The University for the 21st Century

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The University for the 21st Century
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The Change Process The Challenge

• Most of the time, institutional leaders are
  thinking about what to do, rather than how to do
  it.
• At the end of the day, the personal, political
  and cultural aspects of change-the process-will
  make or break a change initiative.
• Change III, p. v

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The Change Process

• Reasons for change (why)
• The agenda (what)
• The design of the process (who and how)
• Source All of this material comes from Change
  III, amended slightly)

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The Context for Change

• Traditions and history of WSU
• External and internal pressures
• Competing constituencies
• Loose connections among units
• Uncertainties (pressing questions with no
  immediate answers)

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Core issues 1

• How did the change agenda start?
• Top-down
• Small innovative group
• Combination
• External mandate
• Who is involved and how are they involved?
• Are new people being recruited to the process?
  How are they being prepared to participate?

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Core issues 2

• Organizational dimensions
• Patterns of decision making (Where are decisions
  made and by whom?)
• Established roles of leaders (positional and
  opinion leaders)
• Values of the University (How do we do things
  around here and why do we do them that way?)
• How closely linked are the various units
  (academic and other) and Winona and Rochester?
• How well do these connections work? What else
  needs to be done to build organizational
  support/capacity for change?

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Change is led through persuasion, through other
leaders and by building trust. (Change III P.
5)IS WSU positioned to function in this way? If
not, what can we do as a leadership team to
create these capacities?
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The Issue of Trust

• Because power is dispersed and leadership
  shared, trust is an essential underpinning of
  change in higher education. In the absence of
  trust, stakeholders will focus on preserving
  rights and privileges rather than taking risks to
  create a future with the common good in mind.
  Distrust feeds unhealthy personal and
  professional relationships and creates
  dysfunctional organizations. (Change III p. 9)

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Core issues 3 Building Support

• Personal Dimensions Our own
• Anxieties about the change process and its
  effects on us or our responsibilities and units
• Issues of the leadership transition
• Readiness to launch the New U
• Personal Dimensions Other peoples
• How do different people/groups view the New U?
• Who stands to lose and who stands to gain?
• Who fears change and why? What can be done to
  alleviate their concerns?

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What Builds Trust at WSU?Quality of the
ideas?Evidence of need? What kind of
evidence?Convincing case for effectiveness of
new approaches?Personal confidence in the people
participating in the process (relationships)?Othe
r?
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Role of the Leadership Team

• Leadership teams will bring a richness of
  multiple perspectives and ideas to the change
  process.
• Change III p. vi

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Role of the Leadership Team

• Be intentional and reflective.
• Develop strategies.
• Work within the norms and structures of the
  Academy governance, culture, expectations
• Model qualities and behaviors required for
  change.
• Look for ways to broaden the scope of
  participation and bring in people with fresh
  perspectives and energy

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Leading Change

• It is likely that we will stop thinking of
  leadership as the property or quality of just one
  person. We will begin to think of it in its
  collective form leadership as occurring among
  and through a group of people who think and act
  together. (Bensimon and Neumann,quoted in Change
  III p. 27)
• However, this is not easy to do.

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Leaders formulate strategy and define the
parameters of a good outcome through a
consultative process. They set the stage for
learning from the change process and interpret
what is happening.Managers report information
and administer policy while overseeing the
effective and productive deployment of resources
(people, time, money, space.)
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Preparing to Change

• 1. Why does this institution need to undergo this
  change?
• 2. What will happen if it does not?
• 3. In what ways does this proposed change fit
  with the institutions mission and values? How
  might it conflict?

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Preparing to Change

• 4. How might the current conditions affect the
  willingness of faculty, staff, students and
  others to support the change and engage in it?
• 5. How will this change affect the core functions
  of the University and improve teaching and
  learning, research and community engagement?

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Preparing to Change

• 6. What are the possible costs and risks?
• 7. How can we encourage a level of trust that
  will increase the likelihood of constructive
  dialogue and meaningful buy-in?

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The Paradox of Change

• To change a culture, leaders must gain an
  outsiders perspective on their culture and then
  help the institution operate paradoxically-that
  is, change its culture in ways that are congruent
  with its culture.
• Change III p. 21

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Unpeeling the Culture Onion

• Surface artifacts insider language, myths,
  stories, published mission, ceremonies and
  rituals
• Espoused values (articulated vs. lived answers to
  what is right, good and what works)
• Underlying assumptions (rarely questioned,
  taken-for-granted hard to articulate)
• Deep sense of personal identity and belonging
  (never spoken but dangerous if challenged
  carried by individuals on the basis of their
  personal experiences)

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A Framework for ChangeMichael Heifetz, Leading
Change, Overcoming Chaos.

• Stage One Choosing the Target.
• Stage Two Setting Goals
• Stage Three Initiating Action
• Stage Four Making Connections
• Stage Five Rebalancing to Accommodate the Change
• Stage Six Consolidating the Learning
• Stage Seven Moving to the Next Cycle.

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Implementing Change the Ramaley Version

• Building a compelling case
• Creating clarity of purpose
• Working at a significant scale and in a scholarly
  mode
• Developing a conducive campus environment
• Creating the capacity to continue the process
  over time and to learn from the experience

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Going to Scale in a Scholarly Mode

• Change must be intentional and must affect a
  significant part of the institutional mission
  e.g. general education, undergraduate majors,
  research and outreach.
• Change must be supported by a culture of evidence
  to document the consequences of the steps you
  undertake and to learn from your experience. Use
  the evidence you collect to tell your story
  nationally and to make your case with potential
  funders.

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Going to Scale in a Scholarly Mode

• It is very important to start out with a clear
  sense of the stages of organizational change.
  Since everything is always connected to
  everything else, be mindful that one thing will
  lead to anotherthe ripple effect
• Expect unintended consequences and address them
  when they arise.

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Creating a Conducive Campus Environment

• Starting out well. The important point here is to
  take care to pick the right first projects.
• Making connections and sustaining change. To be
  effective, the scope of change as it unfolds
  should include the major spheres central to the
  identity and purposes of the institution.

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Creating a Conducive Campus Environment Music of
the Spheres

• Curricular reform
• Definitions of scholarship and faculty roles
• Collaboration with the community
• Campus operations

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Creating a Conducive Campus Environment

• Rebalancing the institution and community
  organizing to recruit additional participants
  and spread the effect.
•  
• Taking time to take stock, celebrate what has
  been achieved and identify the next set of things
  to work on.

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Creating the Capacity to Sustain Change The
CHANGE Principles

• Have a clear mission and action-oriented
  strategic plan that comes from the work of the
  campus community itself and its experiences.
• Establish core organizational values and a shared
  sense of purpose.
• Identify aspects of institution already aligned
  with future direction and develop a vocabulary to
  define and recognize these efforts.

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Creating the Capacity to Sustain Change The
CHANGE Principles

• Create incentives, recognition, and rewards
  consistent with mission and goals.
• Ensure early successes and be sure to interpret
  them.
• Link budget decisions to strategic goals.
• Give resistance respect there is much to be
  learned from the objections of responsible
  critics.
• Demonstrate flexibility and invent as you go
  teach people to accept and embrace the risk of
  not knowing how things will turn out.

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Creating the Capacity to Sustain Change The
CHANGE Principles

• Allow change to be faculty, staff and student
  driven do not micromanage do, however, notice
  and repeat good stories that help everyone
  understand the direction you are headed.
  Anticipate that any big change will be studied,
  interpreted and will occasion reactions based on
  the sense people make of it. Dont wait for that
  to happen. Talk about it and help people
  understand it and map their own interests onto
  it.

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Creating the Capacity to Sustain Change The
CHANGE Principles

• Allow a field of vision to drive change rather
  than management directives do this by developing
  clear criteria for deciding which options to
  pursue.
• Involve everyone, including the doubters and
  nay-sayers, in the design, implementation, and
  evaluation of the effects of changeinstitute a
  culture of evidence.

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Creating the Capacity to Sustain Change The
CHANGE Principles

• Design policies and infrastructure that support
  your mission and goals encourage common sense
  (Nordstroms instructions to employees posted on
  a bulletin board in the mid 1990s Dont chew
  gum and always do the best you can.)

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Creating the Capacity to Sustain Change The
CHANGE Principles

• Encourage experimentation make sure that any
  institutional planning is really a learning
  process provide a safe environment for taking on
  risk.
• Encourage informal networks and a sense of
  community trust people to be intelligent, to
  care about the organization and to do their best.
  Your trust will almost always be rewarded.