Pitt Business e-newsletter Issue 13, January 2009
Notes from the Dean
In 2008, the school initiated a strategic plan designed to leverage our strengths and generate strong outcomes. In addition to identifying areas and actions that differentiate the school, the plan emphasizes the need to create a culture of continuous improvement. To get stronger, we must rely on our talented people. We need to look within ourselves, to assess our processes and activities, and to make changes where necessary. In other words, we must be committed to a process of continuous improvement.
In my annual report to the school's Board of Visitors, I quoted Chuck Noll, the legendary coach of the Pittsburgh Steelers, who said: "Champions are champions not because they do anything extraordinary, but because they do the ordinary things better than anyone else." Coach Noll's advice suggests that we must focus our talent and efforts on getting better in all of our duties and activities. We do so through a continuous improvement process.
Two years ago, I began some improvement initiatives. They had limited success. A task force identified areas where opportunities existed to improve the experience of students. It even categorized improvements in a matrix that allowed focus on the areas that would provide greatest potential gains. Despite the great start, we didn't execute the improvement activities as effectively as was necessary. The fault was mine, though the problem was a typical one. Absent a specific mechanism to facilitate improvements, organizational leaders don't have enough free time to manage the execution of potential changes and solutions.
I was fortunate to receive great advice on this from Max Mitchell, a Katz grad and successful executive on our Board of Visitors. After a conversation with Max, I sought out someone to help the school facilitate its improvement process. Next Level Partners (NLP), a consulting firm with expertise in process improvement was an ideal collaborator for the school. With the help of two NLP consultants, we identified the core areas on which we would focus our efforts and the types of improvement approaches we wished to engage in.
Whereas most organizations identify some sort of revenue or profit goal as a way of focusing improvement efforts, such a measure was not meaningful for us. Discussion and reflection across our team identified the metric that was most important: placement outcomes. To the extent that our activities and processes improve placement results, they will generate positive gains for us in all other areas. Strong placement attracts students and recruiters. Thus, it is self-reinforcing. In addition, strong placement outcomes are critical to the measures used in rankings, which means that improving placement will aid the school's external reputation, which will raise the pride of our alumni (as well as faculty, staff, and everyone else on campus). With this insight in mind, we exposed our MBA team to a two-day goal deployment process training session.
On September 24 and 25, key MBA staff participated in a training program on Transactional Process Improvement and Goal Deployment. This program led to the development of specific career service goals and plans - for next year as well as for five years forward. While I won't go into the details of our top level matrix or the specifics of our plans in this column, it is important to note that focusing on placement causes a significant amount of attention to be devoted to non-placement issues and activities. For example, to secure great placement results, it is necessary to recruit strong students. It is also necessary to have a curriculum that provides a value-added education. Thus, the seemingly narrow placement goal is much broader than it appears at first blush. Our continuous improvement process therefore requires attention to specific activities and the selection of an owner for each activity - someone who is responsible for achieving our planned outcomes.
Our team meets monthly to review its goals and plans and to monitor progress toward the goals. In February, our NLP consultant will sit in on the review meeting to examine our progress, provide feedback, and to continue the pressure to achieve the goals we selected. More importantly, based on the value we are seeing from the goal deployment results so far, I plan to extend the training to other units in 2009.
In addition to the goal deployment training, NLP facilitated Kaizen training for the school's administrative staff from November 10-14. The Kaizen methodology and related tools were originally created in Toyota's Japanese manufacturing plants. Our goal was to use the approach to eliminate inefficiencies in specific staff processes. One team focused on improving our staff hiring process. Another group examined the way the school managed external events. In the hiring instance, we discovered effort duplication, inconsistent approaches across units, and many steps that could be reduced. In the event planning process we found a myriad of examples of poor communication, which led to conflicts, the absence of a process for selecting programming, and failure to evaluate events or vendors. The school has already adopted improved processes in each case. I anticipate many positive developments to occur due to our Kaizen training. I also believe that success here will lead to Kaizen training for other units too.
To be a top business school, to command a strong reputation, and to be a destination for strong student talent, we must begin to do the ordinary things better than our competitors. I am convinced that our continuous improvement process will help us excel - so much so that I am keeping funds available for such training at a time of budget and economic uncertainty. I will keep you informed of our success at continuous improvement, though you'll see the results as you chart our progress.
Finally, communication is critical to driving improvements. I invite you to share your stories on continuous improvement and the facilitation of change. As an organization dependent on human capital, your insights will help us find more and better ways to stay focused on our targets. That focus will make the Katz and CBA degrees stronger everyday.
