Transforming the Strategic Plan to Transform the Institution

Dr. Michael Lacourse, Provost at Utah Tech University, joins Joe Gottlieb to walk through a series of strategic planning cycles and the meaningful impact the entire institution realized as the strategy evolved over time. Learn from Dr. Lacourse about the planning process and its outputs as well as the impressive results for Utah Tech, its students, staff and faculty, and the community.

References: 

Dr. Michael Lacourse

Provost, Utah Tech University

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Transcript

Dr. Michael Lacourse: 0:00

So when I arrived, that plan was, was starting. And, and we did, we executed the plan, we went well beyond the plan. Uh, and on the academic side, we moved fairly quickly. Uh, in the course of five years , uh, we, we created probably close to 40 new independent baccalaureate degree programs and, and , and two or three master's degree programs, which is well beyond what the plan called for. Um, but, but it really provided that, that, that guidance for what we did, what I did on a, on a daily basis. It didn't have the big vision kind of thing that, that, that, you know, that I think is really important. But it did provide a lot of, you know, guidance to the details. And, and subsequently, as we hired, as we began searching for new faculty and administrators, almost to the person that, that I interviewed , uh, and , and hired, they all read the strategic plan. And most of them said, I came here because the , i i, it resonated with me. I, I really enjoyed reading it. So it had a big, it had not only an impact on, on guiding the development of the institution, but also served as a recruitment tool for faculty , uh, and administrators who liked the idea that we had this, this detailed plan.

Joe Gottlieb: 1:09

That's Michael Lacourse Provost at Utah Tech. Michael is about to start leading the third strategic plan that he's been a part of since joining the institution in 2016, which at that time was named Dixie State University. We talked about how an evolving approach to strategic planning has helped reshape this institution from a church school in 1900 to the open comprehensive Polytechnic University that it is today. I hope you enjoy our conversation. Welcome to TRANSFORMED, a Higher Digital podcast focused on the new why's, the new what's, and the new how's in higher ed. In each episode, you will experience hosts and guests pulling for the resurgence of higher ed, while identifying and discussing the best practices needed to accomplish that resurgence. Culture, strategy and tactics, planning and execution, people, process, and technology. It's all on the menu because that's what's required to truly transform. Hello, welcome and thanks for joining us for another episode of TRANSFORMED. My name is Joe Gottlieb, president and CTO of Higher Digital, and today I am joined by Dr. Michael Lacourse Provost at Utah Tech. Michael, welcome to TRANSFORMED.

Dr. Michael Lacourse: 2:33

Thanks, Joe. It's great to be here. And , uh, looking forward to what we wanna talk about today.

Joe Gottlieb: 2:39

Well, on that topic, I would love to talk about transforming the strategic plan to transform the institution. But before we dive in, please share a bit of your background and how you got connected into the work that you do at higher ed.

Dr. Michael Lacourse: 2:54

Yeah, thanks for the question. You know, it really , uh, probably not everybody has a , has perhaps a non-traditional story. But for me , uh, I came into higher ed , um, coming out of high school. I , I don't even know where this began, but I had this dream of becoming a , uh, a track and field coach working with world class athletes. I mean, I was an athlete myself, but nowhere near that. And, but I had this dream, and so I went off to college and , um, you know , uh, got a degree in, in exercise science, and then went into , um, uh, my, a doctoral program. Uh, and I, and I chose , uh, or made that decision because I felt as though if I'm gonna be coaching world class athletes, I need to have advanced knowledge of science as it relates to human performance. So that drew me into , uh, a PhD program with the intent of, of, of earning that at the same time that I'm coaching. But somewhere along the way, the , uh, the research , uh, aspect of, of my education drew me away from the coaching dream. And I, I transitioned to , uh, a career in , in , in academia. And , uh, but the interesting thing, you know, it happened to me even starting when I was young and , and while I was in college and while I was in graduate school, is that I always , uh, tended to want to start things and build things from scratch that didn't exist that really excited me. And I think that spirit has carried across my entire career, because at every university I've been at, that's really the approach I've taken. I, I didn't look so much at what existed. It's what, what potential there was to create something new and, and impactful. And so , um, along the way, I, you know, I certainly as , uh, I , I spent first 20 years in the California State University system and , um, uh, moved up the ranks there and, and began testing some of those ideas with some big projects, and then went off to become a , a founding dean. So there's the , the first opportunity to, to really build something from the ground up, a founding dean at a university in San Diego called National University. So I was a founding Dean of Health and Human Services, and then went off to Sam Houston State University, founding Dean, again, of health sciences there. I ended up , uh, in addition to my college, working on a medical school and a new campus. Uh , and then from there, that brought me here to, to , at the time was , uh, Dixie State University, probably the newest university in America at the time that I had arrived, and thought, man, this is, this is gonna be a great opportunity to, to do what I love and, and to build. So that's, that's how I came to, to be. I've been here in almost nine years now at ,

Joe Gottlieb: 5:23

Well, a very fitting background for the topic that we've chosen to discuss. No surprise. So let's set the stage for this conversation. So, Utah Tech's origin story really features numerous transformations from its early days as a church school to the university as becoming today. So does any part of that history stand out as particularly responsible for the identity of Utah tech today,

Dr. Michael Lacourse: 5:48

Utah ? Yeah, that's a great question. You know, and, and you know, the , the history of the university up until three years ago, every iteration of a name of which there were, I think nine names, every iteration had the word Dixie in it attached some way . And, and so that's a whole story by itself, how the word Dixie came to be associated with Southern Utah. But it's been, it's been here for, for quite some time. So the history of the university has been attached to Dixie up until about three years ago when we changed the name to Utah Tech. But I, I think over the course of, of, of the history of the, in , uh, of the, of the university and, and certainly of the region, 'cause the u the region has grown along with the university. Uh, I think each phase grew upon the next. And so I, I , I think that, you know, every, every generation of educators and students built the university to, to, to , uh, you know, to a , you know, a higher level, to a more impactful level. Um, but knowing that that education is really important in Utah. And I think that, that people were very much committed to, to building and maintaining , uh, a university , uh, here in, in southern Utah. So much so that there were a , a couple of times along the way during , um, during the 20th century when funding dried up, and there were times when the university was , uh, was going to close because of insufficient funding, and the community members came together , uh, tossed their pennies into the, into the bucket, and came up with enough money to keep the university going. And so you cannot , uh, you know , the , the impact of, of the community coming together is , has been enormous. But I think in terms of the current identity of the university, certainly becoming a university in 2013 was probably the most impactful single moment , uh, in , in the last a hundred years, because it really transformed , uh, the institution from, from its origins as more of , um, um, uh, associate degree granting institution to baccalaureate and now, you know, master's in doctoral degrees for us. So, so I think the, the 2013 decision to transform the institution was, was extremely , uh, impactful. Uh, and then certainly since that time , uh, the university has in every possible way has completely transformed. There's really, other than a few buildings that were here at that time, the, the institutions physical structure, programmatic structure, administrative, every part of it has, has, has changed. Uh, so I, I think that, you know, those times when the community members chipped in to keep the university highly impactful, and certainly becoming a university in 2013 was, was a high impact experience.

Joe Gottlieb: 8:19

Wow . Great. Great. Highlights for what sounds like just a really fascinating journey that Utah Tech has been on. And I know along that journey, you've, so much of the journey is run counter to traditions and norms, typical of other institutions in Utah. So what are example , some examples of this, and how did you manage through some of the resistance that you encountered?

Dr. Michael Lacourse: 8:42

Yeah, sure. So, so, you know, in, in 2013 , uh, when , uh, the university was , uh, was officially designated as a university by the, the legislature, and certainly the governor , um, you know, it was a state college. Uh , and just coming out of that , uh, a new president was hired soon after that , uh, Biff Williams. And then , uh, he hired me in 2016, and we began to think through about where this university might go. And , uh, having been a founding dean myself twice , uh, and, and the, the methodology that I employed in both of those previous universities, due diligence, talk to people, read, study, understand where you are, the context , uh, I did exactly the same thing here. And what I learned , uh, from conversations in the community is that , uh, this part of the state is really , uh, traditionally economically , uh, uh, a service oriented economy and, you know, construction and then retirement space, people servicing the retirees and so forth, but not much of a professional middle class , no real industries to speak of. And, and part of the, part of what I was, what I heard was that we need the university to step forward in a significant way to start, you know, building degree programs and things like, you know, STEM fields, engineering, computer science, software engineering, all these things that, that would attract and retain companies that were willing and interested in growing here. So we heard that loud and clear. So taking that piece of information, coupled with, at that moment in time when I arrived in the first few months, the university had adopted a tagline called Active Learning, active Life, which personally I loved. And, and , um, so if you take this idea of active applied learning and attach it to these STEM fields , uh, and having myself spent, you know, a few years at California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo , I started, I began thinking, maybe that's the direction, you know, if we're gonna , if we're gonna differentiate the university, maybe that's the difference. And so I, I began looking at that as a possibility. Uh, I mapped all the technology universities in the United States, and, and lo and behold, you see this massive gap in the Intermountain West, where there was no technology or Polytechnic University. Um , and so putting all of these things together, I I had proposed to the president that we transformed the institution into a polytechnic university and gave him all the reasons why, and he agreed with my assessment, and we began putting the pieces in place , uh, almost immediately, quietly, without talking about it, just knowing that that's the direction we were going. So, so, so that was, that was a , that was a , a significant piece. A a funny story along the way is that, is that , um, um, you know, to be a , a polytechnic university or a technology university, engineering is the core program. And we didn't have engineering at the time, and at the time , uh, there was this general sense, general sense in the state that only the large research universities were really allowed to have engineering and regional campuses like ours were not. And so I said, well, let's, let's give it a go. So we invited the dean of, of engineering , uh, to campus, and , uh, said , we'd like to build engineering here , uh, would you support us doing that? And, and he agreed to our great surprise, he said, I will support you. Um , I'll have faculty that will send down, they can help you on curriculum and, and, and develop the programs. Well, nobody could believe that, that they would ever agree to support us. So off we went, we built our, our degree programs , uh, and then when we came to the point where we're getting state approval, we wrote in our, our proposal that the University of Utah , uh, supported us. And, and so , um, somebody asked the, the person from the University of Utah, why did you support them? And his, his response was, 'cause I never thought they'd actually do it. And so , uh, to , to their surprise, we did it. And, and, you know, we've, we've transformed very much the, the, I mean, we not only have the , the programs, we have probably spectacular facilities and buildings on campus now. And, and this has allowed us really to, to, to advance. But I don't think anybody thought we could do many of the things that we've done along the way. So we're, we're pretty proud that we've been able to find a way on limited resources.

Joe Gottlieb: 13:00

Nice. So if we now step into the body of this effort, right? So you pitch the president on an idea to become a Polytechnic University in southern Utah, that, that clearly would be filling for the first time , um, an entry in the Intermountain West with, with such a university. It got some help from Utah University , uh, even though they, they only probably offered it because they didn't think you'd take, take them up on it. So breaking some traditions, making some surprises happen really nice. So then you start, you start really exercising some strategic planning cycles to pursue this vision of becoming a Polytechnic University. So take me through those first cycles that you were involved with and how they helped to shape this effort , um, that, that has become Utah Tech.

Dr. Michael Lacourse: 13:55

Yeah, that's great. A great question. And, and really, the strategic planning has become sort of a hallmark of our institution, and , uh, so much so that the other , uh, universities in the state have, have been nudged along in that direction to do it at the same level of intensity that we have. But, but , uh, I , you know, I credit certainly our president , uh, Biff Williams at the time. Uh, he, he was, he was the , uh, the person , uh, who initiated the first strategic planning cycle , uh, that happened in about 2015 , um, after he came. And , uh, uh, you know, there was a , a process that involved, you know, a large, very large number of people both on campus and off campus . Uh, they produced a document that , uh, titled , um, A Status to Stature. And, and I thought when , when I first saw that strategic plan in , in , when I was applying for my job, I , I wasn't here during that. But when I was applying for the job, I, I did find the plan online and, and started reading it, and was incredibly impressed with, first of all, the title was incredibly appropriate. I'm not sure who was the originator of that, but, but really was the case where, yeah, you , you've got the, the title of a university, but you don't really have , uh, the stature of a university because you don't really have the capacity and the infrastructure to be a university, so you need to build it. So it's obvious that was step number one. And so that plan really articulated really in great detail , uh, more about capacity building than anything about academic programming and so forth. So it looked across the institution and the usual areas. Obviously there was capacity building and academics. There was , uh, you know, development and, and marketing and business services and on and on. So all of , all of the divisions of the university were represented in that, in that first plan , it was, I believe, roughly 80 pages, single spaced , uh, with hundreds of action items. And I read them all , uh, before I came , uh, and interviewed for my job. And, and , um, was really, you know , like, okay, we've got a plan. I'm just gonna, I'm gonna execute the plan. And so when I arrived, that plan was , was starting. And, and we did, we executed the plan, we went well beyond the plan. Uh, and on the academic side, we moved fairly quickly. Uh, in the course of five years , uh, we, we created probably close to 40 new independent baccalaureate degree programs and, and, and two or three master's degree programs, which is well beyond what the plan called for. Um, but, but it really provided that, that, that guidance for what we did, what I did on a, on a daily basis, it didn't have the big vision kind of thing that, that, that, you know, that I think is really important. But it did provide a lot of, you know, guidance to the details. And, and subsequently, as we hired , uh, as we began searching for new faculty and administrators, almost to the person that, that I interviewed , uh, and , and hired, they all read the strategic plan. And most of them said, I came here because this , I, I, it , it resonated with me. I I really enjoyed reading it. So it had a big, it had a , not only an impact on, on guiding the development of the institution, but also served as a recruitment tool for faculty , uh, and administrators who liked the idea that we had this, this detailed plan. So that's, that's plan number one , uh, status to stature. So, so as a con as we begin , uh, we, we concluded that plan , um, uh, I was asked to serve as the chair of the next plan, as of the strategic planning committee. And, and early on, we made a decision that this second plan had to be different than the first in the sense that, okay, now we're a university, what kind of a university do we want to become? And so that was the guiding principle, like, okay, we need to think through a plan that moves us in a particular direction. So now, all this work that we had done for the previous five years below the radar in terms of building a model that looks like a a , a polytechnic university, now, it was time to surface that and to put that out front. So one of the very first things we had we did is, is to , uh, redo our mission and vision statements to, to create , uh, what we now call an , an , uh, an open comprehensive polytechnic university. Uh, and, and the reason that we, we are open is , uh, well, obviously, I , I , we, I think it's a , it's the right model, but it's, it's also mandated in some ways because we are an open admissions university, and we are also a dual mission university, meaning that we are both a community college and a comprehensive university all wrapped up into one. And so it's about as open as you can, as you can get. And so we really embrace the idea of, of openness , uh, as a , as a design characteristic for the institution. The poly , the comprehensive polytechnic was part , was really a negotiation, because, you know, here we have a , a six college university, and we're focused on polytechnic. And certainly some people felt as though that we did not want to just move away from the humanities, social sciences, arts, and so forth. So let's make , let's retain that comprehensive dimension. So we all agreed , and there was no, no real concern about that. So we ended up choosing these three main characteristics, open comprehensive polytechnic. And so we began building a strategic plan really to, to sort of move us in that direction, okay, what are the first things we need to do to really be to, to, to , um, to pursue those three characteristics at a , at a high level. So, so plan number two was new mission, new vision, and setting, setting the direction to, to pursue the achievement of , of those. So that was, that was round two, also a very detailed, I don't know, it's probably about 60 or 70 , uh, page , uh, single space document , uh, with , uh, hundreds of action items , um, that, that, you know, were negotiated during that process. Um, and so that's the, the similar model to the first one, but a di very different approach, not, not really capacity building, more on program manning , uh, programming , uh, man enrollment management , uh, development of, of people , uh, talent and those kinds of things. So, very different approach. Um , so now we're ready for, for round three. So , uh, so this year , uh, for the next , uh, 12 months, we'll be, we'll be working on, on the next strategic plan. And I think this one is gonna look a little bit different. I don't, I don't anticipate a 70 page single space document this time around. I think we've, we've, we've , um, we've moved into a new , uh, type of planning , uh, philosophy , uh, where , uh, we would be focused more on general ideas, general themes, and, and not so detailed , uh, in , in terms of , um, uh, the specific actions that we would be taking in the next, in the next five years. So I anticipate , uh, uh, that we will have a different approach to strategic planning. Uh, and I, you know, it's probably gonna be a combination of capacity building and, and , uh, and programming.

Joe Gottlieb: 20:42

It's exciting to see how the approach in those, well, those two recently completed plans, and the one that you think, you know, you see coming up next has evolved. And, and so if we focus in on the most recent strategic planning cycle where you've now been, you've been at it executing that plan for the last few years, what were some of the biggest challenges that you encountered? I know Covid was in there, but probably wasn't the only thing that you encountered that in my mind, strategic plans are, are often measured by how they overcame challenges, how they overcame, you know, things that maybe weren't anticipated effectively. So you've got, you've gotta keep living with this document that has set a course. So maybe share some thoughts on some of those challenges and how you navigated them.

Dr. Michael Lacourse: 21:35

Yeah. Well , we started in , uh, the fall of, of , of 2000 and, and 19 pre covid . And , um, I think, again, we, you know, one of the first decisions was, you know, what's this plan gonna look like? I mean , what's the purpose of this plan? What's the theme? What are we gonna do? And so I, I , you know, there were a lot of , uh, before we could even start talking about the plan, we went deep into the mission and vision, like, that needs to be reexamined. We need to think through this first before we start doing any planning. And so, I would say of, of the, of the roughly 10 or 11 months that we worked on this, more than half of it was just that mission and vision , uh, working through that and, and, and took us the entire fall semester really to , uh, ultimately lead to , uh, an articulated , you know , uh, mission and vision that we all felt felt comfortable with. So, so I think, I think that , um, that was the challenge. The second challenge , um, is that, you know, we did, we did the typical SWOT analysis , uh, approach early on. And , um, there were relatively few people involved. It , it only lasted a very short time, and the outcomes of that were really not very instructive at all. I think a lot of it was just obvious , um, and, and not a lot of deep thought. Um, and , and that was put into that, that SWOT analysis. So I was personally a little disappointed at the outcome of that. I didn't really feel like it gave us much of anything. So as a result of that, we ended up inviting , um, some , uh, uh, guests , uh, uh, futurists to come to campus and to talk a little bit about trends and higher education and get a different approach, different perspective. We invited folks from , uh, polytechnic universities to come and talk about what it is to be a polytechnic university from their perspective. So, so we tried to supplement the swot , um, the lack of a really in-depth SWOT analysis with , uh, external experts to provide some additional context to the conversations we were having. So , so I think that that was a piece of it. We didn't have great data at that time. Uh, you know, we just, we didn't have a well developed , uh, uh, set of metrics that we could use historical data to, to give us some indication of where we've come and where we've been and, and where we are , uh, to help, help guide us in future decision making . So we were really absent data, we were absent to really high quality SWOT analysis, I thought. And then of course, you know, once we went through the fall semester and, and had , had arrived at our, our mission and vision, we come back in the spring, and then now we're, now we're facing covid and, you know, like everyone else, everybody scattered. And, you know, that was the, there were no more meetings we had , we never brought everybody together again in the same room , uh, ever. Uh, and so we, we did it , uh, in small groups and, and the work in small groups and, and, and on Zoom. And, and frankly, a lot of the work was done by a very few people. Um, just that was the nature. We had some timelines to get this finished. So, so I don't know that that as great of, of broad involvement. We had phase one fall semester during covid , you know, it was a smaller group of people , uh, working on, on the details of the plan. So , um, so anyway, that, that's , um, you know, some of the, some of the, the , the challenges that we, that we experienced during that phase. So

Joe Gottlieb: 24:58

You also wound up with a tagline that you wound up adjusting. I thought that was another interesting thing. So share a little bit about that.

Dr. Michael Lacourse: 25:05

Yeah, we've, you know, so , so , uh, that was a , a subsequent thing. So the, the , um, the str the mission and, and vision , uh, particularly the vision contains language that says that we will become distinguished for exceptional , uh, student learning and success and innovation and entrepreneurship. So as a follow up to the strategic plan , uh, we had to, to, to take a closer look at that language and say, okay, well, what is exceptional? What , what is exceptional student learning and success? Well , what is success? I mean, how, how are we gonna define success? How , how , we're not, we can't pursue a mission, a , a , a vision until we understand what we think , uh, exceptional learning and success looks like. And so we, we had a , a follow up group of people that, that , uh, met , uh, did some retreats and so forth, and tried to really go deep into this space. And so one of the outcomes of this was this tagline that everybody is an educator. And, and the idea is that every , uh, experience that a student has at the university contributes in some way to their learning. And because the people mowing the lawn make the campus look nice, and the people that are, that, you know, that, that take your money , uh, they need to do it in a , with customer service friendly way. All of these pieces, not just the faculty contribute to the ed overall educational experience. So we went down the path on, on, on, on that as a theme. Uh, and that didn't go over so well, <laugh> , uh, I don't think the faculty felt as though everyone is an educator, quite like the way we would find it , portray it. And so, so we ended up , uh, uh, uh, not using that tagline , uh, even though we've, we actually recently have sort of resurfaced that, that notion that everybody, we may have to, to reframe the, the way in which we say it, but everybody does contribute. And I think we all know that's true at any university. Everybody contributes in some way to the student experience. So anyway, that's the story.

Joe Gottlieb: 27:01

Yeah, I just, I just wanted to include that because I, I think it's a great, just reminder that it's smart to test , um, your work product or your, your decisions, your , your , you know, the solutions you come up with, particularly when it comes to communications and the fact that you, you ran into some resistance on that, that you felt, you know, could get in the way of, of , of it being very really useful and unifying. Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> , uh, you made an adjustment. And I , I think that that's, that's what I wanted to capture there. So making adjustments is really important. So, you know, on that point, throughout this journey, you know, you've learned a lot, I think, about how firm or flexible a strategic plan should be. So, so share some thoughts on that. 'cause I just, you mentioned you're transitioning from a very long single space document with a lot of action items, a lot of specifics to something that's probably more thematic. Um, I think that's reflecting this notion that there's a, there's this balance between firm and flexible on a strategic plan.

Dr. Michael Lacourse: 28:02

Yeah, and I, and I think that we're learning that , um, uh, you know, in the last year or so , um, because so much has changed, our strategic plan was created this current one in 2019, pre Covid AI didn't really, wasn't on the, wasn't on the horizon. I mean, there are some things that have happened, you know , the , the national political scene , uh, uh, you know, there is so many things that have happened in the last five years or last four years , uh, that have knocked our strategic plan over a little bit. I mean, we're still pursuing, you know, many of the action items, but we've had to reallocate our time and energy in slightly different ways that were unanticipated. And I think the learning, the learning from that is that maybe we're, we're too inflexible. You know, we had these hundreds of action items and obsessed with achieving these action items , uh, and many of which now we've had to, to put aside because we have to focus on other things that, that have occurred in the last, in the last four years. So, so I, I , I believe that that , uh, experience of, of perhaps being over speci , over specified in our planning , uh, is leading to a , a reconceptualization of what our next plan will look like to be much more thematic based . And it may end up being that, that very high level goals and, and then , uh, an annual process where in fact, we modify what those actions are based upon current trends and, you know, where we are as an institution. So I , you know, we, we haven't created it yet. So I, I , I don't know what it's gonna look like, but I believe that's the direction that, that , um, um, that we're gonna move in, in terms of, of that, of that planning process. So, and we've seen some others, some other universities, and I, and I think that, that , um, you know, that's more of the direction that we're seeing than this, you know, highly specified 60 or 70 page document with all these details . So anyway, I, I think we we're , we're we're moving that direction. A couple of things that, that , um, um, you know, that have also happened in the last , uh, uh, you know, even 12 months is that, you know, the state, you know, in addition to ai , uh, the , the covid thing has moved, you know, most of our student , a large portion of our students to online. I mean, it's, it's, we are growing leaps and bounds in online, and I think it's, it covid drove, it drove us there. And so, so that wasn't, that wasn't , uh, part of our planning at all to go that deep into, into online at that time. Um, you know, the state , uh, the politics in the state are such that , um, uh, they're re they're , they're reexamining , uh, higher education , uh, with, with a microscope and looking to move it in a direction that they feel as though aligns better with the culture , uh, of the, of the state. Um , and so one of the first things, not the first thing , but one of the first things they did was that, that we , we have, we have to eliminate the words , uh, uh, diversity, equity, and inclusion. In fact, what , what we, well, what we really can't do is use any two com , any combination of two words together. You can talk about diversity, you can talk about , uh, equity, and you can talk about inclusion, but you can't talk about all of 'em at the same time or any two at the same time. So it's a really interesting law that we're now implementing , uh, but it impacts even our most basic mission and vision statement, which previously read Open Inclusive, comprehensive Polytechnic. And we built , um, a lot of our strategic plan with this idea that we want to become an inclusive campus. And, and in fact, you know, as an example , uh, we've spent a lot of time , uh, talking about and building support systems for Neurodiverse students. 'cause Neurodiverse students, many of them , uh, gravitate the STEM fields. And so we wanted to, to , to be inclusive of, of students , uh, you know, who are, you know, who are neurodiverse and make this a welcoming environment. We've, we've put a lot of effort here into, into building capacity for students that, that , um, uh, are, are , uh, visually impaired. Uh , we've actually built a degree program and, and, and, and, and so forth to, to really elevate that. So we're trying to look at inclusiveness from a very broad lens. Uh, and so we've worked on that. And of course, now , uh, we've, we've gotta scale some of those initiatives back. Uh , we'll have to just kind of see how the , how, how things move forward and , and what we can and cannot do. But, but certainly that was unanticipated four years ago,

Joe Gottlieb: 32:26

I should say. Well, it's, it's fascinating to hear from the inside some of these, these influences and forces that that come into play when you're, you know, trying to make progress. And , um, and sometimes they come from un unexpected sources. So let's close this out with , uh, I've got one more big question for you, and that is, I'm always fascinated to understand how different organizations approach the effort to achieve strategic objectives in a plan, right? And so, so it's just the, the, the, the stew that is unique to every institution that, that, that comes about in terms of what the objectives are and how they assign ownership and how they iterate to pursue progress, how they measure all that. So share, if you don't mind, a few , a few thoughts on that, how you, how you went about managing it.

Dr. Michael Lacourse: 33:20

Yeah, and I really think it started for absolutely with certainty with our president , uh, because it was a high priority for him to do the strategic planning when he first came here and put a lot of , um, uh, of resources into the planning process itself. Um, uh, obviously that was the first time that this university had ever engaged in such a process. Not sure how much thinking had ever been , uh, had ever happened in terms of long term thinking about the institution. So , um, so I , I think it really started with, with the president and and I, and, you know, his approach , um, to, to that first plan was to, was to make it highly visible , uh, so that it's on top of mind of everyone that we have a plan. Uh, I even mentioned, i I in previous question, that, that , uh, we got to the point where people were applying for jobs here simply because they read the plan and felt as though we knew where we were going and had a direction. And, and so it had, it had that type of , uh, of impact. But in internally, I think a key piece of this was that , uh, the president attached money to, to the , the goals and actions within the strategic plan. So, so the process, we do an annual strategic planning process here. It's all, it's, it's continuous. Uh, there are different phases annually , um, but , uh, you know, starting at , you know, in, in, in the fall semester , um, uh, goal leaders or action , uh, or , or strategy leaders , uh, are , are beginning to work on, on implementing their strategies. Uh, there is a , uh, an opportunity in the summer prior to that to apply for funds. And so we have a competitive process , uh, uh, faculty and staff that are leading , uh, can apply for funds to support their initiatives. And, you know , it's only so much, so it , not everybody gets funded, but , uh, the president , uh, in a small group get together and look at it and identify , uh, you know, is this a good ROI on this, is this, is this a plan that's gonna work that's gonna move us forward in this particular strategy? So, so they make those decisions and they allocate the funds in September, and, and then people , uh, are off running with, with their work. Uh, then we do sort of a mid-year or end of fall semester checkup. You know , we , um, uh, it's more of , um, of , um, a report back to , uh, an inclusion on , we have a master document that talks about where we are, and so everybody has to provide feedback by the end of the fall semester on what their progress is. Uh, then we come back into the spring semester, and then we have a large report out event , uh, on campus high high profile event that happens, I think probably in about early April , uh, where everybody , uh, who is leading , uh, a strategy , uh, needs to report on , uh, publicly on, on their progress , uh, what's working, what's not working , uh, and and so forth. Uh, and we go through that entire process. The community is invited, although not many come, but they are invited , uh, certainly our trustees and, and others are, are, are there to hear, hear our progress. And then , um, and then we finish that up with a final written report , uh, in the spring , uh, in the early summer. And so that sort of completes the, the one year cycle, and then we start it all over again , uh, with , uh, uh, requests for, for funding , uh, for the, for the subsequent year. And so that's sort of our, our annual cycle of, I guess the president does. I will say that one piece that I didn't mention is that the April report out , uh, the president , uh, records all of the progress, and that forms the basis for his state of the , uh, the university address in the subsequent September, which they , which he does every year. He doesn't work here , he's not president anymore, but that was his, how was his approach was in September , uh, to basically report even more publicly , uh, the progress that we've made and the strategic plan. So it is absolutely top of mind. Uh , if you ask the average employee of the university, like, tell me something that's unique about university. I think many of them would say a strategic plan , uh, process is , is high profile. It's high impact for us.

Joe Gottlieb: 37:20

It's so interesting to hear about that commitment to the activities that fit into the academic year and the planning cycle. The mixture of incentive are , you know, the , the , and the competitive effort to qualify for funds, right? Just makes a lot of sense. But then tying it into multiple points along the year where there's tracking of progress and the , and an ability to demonstrate transparency, and I'm sure learn from that process on an ongoing basis. Um, great stuff to be sharing. So let's, let's bring this to a close, Michael. What, how would you summarize, give our listeners the three takeaways on this topic of transforming the strategic plan to transform the institution?

Dr. Michael Lacourse: 38:09

Yeah, that's a, it's a, it's a, it's a great question out of all of that , uh, you know, I, I'd have to say that, that , uh, for , for me, and I think for us , uh, it's really about creating a vision. And you know, I , there there's a book, and you , I'm sure that you've heard this, that this book by Simons , uh, Sinek start with the why. Uh, we don't, we didn't talk about that book , uh, or, or that, but that's really what, that's really in essence how we've approached , um, our planning process is , is, you know, what is the vision? Why, why are we here? Why, what are we, you know, what , what , why is this university exist ? It's a unique university in many ways. Um, and so , uh, understanding the why, which is articulated through our vision statement , uh, is the document or the, the statement by which I think will guide each strategic , uh, planning cycle , uh, for us. Uh, when we started our, our strategic planning process, the last one , um, we decided that we would, we would look to mid-century , um, 2050 and to try to , um, uh, get, gain some perspective on what the world might look like and where we might go. And a a lot of that frankly, was driven by , uh, demographic information that we had about where , uh, southern Utah was going. Um , you know, we are a population here, about 200,000 people, but by 2050, the , uh, projections are that we had around 500,000 people. And so knowing that this community is gonna more than double in size in the next 30 years, what kind of university do , and we're the only university, what kind of university do we need to be to serve 500,000 people? And so that was a major , uh, driver in terms of our thinking about , uh, uh, uh, about, you know, 2050. Okay. So step one is to begin instituting our, our basic , uh, components or, or our tenets of our, of our, our vision and mission. Let's start that. Let's, let's institutionalize that first in five years, and then we can begin to build upon that later. So that was so , so I think that if you're gonna do multiple strategic plans like this, I think the vision carries you across that to ensure that you, that you're moving in a, in a consistent, coherent direction rather than sort of a zigzag approach. Let's try this, let's try that. But I think that's, to me, that's, that's really the most important thing. The second, the second , uh, uh, piece of this I think is that you really have to be all in, I mean, in our case, it's, it is an institution wide , um, uh, initiative, process, awareness, recognition, all of those pieces are part of it. Everybody, everybody's in. Um, um, and , and so I think that for us to be successful or to be successful or, or to maximize your success, it really requires everybody to buy into the strategic plan. And, and, and I, I have worked at other universities that did strategic plans, and that , quite frankly, in one case, that was done external to the university and brought back in, and nobody, you know, it was a nice doc , beautiful document, spectacular document, never saw it again. Then to that, I mean, so, so, you know, then you , then you lose credibility in terms of the process itself. So I think, I think that the all in approach provides the credibility that yes , uh, we're gonna do this, so get ready and, and be a part of it. So I think that's the second thing. The third thing is , is really to involve everyone. Uh, you know, we, and the example I just gave of my , one of my previous universities where the plan was created by an national experts who got together, you know, a thousand miles away from the university over a weekend and created a strategic plan, they brought it back into the university and said , okay, well here's our plan. Uh, you know, no , nobody's in , nobody's involved, nobody ever was involved with , with that, that process. So in our, in our case , uh, e everybody on campus has a, has a , has a potential to be involved with, with , uh, with the plan. One of the mistakes that we made in Plan one , I think , uh, and, you know , I wasn't part of it, but when I got here, I recognized it right away, is that , um, people who are assigned to lead strategies in some way are really people who raise their hand. And, and raising your hand doesn't necessarily mean you have the skillset number one, or the num or number two, that, that you , the strategy you're leading is actually something that you can implement based upon your job responsibilities on campus . So in round two, we made sure that we aligned , um, all of our strategy leaders, our people whose job responsibility it is to, to , to execute that strategy anyway, so, so it's just naturally aligned with your job responsibilities and you're not working outside of your job responsibilities . So I think, I think engaging everyone , uh, and making sure that , um, that your involvement in the process is aligned with your job responsibilities in the university. So those , for me, those are three real big takeaways.

Joe Gottlieb: 43:00

Great summary. Michael, thanks so much for joining me today.

Dr. Michael Lacourse: 43:04

Well, thanks for having me. Really appreciate it.

Joe Gottlieb: 43:07

And thanks to our guests for joining us as well. I hope you have a great day and look, hope forward to hosting you again on the next episode of TRANSFORMED. Yo, stop the music. Hey, listeners, have transformed. I hope you enjoyed that episode and whether you did or not, hope that made you stop and think about the role that you are playing in your organization's ability to change in the digital era. And if it made you stop and think, perhaps you would be willing to share your thoughts, suggestions, alternative perspectives, or even criticisms related to this or any other episode, I would love to hear from you. So send me an email at Info@Higher.Digital or Joe@Higher.Digital. And if you have friends or colleagues that you think might enjoy it, please share our podcast with them as you and they can easily find TRANSFORMED is available wherever you get your podcasts.