Navigating Change: The Podcast From Teibel Education

Do you know your institutional research team? If not, you should. This question of data, and how we use it most appropriately and effectively is becoming an ever-increasing tool in driving change. But what comes with data is complexity. Today on the show, we welcome Terra Schehr, Assistant Vice President of Institutional Research and Effectiveness at Loyola University Maryland. Terra shares her experience leading the IR team in demonstrating and serving the institution through data. Terra is being asked to collect and report new kinds of data — and reflects on some of her practices in benchmarking and longitudinal data around lifelong student experience. It’s a fascinating conversation on an incredibly powerful set of tools in service of institutional growth and change.

Dr. George Martin has served as president of St. Edward’s University for over 15 years. In his tenure there, he has become an expert navigator of the waters of institutional change. This year, Dr. Martin has launched a new project, an administrative review designed to capitalize on the university’s successes, and prepare to face the challenging landscape of higher education before us all. This week on Navigating Change, Dr. Martin shares his experience in cultivating top-down and bottom-up decision making that positively engages the entire university community. He outlines his rationale behind embarking on such an audacious change project now, and what success will mean to the finance office — and the culture of St. Edward’s in the future.

The 2015 National Conference on Trusteeship from the Association of Governing Boards is coming up April 19-21in Phoenix and this year’s event promises a rich line-up of leaders and board members tackling the biggest issues facing higher ed institutions around the world. Howard Teibel is on the docket this year, joining the list of facilitators for the Leadership Institute for Board Leaders and Executives the day before the main session, April 18. We’re thrilled to welcome AGB President Rick Legon to the show this week. Rick has served as AGB President since 2006. This week, he shares his keen insights in the challenges facing board leadership in today’s institutions, and how the Conference on Trusteeship serves to align leaders to face them. How do we maintain an affordable education while ensuring the highest quality? How do we address the glass ceiling of tuition revenue in supporting the institution? How do we adapt to the changing relationship between state and federal regulation and the education experie

In Norse mythology, Loki was the trickster. In one of his particularly sticky exploits, he wagered his head with a group of dwarves and lost, creating a wonderful metaphor describing the complexities of difficult negotiations for us today known as “Loki’s Wager” — if a concept cannot be satisfactorily defined, it cannot be discussed. Seemingly impassable problems are common in the boardroom. But in most cases, such challenges stem from weak trust and a poor culture around handling conflict. Astute leaders know that the great benefit of team work is leveraging different perspectives toward big problems. To do so requires reframing the intractable, and moving beyond Loki’s most frustrating wager. This week on Navigating Change, Howard Teibel and Pete Wright discuss Loki’s Wager, and share insight that can help to adjust our natural assumptions around conflict, trust, and the ground rules required for an effective problem-solving and decision-making engine at the negotiating table.

Holiday breaks are coming to a close and students are heading back to classes as we celebrate one more trip around the sun. This week on Navigating Change, we take on four key trends bound to influence your decision making in 2015 as we reflect on the year gone by. In doing so, we’re setting the stage for our own conversation for year to come around institutional responsibility for external mandates, the role of academic performance measurement in data driven decision making, continued consolidations and shared services, and the leaders role in positively engaging the workforce in the face of great change ahead. This week on Navigating Change, Howard Teibel and Pete Wright take on four key trends bound to influence your decision making in 2015.

The 2015 National Business Officers Association Annual Meeting is coming up February 22-25 in Boston and this year’s event promises a rich line-up of speakers and educators tackling the biggest issues facing independent school business officers around the country. Howard Teibel is on the docket once again this year, delivering a pair of deep-dive sessions on impactful group decision making and strategic communication. We’re thrilled to welcome NBOA President and CEO Jeff Shield to the show this week. Jeff has worked tirelessly to ensure that this upcoming annual meeting is the best yet, and shares not only a fantastic origin story of the association, but offers welcomed insight around the importance of the business officer in the tight-knit independent school community, and the challenges they face in collaborative work across their campuses.

Over the last year, we’ve returned to the topic of administrative and academic collaboration a number of times. Our lesson: successful change projects are the result of academic leaders and administrative leaders working in concert with one another. This week we welcome Dr. Ahmed Abdelal, Provost and Chief Academic Officer at UMass Lowell. His work provides a framework for the structure and culture that makes for a collaborative leadership model that transcends competition and gridlock. This week on the show, Provost Abdelal joins Howard Teibel and Pete Wright to reflect on his philosophy around academic leadership and his successes in working toward respectful and reciprocal leadership across the institution.

Creating a culture adept at group decision making is one of the great leadership challenges. It requires alignment in the face of personal stakes on the team, political motivations, individual belief systems and ego. It requires individual contributors to have a keen ability to listen, and an even deeper ability to dig into a key question that is almost never asked, but may be the most important question for team processing: Why are we doing this? This week on Navigating Change, Howard Teibel illuminates the decision making process for teams, shares his own insights for making difficult decisions, and creating teams that do the same.

For those who live with it, perfectionism can be a powerful tool for creating great work, or a blunt force impeding forward motion. In either case, we often refer to perfectionist traits as profoundly personal, a set of behaviors that impacts us, but that we confidently stow away when teams are involved. The truth: the team is an organism made of individuals. And as individuals, we bring all our behaviors with us. It is the collection of individual traits that determines the identity of the teams in which we work. This week on the show, Howard Teibel and Pete Wright unravel the nature of perfectionism on teams. From our common understanding of team norms to how this drive toward perfection can hinder the discovery of key insights that can live in the gap between awareness and action.

As leaders, it’s critical that we engage change on our campuses with enthusiasm, curiosity, and courage. Our teams are counting it, as are our extended constituencies — students, parents, and our community at large. In our efforts to engage with enthusiasm, our first and most important challenge is to embrace our own ignorance. This week on the show, Howard Teibel and Pete Wright discuss the key tenets of process consultation, and offer guidance for asking tough questions of our own assumptions in our work to drive change in our institutions.

This week on Navigating Change we’re coming to you once again from the EACUBO 2014 Annual Meeting in Orlando, Florida. Speakers at the conference have been taking on some of the most challenging issues facing chief business officers in higher education. This week, we’re joined by all four regional CUBO presidents for a conversation on the challenges they’re facing in their regions. From dropping high school populations to a changing demographic landscape to dramatically declining state subsidies, each region is working hard to ensure their members are prepared to face tomorrow’s challenges today. Our Guests Regional Presidents, Associations of College and University Business Officers Michael Gower, EACUBO Senior Vice President, Finance & Tresurer Rutgers University Harold Hewitt, WACUBO Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Chapman University Mary Lou Merkt, SACUBO Vice President for Finance and Administration Furman University Kathy Qualls, CACUBO Senior Vice Provost for Academic Finance &

This week on Navigating Change we’re coming to you from the EACUBO 2014 Annual Meeting in Orlando, Florida. Speakers at the conference have been taking on some of the most challenging issues facing chief business officers in higher education. We’re kicking off our EACUBO series with two people who serve as leaders in the effort to prepare CBOs for the demands of tomorrow’s institutions. Lynne Schaefer is vice president for finance and administration at University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and currently serves as EACUBO vice chair. Marta Perez Drake serves as vice president for professional development for NACUBO. This week on the show, Lynne and Marta join Howard Teibel and Pete Wright to share their work in developing CBOs as strategic leaders prepared for broader challenges beyond the typical expectations of the office. Our special thanks to all who turned out to join us at this special live event in Orlando, and to the EACUBO team that helped to make this happen!

This week on Navigating Change we conclude our three-part series in which we share the administrative and academic review from the inside out. Our final guest is Terry Sawyer, Vice President of Administration at Loyola University Maryland, and it was under his guidance as co-chair of the "New Way Of Proceeding" committee that deep investigation into institutional operations occurred. Terry’s role in senior administration, in partnership with his colleague and faculty co-chair Steve Fowl, put him in an ideal position to support challenging initiatives and difficult solutions across the institution. This week, Terry shares his insights on the academic and administrative review from the administrative perspective, and how we were able to form a partnership to deliver both financial and cultural benefits to Loyola Maryland.

When navigating complex change initiatives, there may come a time when your team will face the challenge of calling on outside support for expertise, guidance, and potentially even leadership as you cruise uncertain institutional waters. How do you engage the right support, at the right time, in the right capacity? This week on Navigating Change, Howard Teibel shares his experience in building outstanding relationships with external consultants as a consultant himself. From setting clear boundaries for communication, to taking on key strategic responsibilities, Howard’s insights offer a keen view into what makes a consultative partnership valuable in achieving the strategic goals of the institution.

This week on Navigating Change we continue our three-part series in which we share the administrative and academic review from the inside out. Our second guest is professor Steve Fowl of Loyola University Maryland, and it was under his guidance as co-chair of the "New Way Of Proceeding" committee that deep investigation into institutional operations occurred. Steve’s role as chair of the faculty senate at the time made him the perfect representative in the review process. This week, Steve shares his insights on the academic and administrative review from the faculty perspective, and how we were able to form a partnership to deliver both financial and cultural benefits to Loyola Maryland.

The Central Association of College and University Business Officer’s Annual Meeting is coming up fast — October 5-7, Kansas City will play host to central region change leaders and business officers addressing the crossroads of higher education. Gail Gregory will be on-site at the conference delivering her presentation, “Communicating Financial Information Effectively.” This week on the show, Gail joins Pete Wright to share her perspective on strategic communication and the evolving role and responsibility of the business officer, with a great review of the big events coming up this weekend. Listen in!

This week on Navigating Change we begin a three-part series to share the administrative and academic review from the inside out. Our first guest is Vice President of Finance of Loyola University Maryland Randy Gentzler, and it was under his guidance that the project ensured its focus not only on ideas for change consistent with mission but also ones that would have a positive financial impact. As the chief business officer, Randy describes the project from its inception to deal with the short-term operating budget as well as defining a new model of financial success. Randy and Howard share their experience working as true partners in this project and offer key learnings for getting the most out of this unique relationship.

There are two fundamental considerations when communicating complex information from the business office. First, do you have the right data for your audience. Second, are you communicating that data using the right tools. Our special guest Nicole Trufant has been polishing her communications practice from the business office as Vice President for Fiscal Affairs at University of New England Next month, Nicole will join Howard Teibel on stage at the EACUBO 2014 Annual Meeting in Orlando as presenting, “Communicating Strategically to Make and Impact.” This week on the show, Nicole joins Howard and Pete Wright to discuss how the role and responsibility of the business officer has changed in the last decade, and shares insights into her daily work to support her president, administration, faculty, students and parents across the institution. Join the Teibel Team at the EACUBO 2014 Annual Meeting! We'll be recording live at the Cheers Reception on Monday evening, October 20. Come by and join the conversation, share

Last week, Canisius College President John Hurley welcomed faculty, students, and staff to the 2014-15 academic year at the school’s convocation event. In his speech, he outlined a vision for college success by way of three key areas: Redefinition — understanding what it means to be a student-centered institution; Revitalization — embracing new approaches to the academic model; and Innovation — evolving the business model to support a more agile institution. This week on Navigating Change, President Hurley joins Howard Teibel and Pete Wright to reflect on his role as he begins his fifth year of service. He shares his approach to building trust in times of challenge, the critical importance of communication, and building support and understanding across a diverse body of students, faculty, and staff. President Hurley offers candid insight into his role and it’s many opportunities and challenges.

This week on Navigating Change, we’re thrilled to have friend of the show, Michael Gower. Michael currently serves as senior vice president of finance at Rutgers University and the chair of EACUBO. He joins us on the show this week to share his insights on building trust, technology, and the forces impacting the changing business model in higher eduction. The EACUBO Annual Meeting 2014 will be held in Orlando October 19-22. Michael and the EACUBO leadership team are leading a shift in the approach to the annual conference with new presentation models and events designed to give financial leaders the the tools they need to build trust and deliver on the mission of their institutions. Hot news! Howard and Pete will be hosting Navigating Change Unplugged live on Monday, October 21 at the conference. If you’re going to be in Orlando, join us in person — details coming soon!