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If you could tell your college president …Posted by Brian Niles on June 3, 2009 For many years now I’ve been told that we should write a book. If you know the team at TargetX, we’re big on pushing the envelope and getting colleges to see things differently (heck, our company motto is “Overthrowing Dead Culture”, so we have an opinion or two on something). The idea of sitting down to write a book on this stuff seems daunting to me, at the very least. Who would read it and how would it be different, practical, forward-thinking and timely? Despite these lingering questions, a couple of months ago we got the process started and we’re hoping to publish the book later this year. But I thought I’d take some time to solicit some help from all of you. If you had your college president’s ear, what would you want to tell him or her about the current state of college marketing or recruiting, how your institution is being managed (or mis-managed), what makes this generation so different or what they need to do as your institution’s leader? The premise of the book is not that much different than why TargetX was created 11 years ago. That the way students search for the right college is very different than the way colleges market and communicate with them. That the way colleges are structured does not match the current state of business or consumer purchasing habits. That the current economic situation may have created a tipping point in how families choose a higher education route. And that colleges may be one of the most inefficiently run industries in a time of fiscal crisis for some. I find those of you that read the iThink blog have a keen and unique grasp on the situation, have excellent ideas and perhaps sometimes feel like you’re not always being heard. I’ve been there. So I want to give you a place to vent, suggest, proclaim, announce, demand or simply share your ideas. Take a few moments, if you would, and tell me what’s on your mind you’d like college leadership (or your college president) to hear. If we like what you have to say, we may want to talk with you further and consider including you and your thoughts in our book. Thanks for your help!  3 Responses to “If you could tell your college president …”Leave a Reply |
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June 3, 2009
I find cultural shifts, especially with regard to accountability, in staff to be a painfully slow process. But, however slow they do eventually occur. I struggle to understand why this shift seems to never take place with faculty. New initiatives, policy change, and more are set out before staff in an adapt or die manner while faculty are left to their own whims and held accountable for little else than showing up to class most days. Why is there so much dancing around obvious issues that require faculty to do something that may not be on their list of career-advancing priorities? Stand up and be held accountable, along with the rest of us, for the success (or failure) of the university. Tenure shouldn’t excuse you from this responsibility.
June 4, 2009
I think, along the same lines as Heather, that faculty is the biggest obstacle in any change at our university. The biggest issue for us is that our administration is unwilling to do anything that will make our faculty upset. They won’t stand up to them to make changes for the betterment of the institution. Also, there are too many people that have been around for too long that still have huge amounts of power and are out of touch with what is happening. So many changes have to wait until “so and so retires.” Changes need to happen at the speed the environment is shifting, not when it happens to be most convenient.
August 31, 2009
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