CBT: The College Brain Trust

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CBT Case Studies

College of Western Idaho

College Brain Trust consultants help build a new American community college

On approximately July 1, 2009 a contract was finalized between the College of Western Idaho (CWI) and the California Collegiate Brain Trust (represented by Patrick McCallum and Rocky Young) in which CCBT would work with the college to develop a comprehensive strategic plan for the college that would be implemented during the five-year period ending June 30, 2015. Rocky Young was designated as the team leader and the work was to be done by a 13- member team during the 2009-10 academic year with a final product to be delivered to the college by the end of May, 2010.

(The California Collegiate Brain Trust changed its name in 2010 to the College Brain Trust to reflect its national scope of work.)

As originally proposed in the CWI Request for Proposals, the college wanted a product that included nine distinct plans (an Educational Master Plan; a Facilities Plan; an Organization Plan; a Staffing Plan; Unit Plans; Mission, Policies and Procedures; an Infrastructure Plan; a Decision Making Plan; and a Communications Plan). In the development of the contract with CCBT, it was clarified that other independent consulting firms would develop the Infrastructure Plan (SIG) and the Facilities Plan (MIG). Accordingly, both of those pieces were developed outside of the CCBT effort, but MIG did use the work products of the Educational Master Plan and the Unit Plans in the development of the Facilities Plan. The Infrastructure Plan and the Facilities Plan stand as separate documents. Furthermore, during the strategic plan development, four notable changes occurred as it relates to the CCBT effort. CWI decided that the college needed CCBT’s assistance in the preparation and submission of the initial accreditation documents for the Northwest Accrediting Commission and CWI decided that they wanted to develop the Communications Plan using college personnel. In the case of the latter, the CCBT communications consultant (Alicia Ritter) worked instead with the CWI Vice President of Institutional Advancement on development of the CWI Foundation. The original agreement between CWI and CCBT included an element in which CCBT would draft new Board Policies and Administrative Procedures as it related to changes created by the strategic plan. However, the college asked for CCBT’s assistance (Julie Hatoff) in helping to restructure all of the CWI Policies and Procedures . Finally, CCBT felt that the RFP needed to be supplemented with a tenth plan, a Finance Plan. Accordingly, that has been added to the final work products of the strategic planning effort.

The methodology used by CCBT to develop the comprehensive strategic plan was to create a series of five sequential stages in which each stage built on the efforts of the previous stage. The first stage was data collection, data analysis and discovery. It was a joint effort between CCBT (Julie Slark), EMSI (an independent research consulting group based in Idaho) and the CWI Director of Institutional Research. The effort included both quantitative and qualitative analysis using existing external data bases, college data bases, stakeholder interviews ( Eva Conrad and Rocky Young) and employer interviews (Rob Gamble). The work product of this effort provided the foundation for the entire strategic plan and can be viewed in the document entitled Fact Book 2009 (http://www.cwidaho.cc/about-cwi/downloads/2009_CWI_Fact_Book_(10-29-09).pdf). The important outcome of Stage 1(and Chapter 10 in the Fact Book) was to create a set of Planning Assumptions that represent the conclusions from the research and provided the starting point for Stage 2.

Stage 2 utilized separate facilitated discussions (Rocky Young and Eva Conrad) with the Board of Trustees and the college leadership to develop a new Mission description which conformed to current accreditation standards and a set of strategic directions for the college. The Board crafted a new draft of a Mission description based on the college’s values and priorities with appropriate core themes and measures of mission fulfillment. College leaders reviewed the draft and provided recommended changes to the President which were incorporated in his recommendation. The Board adopted a final version of the Mission description on December 15, 2009. A similar process was used for the creation of the Strategic Directions for 2010 – 2020. The Board created nine general strategic directions and the college leadership developed 58 specific directions within the nine general areas. The college leadership then prioritized the specific directions and assigned 36 of them to be implemented in 2010 – 2015 and deferred 22 of them to 2015 – 2020. The nine areas and the 58 specific directions are listed in the Strategic Direction Directory and have been sorted into the two time frames. The Directory also indicates which plan (e.g. Educational Master Plan, Finance Plan) provides the action steps and cost projections for implementation.

Once Stage 2 was completed, it was possible to launch the two independent elements of Stage 3 – the Educational Master Plan 2010 – 2015 and the Making Decisions at CWI document. The Making Decisions document (Rocky Young and Carolyn Russell) was developed to describe the structure and operating agreements for making decisions at CWI. These processes put into practice the mechanisms through which the voices of the college’s constituent groups are heard in making decisions. The document describes the elements of the college culture that are critical ingredients for making the defined processes effective and defines the roles of faculty and administrators in making decisions. Making Decisions also specifies the types, membership and structure of each group that makes recommendations in the decision-making process and includes the charter for each group or committee. Finally, the document provides templates for future use by CWI to develop decision timelines, linkages between planning and decision-making as well as a proposed program review process.

The Educational Master Plan (Eva Conrad, John Spevak, Ed Myers and Andy Howard) is based on the research developed in Stage 1 and the Mission and Strategic Directions developed in Stage 2. Its primary focus is two-fold. First, based on the data, a descriptive snapshot has been developed for each of the 63 instructional and student services programs at CWI. In particular the material delineates how each program will contribute to the anticipated enrollment growth at CWI between 2010 and 2015 by designating whether each program will be growing slower than, at the same rate as, or faster than the projected college enrollment. The description also includes programmatic projections as to how each program will change during this five-year period. Second, the plan includes the necessary action steps, timeline and responsible party for the 16 specific 2010 – 2015 strategic directions that relate to the Educational Master Plan.

When the Educational Master Plan was approved by the Board of Trustees on December 15, 2009, it was possible to begin Stage 4 – development of the Unit Plans (Eva Conrad, John Spevak, Mike Hill and Jean Malone). The Unit Plans are a logical progression from the Educational Master Plan and there is a plan for each of the 63 programs described in the Educational Master Plan as well as additional plans for the administrative services areas. Each unit plan includes: a projection of the unit’s FTES in 2015; a description of how that growth will be achieved as well as how efficiency will be improved; the resources necessary to generate the growth; and the cost of department-specific programmatic projections.

The completion of the unit plans was a critical step in the process because it permitted the remaining elements of the strategic plan to be simultaneously completed in Stage 5. More specifically, the enrollment projections from the unit plans could be converted to assignable square foot estimates (Jeff Kingston) so that the Facility Plan consultants (MIG) could begin the development of the Facility Plan. Also, the completion of the unit plans permitted the projection of faculty needs and staffing needs to support the growth and evolution of the college. These two elements were critical for the development of the Finance Plan. Finally, once it was known what the planned expansion of the college would be by 2015, work could begin on the Organization Plan.

The Organization Plan (Rocky Young and Eva Conrad) is a recommended organizational structure suitable for the next five years at CWI. Five criteria were used in developing the recommendations. Those criteria were:

• Develop recommendations as impartial outsiders with the goal of strengthening communication and uniting the College;
• Ignore the College’s history and any individual’s performance in his/her current position;
• Base the recommendations on the consultant’s own experiences as well as observations of community college across the nation;
• Consider the current and projected fiscal constraints; and
• Based on the previously approved strategic directions, develop an organizational structure that serves students effectively/efficiently by integrating instruction and student services.

The plan focuses on the administrative structure starting at the Dean level up through the President of the college (including recommendations on the direct reports at each level). The plan also suggests recommendations related to instructional Department Chairs and concludes with organizational recommendations on administrative assistants and outsourcing.

The Finance Plan (Mike Hill) is the final plan element in the Comprehensive Strategic Plan. Using all of the aforementioned documents, along with forecasted revenues and expenses, the finance plan attempts to determine the financial consequences of plan implementation and of meeting operational needs of the college. In particular, based on stated assumptions, a five-year annual budget projection has been provided along with recommendations for improving the financial condition of the college.

The Staffing Plan was originally intended to be a separate document but it was felt to be redundant because it was really constituted by elements from other plans. The faculty and staff needs have been delineated in the unit plans and are summarized in different tables as attachments to the Finance Plan. Likewise, staffing changes related to administrators and department chairs have been detailed in the Organization Plan.

The development of the Comprehensive Strategic Plan has been possible because of the enthusiastic participation by the people of CWI and quite simply, it has been a lot of work for the college. However, the work on a strategic plan never ends. All of these documents are meant to be living documents that must be continually monitored, reviewed, updated and changed as circumstances dictate. If that commitment and effort exists, the college has a wonderful structure to use as its foundation for the exciting evolution of CWI over the next five years and beyond.

Final exit presentations were made for the college leadership, the CWI Board of Trustees and the Albertson Foundation on May 17 to 19, 2010. CCBT has also conducted a follow-up visit in October, 2010 in which assistance was provided for clarification of plan elements, new issues that have arisen since the plan was completed and continued support for the college’s initial accreditation process. The consultants will also continue their availability through the spring semester of 2011 with either another visit or teleconference discussions.

December 8, 2010