By Sharron Hannon
To kick off the university’s strategic-planning process, President Michael F. Adams invited more than 200 administrators and other unit representatives from across campus to a first-ever conference on fiscal, management and strategic planning issues.
 Participants heard from the university’s three senior vice presidents and from Michael Crow, vice provost and professor of science and technology at Columbia University, during the daylong event on Feb. 18 at the Georgia Center for Continuing Education.
Vice President for Strategic Planning Don Eastman wrapped up the conference with a presentation on how the institutional strategic planning process will proceed.
“As budget managers and leaders, we almost never come together,” Adams told the group assembled in Mahler Auditorium. “If we can have consistency in our concerns for the institution and what we’re trying to accomplish, we can all benefit.”
Allan Barber, senior vice president for finance and administration, began the day with a look at the “changing climate” of fiscal responsibility. Barber discussed the annual state audit process and the required redirection of 5 percent of operating funds in next year’s budget--4 percent to other internal purposes and one percent returned to the state.
He reminded administrators that they are “legally, ethically and financially” responsible for how money is spent within their units.
In introducing Kathryn Costello, senior vice president for external affairs, Adams said UGA must improve its capacity for garnering outside funding. He said that although progress has been made in the past 10 years, the university remains “seriously under-endowed” relative to peer institutions.
Costello said the university needs to create a “climate and culture that encourages giving.” Noting that state support has been solid but flat, she said private gifts create the margin of excellence. She said fund-raising success hinges on the institution having a compelling vision, a solid alumni program, a consistent communications program and the commitment of the entire university leadership.
She encouraged participation in the recently unveiled University Partners program. Faculty and staff can participate in the program by contributing $1,500, with at least a third of the total unrestricted.
“Every university employee should be a donor to UGA, even if the amount is only $1,” Costello said. “You should believe enough in this institution to make it part of your charitable giving.”
Karen Holbrook, senior vice president for academic affairs and provost, introduced Columbia University professor Michael Crow, who gave a luncheon address on “Universities and the New Manifest Destiny: Organizational Principles for Strategically Realigning American Research Universities.” Crow is the second speaker Holbrook has brought to campus as part of a lecture series to encourage “uncommon” thinking.
Crow said research universities represent “the driving force for what we will become” in the new century. He said that by the year 2029, scientifically based discoveries will require integrated knowledge--with scientists joining with ethicists and others to focus on large-scale issues.
Such collaborations challenge traditional university design, he noted, so for research institutions to survive they must “design away from the traditional,” reaching out not only across disciplines, but even across institutions--viewing other universities not as competitors, but as potential allies.
The question of potential internal and external alliances is among the key issues to be addressed in unit and institutional strategic planning, according to Don Eastman, who closed the day with guidelines for UGA’s strategic planning process.
Ultimately, said Eastman, “the process is more important than the plan. If you get the process right, the plan will eventually get right.”
Eastman shared guidelines for strategic planning that call for draft plans to be produced by 26 campus units. An institutional Strategic Planning Group will assist units and guide the overall institutional plan. Draft unit plans are due by July 1, 1999, and final plans by Jan. 1, 2000. The institutional plan will be drafted between January and March of 2000.
“The strategic plan is about what we desire to be,” said Adams. “This is an opportunity for input from anyone from the newest freshman to the most senior faculty. This should be the most broadly participatory strategic plan in the history of the university.”
|
|
