As the student council president, the most challenging aspect was not the weekly announcements in front of hundreds of students or the pressure of being looked at with magnifiers. Instead, it was maximizing efficiency across a student council of over 50 members.
The council was composed of three different bodies, each responsible for school events, regulation review, and enforcing disciplinary actions. These are the three pillars of high school life, giving us an extreme leverage in shaping the teenage experience of all students.
That being said, as a leader, I carried great responsibility to ensure the proper functioning of our council. In this role, I found that the most important thing was to build systems. A mistake I often see leaders make is the urge to control everything. This comes at great costs of the group's cohesiveness. The role of a leader is not to micromanage every single detail and give tons of direct instructions, but instead to provide a system for fellows to follow. The better your system is, the more efficient the group is going to function. This means there are less instructions you have to give as a leader, since the group starts to function “automatically.” Only with automation established, leaders can put 100% of their focus on more important topics instead of ordinary management practices.
