President's Campus Update
Oct. 1, 2015

Strategic Planning

Today, as author Charles Dickens might point out, we are facing conflicting challenges. On one hand, we must deal with budget reductions that will minimize the impact on students. On the other hand, this is the time for investment and innovation. Quite simply, we are asking our campus community to be fiscally conservative, yet we seek to make real and meaningful investments in the future. While we must seek to make budget reductions where they makes the most sense, at the same time we seek to new ideas and innovation for move us all forward. Unfortunately, this can create a tension in the decision-making process and confusion among the community. While we might seem to be sending mixed messages at times, it is critically important to understand that we must do both – budget reductions and investments – right now in order to navigate the changing times. Although this tension is uncomfortable, from it comes creative thinking and creative solutions to our complex issues and help to propel us forward.

As we discussed at the Town Hall meeting (Sept. 23), due to the bigger than expected enrollment drop (about 400 students), we now have a $2.8 million deficit. Because we are already into the semester, some of this hole will need to be covered this year with one-time funds from our reserves. But one-time funding means just that – one time, not annual. Structurally, we must adjust to our new student population size and mix, and the subsequent revenue that is available.

It is important to remember that as hard as the budget reductions are and will continue to be this year, the opportunities we have right now to change Northern Michigan University in transformational ways far outweigh the challenges. I said at convocation this year that I believe this may be one of those points in the timeline of the university's history that will be remembered as a major turning point.

That's why it's so important to have everyone participate in the strategic planning. We need to hear and consider all perspectives. I don't know what Northern's "next big thing" will be – although I'm often asked that question – but I do know that if we continue to only do what we've been doing, we'll be discussing another $4 million or more budget deficit in another year or two, then another a year or two after that. We can't do the same things and expect to miraculously have different results. I also know that Northern's historical timeline includes many instances when the university has successfully implemented transformational change. This is something I'm very confident we can do. In fact, I have no doubt about it.

In the draft of the strategic plan, we introduced five focus areas: academic excellence, student success, outreach and engagement, investment and innovation, and enrollment. In our discussion sessions with the colleges and governing boards (NMU Board of Trustees, Alumni Board and NMU Foundation Board), I've asked if these are the right areas of focus and right strategies. As we head into a series of open discussion sessions, here is some of the feedback on the draft of the strategic plan received so far for you to consider.

Several people have questioned whether enrollment should be a focus area or if it should be considered a positive result of enhancing the other four areas. One group felt pretty strongly that Northern should make "environment" a focus area and that if our strategic efforts were aligned with taking advantage of our natural surroundings it would bring the university distinction and draw students.

The "environment" conversation started with the observation that six of the seven core values were highlighted in the goals of the five focus areas, the lone exception being environment. The natural environment does appear in several of the strategies, but currently doesn't appear in the goals. When drafting the preliminary plan, we tried to include natural environment in the goals of the focus areas, but to be honest, it just didn't seem to fit right in any particular one. Where would you put that core value? Because it's already a core value and the elements of the strategic plan are supposed to support our core values, I'm not sure that we should duplicate it by making it also a focus area. What do you think?

The most consistent suggestion has been that the plan needs a unifying theme or connection, which also has been called an umbrella and a focused direction. I agree and I'm curious to know what you think works to bring all of the parts together. As mentioned, one group thought environment might be that umbrella. Another group spent considerable time discussing the idea of Northern being known for leadership, highlighting our nationally recognized leadership development programs, our university's outstanding community service and the idea that everyone can play a leadership role in whatever capacity they hold at Northern.

Another group wondered if we come up with an overall strategic plan theme, should that be considered the university's vision? Will the strategic plan vision compete with the university vision statement? Should we, in fact, create a new university vision statement or modify our current one and use that as the strategic plan's connecting element? I think these are great questions and I'm intrigued by this idea. While I really don't want rewriting the vision statement to slow down the process to bring a strategic plan to the Board of Trustees in December, I think it could probably done as part of the discussion process and still stay within the timeline. What do you think about that? I'd really like to know.

Some Alumni Board members were concerned because, at first, they couldn't see where alumni fit into the strategies. Some at the three boards sessions also questioned whether the plan had too many strategies and was too long, but others said the strategies were strategically general to allow for inclusion of all within the university community.

Interestingly, participants have rarely brought up the individual strategies. I'm not sure if this is because we run out of time discussing other things, primarily the focus areas, or because they have little to say about the strategies. If it's the latter, is that because the strategies are so complete and on target or because they are too general? I plan to delve more into question more deeply as we proceed.

Another interesting trend of the discussions so far is that we've spent as much time talking about desired outcomes as focus areas. I would categorize these in the following ways: 1) bringing distinction and/or prestige to the university, 2) being bold in taking new approaches to things at Northern (new programs, new processes, new ways of doing business, etc.) and 3) creating or expanding partnerships.

Here's what I haven't heard yet: No one has actually said that the goals and strategies, and the opportunities to create initiatives under them, are inspiring or motivating. So, I'm back to one of my original sets of questions: Is this plan bold enough? Are the ideas in it going to move Northern forward?

We're now heading into a series of six open discussion sessions. The dates and times were emailed to you, but you can also find them by clicking the link to strategic planning in the news section on my home page (nmu.edu/president). We will also be holding a student-only session and an alumni-community session.

Please come and share your thoughts. For us to get back to what we might define as "the best of times" we'll need to implement innovative strategy. Our strategic plan should be our blueprint that drives our transformational change.

Thank you for your time and input.

Fritz Erickson, NMU President