This document discusses how Benedict College has used tools from change management to drive success in higher education. It summarizes how the college used approaches like Six Sigma, Lean, Design Thinking, and organizational storytelling to define goals, measure progress, analyze challenges, and improve student outcomes and institutional excellence during a time of major changes in higher education. It also reflects on lessons learned, like the importance of having a clear vision and plan, aligning structures and systems to support change, and using storytelling to maintain identity and engagement during transformation.

1. HIGHER ED
GOES TO
SCHOOL:
Alex Gorelik ◉ Tami Ashford Carroll
BORROWING THE TOOLS
OF CHANGE
MANAGEMENT
TO DRIVE LEARNING
SUCCESS
Benedict College

3. Alex Gorelik ◉ Tami Ashford Carroll
"THE PAST OF TODAY":
WHY IT IS NECESSARY TO MANAGE
CHANGE
Benedict College

4. (…) I would enjoin you to consider the very simple notion that the
institution of higher education has served its purpose and that there are
other ways of doing things that make better sense. I am not suggesting
that we destroy the central concept of the university but rather wish to
say “Let’s forget about the structure for a while and let’s talk about the
function and what is the best mechanism, the best structure for making
certain that the function continues to do what it is supposed to do.” This is
something that we are unwilling to do, but we prefer to start with existing
structures and ask how to adjust them. But rather than relying on this
approach, our first question should be, “Should we destroy the existing
structure and start a new one?” That is a question that we are very
unwilling to ask.
(Brick & Bushko, 1973, p.57)

6. Major Changes Underway in Higher Ed
Figure 1: Major Changes Underway in Higher Education (Ransom, Knepler and Zapata-Gietl, 2018. p.2)

7. Then & Now

8. Alex Gorelik ◉ Tami Ashford Carroll
TOOLS OF THE TRADE:
USEFUL APPROACHES TO CHANGE
MANAGEMENT
Benedict College

9. Organizational Change

10. Organizational Change

11. Organizational Change

12. Organizational Change

13. Change enabling systems

14. Change enabling systems

15. Change enabling systems

16. Alex Gorelik ◉ Tami Ashford Carroll
LEARNING TO BE THE BEST:
MANAGING CHANGE AT BENEDICT
COLLEGE
Benedict College

17. Managing Change at BC: Org. Storytelling
Student Success
Institutional Excellence
Local / National Engagement

18. Managing Change at BC: Six Sigma
Define Student Success
Measure Financial KPIs
Analyze What are CTQs? Not
what we thought!
Improve Resources redirected
to CTQs
Ended Open
Enrollment policy
Reduced majors and
academic programs
Added new majors
and academic
programs
Invested in student
relationship
management
Emphasized
professional
development and
started a faculty
mentorship program
Control Quantitative data Qualitative data Scope of data

19. Managing Change at BC: (Lean) Six
Sigma, Agile
Define Institutional Excellence
Measure Student readiness Faculty / Staff readiness Systems readiness
Analyze
New, fuzzy processes have
to be created and rapidly
prototyped
• Hybrid / remote environment for
students
• Hybrid / remote environment for
faculty
• Support systems
Design End Open Enrollment policy
New role for the Center for
Teaching and Learning
Faculty Mentorship Program New support systems rollout
Verify SACS Quality Matters Open Learning Consortium Internal Surveys / Interviews

20. Managing Change at BC: Design Thinking
▷Center for Teaching and Learning as a Design Thinking
and Agile playground
▷Sponsorship: C-level
▷Champion: Director, Center for Teaching & Learning
▷Change management team of 18: cross-departmental,
representing full-time faculty, adjunct faculty,
learning designers and administrators

21. Managing Change at
BC: Design Thinking

22. Managing Change at
BC: Design Thinking

23. Managing Change at
BC:
Lean

24. Managing Change at BC: Org. Storytelling

25. Managing Change at BC: Org. Storytelling

26. Managing Change at BC: Org. Storytelling
#BESTOfBC
intentional branding through engagement

27. Alex Gorelik ◉ Tami Ashford Carroll
"WHEN EVERYTHING HAS CHANGED, YOUR STORY
REMAINS":
WHAT WE'VE LEARNED FROM OUR EXPERIENCE
Benedict College

28. Reflections: The Vision and the Plan

29. Reflections: Structure and Systems

30. Reflections: Overcommunicate

31. Organizational Storytelling
"when everything has changed,
your story remains"

32. Alex Gorelik ◉ Tami Ashford Carroll Benedict College