officers don’t want to run for election again or are unable to do so, they can become an official Mentor of the organization. These mentors can offer insight and advice to the new officers, but don’t carry any of the responsibilities or decision-making weight of the executive team.
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