Higher Education
Worked with a small liberal arts college caught up in the energies of re-inventing itself and with all the challenges such change provokes. The interrelationship of program, students, "market," finance, and leadership all were critical to reaching greater understanding of the work ahead.
Returned to a women's liberal arts college first served 15 years before. Dramatic positive movement in recent years now required re-assessing the status of the last strategic plan and the directions for the years to come. By engaging the board, administration, and a group of faculty leaders in generating an overview of the college's situation and needs, the groundwork for a full-scale strategic planning process this fall was laid.
Assisted a private university in drawing together multiple strands of planning undertaken in the prior two years. Careful engagement of all constituencies and focused questioning on sustainability had generated broad discussion of possibilities and alternatives. A three-day retreat of some 60 participants provided the university with the ideal opportunity to draw these many strands together into one plan in fairly short order, present it to the community for further review, and bring it to the board for final approval.
Worked with the board of a prominent urban community college that was grappling with the opportunities presented by a recent presidential departure. Regular review of institutional needs and priorities brought the board together, guided the interim president, allowed for a successful search, and aligned the new president with it. Good board members began to take pride in the board's many accomplishments and to understand the many ways in which they could work as partners with their new president.
Helped guide the leadership of a large regional state university as it struggled to bring its budget into line with rapidly declining state revenues. Several days of interviews with key constituent leaders made clear that the university had reached the end of the cuts of the prior seven years: It now had to change how it did business. Following a full day retreat of university leaders, a plan emerged.
Guided a noted liberal arts college as it sought to lift its board's performance to match that of the administration and college. A charismatic president had captured the imagination of faculty, students, and alumni - and the board wanted to keep pace.
K-12 Independent Schools
Spent a full week with the upper school of a prominent girls school on questions of program. Lengthy interviews with faculty and administrators, followed by seminars with each department and school area on available directions, led into a full upper school retreat focused on the work to be done. An agenda for the year and years to come emerged.
Moved beyond strategic planning with one urban independent school to address issues of management structure, marketing, and communication strategies.
Returned to lay the groundwork for another strategic plan for a large girls' school with which work began in 1996. Given familiarity with the consultant's ways of doing business – and well-earned confidence in the school's accomplishments – the outline of the new plan fell easily into place.
Worked with the board of a day school that had been experienced significant losses in enrollment for a period of years. The key to its future lay not in asking how it could increase enrollment, but rather how it could operate and survive with 20% fewer students.
Completed a strategic planning process for an urban PK-12 school asking whether declines in enrollment at lower grade levels – largely the result of the passing of the "baby boomlet" – best could be met with restructuring. Did expectations of enrollment have to be reset? What were the implications?
Other organizations
Returned to a foundation that had opened a new affiliate operation in the United States several years before. Wide-ranging "start-up" work had resulted in a complex and well-functioning office, overseen by an energized and capable board. With the pieces in place and functioning well, the foundation could turn to a more focused look at the work it desired for the years ahead. Numerous exciting alternatives lay before it, all linked to emerging trends in global scholarship and research, and, through careful exploration, a course was laid.
Began work with a nonprofit musical society ready to update systems, function, and governance to match its growing success and to seize on current market opportunities.
Helped a long-standing and successful group home develop a plan for adjusting its programs and structure to meet changing definitions of best practice for the care of vulnerable children. Fundamental transformations in ways of doing business were required – while retaining founding values and superior service.