[qwerty49]

I would love for Qwerty to be able to do a consulting gig for Stanford so that we would have a better idea of how decisions are made, how responsibility is delegated (or taken), who is accountable. A big RACI matrix. Based on what I have heard from Howard Wolf and others, the BoT deals with big picture issues - finances, strategic direction, executive oversight. Ratifying implementation of strategic planning actions like the residential neighborhoods for undergrads. I infer that the president has a similar scope plus some figurehead responsibilities. it seems to me that most of the campus management activities are delegated to people under the Office of the Provost - Res Ed, Athletics, Student Affairs, the academic schools, etc.

Here are the 30(!) deans and administrators who report to the Provost - https://provost.stanford.edu/about-the-office/

Since the Provost cannot possibly manage that scope of responsibility with the oversight needed, the various deans and administrators have their own little fiefdoms. Even so, when things go wrong (as they have), no one seems to be held accountable for bad outcomes.

Ha ha yes Spiny a giant RACI matrix is exactly what’s needed. The real question is, assuming you start at the top (BOT? Donors? The endowment?), how far down do you go, to maximize relevance and usefulness?

I hadn’t really thought through what a specific battle plan would look like, but here are a couple of thoughts:

Frame the program as continuous improvement, or what the Japanese call Kaizen. This sets up a culture that hopefully prevents this from being a one-time thing. I get the feeling that Kaizen is pretty un-techie and is usually part of the middle-aged corporate universe, but let’s face it - Silicon Valley is definitely showing some signs of middle age. This also can establish some academic grounds for faculty and student participation and input.

At least one, if not several, cross-functional teams looking at various streams. This is the tricky part. What are the streams? Are they traditional “boxes” like Research? Academics? Student affairs? Athletics? Plant and facility operations? Community and alumni relations? Or are they functional like Finance/resource allocation? Marketing/Branding/Licensing? HR? Or some other way to parse the universe? I honesty haven’t given that any thought, but I do know that “the way we’re always done things” and “because everyone else does it this way” are just as often wrong as right.

Ideally some Stanford people are seconded to the team(s). These need to be people in the trenches (stakeholders!) and yes, should definitely include a cross-section of both undergrad students. Get a faculty advisor on each team and offer units of credit for a full-time commitment over a quarter. Staff members should be seconded as much as reality allows. Suffice to say that in any organization there’s  an element of “bloat” that can be redirected to a worthy cause. There would be a lot of fact-finding (interviews, mapping etc) involved.

But enough of my blabbering. The elephant in the room will always be the internal politics and that is the main value of bringing in objective outsiders.

But important to have real stakeholders and not just outside consultants involved because you need ownership to make things happen. The consultants drive the process but do not generate magic answers. (That’s the secret sauce that firms like McKinsey don’t like to admit, especially when they invoice you for, say, $100-150 million for a project like this, with yearly “tuneups” for, say, about $15-20m.)

[qwerty49]

I would love for Qwerty to be able to do a consulting gig for Stanford so that we would have a better idea of how decisions are made, how responsibility is delegated (or taken), who is accountable. A big RACI matrix. Based on what I have heard from Howard Wolf and others, the BoT deals with big picture issues - finances, strategic direction, executive oversight. Ratifying implementation of strategic planning actions like the residential neighborhoods for undergrads. I infer that the president has a similar scope plus some figurehead responsibilities. it seems to me that most of the campus management activities are delegated to people under the Office of the Provost - Res Ed, Athletics, Student Affairs, the academic schools, etc.

Here are the 30(!) deans and administrators who report to the Provost - https://provost.stanford.edu/about-the-office/

Since the Provost cannot possibly manage that scope of responsibility with the oversight needed, the various deans and administrators have their own little fiefdoms. Even so, when things go wrong (as they have), no one seems to be held accountable for bad outcomes.

Ha ha yes Spiny a giant RACI matrix is exactly what’s needed. The real question is, assuming you start at the top (BOT? Donors? The endowment?), how far down do you go, to maximize relevance and usefulness?

I hadn’t really thought through what a specific battle plan would look like, but here are a couple of thoughts:

Frame the program as continuous improvement, or what the Japanese call Kaizen. This sets up a culture that hopefully prevents this from being a one-time thing. I get the feeling that Kaizen is pretty un-techie and is usually part of the middle-aged corporate universe, but let’s face it - Silicon Valley is definitely showing some signs of middle age. This also can establish some academic grounds for faculty and student participation and input.

At least one, if not several, cross-functional teams looking at various streams. This is the tricky part. What are the streams? Are they traditional “boxes” like Research? Academics? Student affairs? Athletics? Plant and facility operations? Community and alumni relations? Or are they functional like Finance/resource allocation? Marketing/Branding/Licensing? HR? Or some other way to parse the universe? I honesty haven’t given that any thought, but I do know that “the way we’re always done things” and “because everyone else does it this way” are just as often wrong as right.

Ideally some Stanford people are seconded to the team(s). These need to be people in the trenches (stakeholders!) and yes, should definitely include a cross-section of both undergrad students. Get a faculty advisor on each team and offer units of credit for a full-time commitment over a quarter. Staff members should be seconded as much as reality allows. Suffice to say that in any organization there’s  an element of “bloat” that can be redirected to a worthy cause. There would be a lot of fact-finding (interviews, mapping etc) involved.

But enough of my blabbering. The elephant in the room will always be the internal politics and that is the main value of bringing in objective outsiders.

But important to have real stakeholders and not just outside consultants involved because you need ownership to make things happen. The consultants drive the process but do not generate magic answers. (That’s the secret sauce that firms like McKinsey don’t like to admit, especially when they invoice you for, say, $100-150 million for a project like this, with yearly “tuneups” for, say, about $15-20m.)