Dear Colleagues:

Before many of you depart for a well-deserved spring break, I wanted to give you an update on two important topics – vice president searches and the Organizational Excellence Advisory Group.  I apologize in advance for the length of this email, but there is a lot of information to share.

Vice President Searches

As you are aware, we currently have an Interim Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost, Interim Co-Directors for University Advancement, and the Vice President for Student Affairs will be retiring this August.  I know the campus is eager to have stability as quickly as possible in all of these positions, so over the past few weeks, in consultation with our senior leadership, I have worked to develop an approach and timeframe to do just that.

Because Truman is in the midst of many important initiatives including bringing to fruition the work of the Next Steps Teams, implementing the new strategic plan, meeting the goals of the capital campaign and addressing our budget realities, it is imperative we pursue an aggressive timeline for the searches while structuring them to ensure we have the best people in place to lead Truman at this exciting, albeit challenging time.

• Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost.  Given time is of the essence in successfully achieving the goals of our initiatives, as well as the fact that the search for a provost is very closely tied to an academic year and it is already almost mid-March, I believe it is in the best interest of our university to do an internal search for provost.  We have a number of bright and talented colleagues who could very successfully serve as the chief academic officer of our institution.  Qualifications of the position, application requirements, and the finalized list of the members of the search committee will be provided next week.  Applications will be due by April 10 and on-campus interviews/meetings will begin the week of April 24.

If for some reason the internal search is not successful, we can launch an external search in August.  We would not lose any time by doing an internal search, as August would be the earliest we could conduct an external search given we are so close to the end of the current academic year.

• Vice President for Student Affairs.  Given our collective desire to bring stability to the senior administration positions as soon as possible, it is in the best interest of the university to launch an external search (internal applicants are most welcome to apply) this semester in the hope of not needing to name a year-long interim in August.  Qualifications of the position, application requirements, and the finalized list of the members of the search committee will be provided within the next two weeks.

• Vice President for University Advancement.  This position has been in interim status the longest, as the previous search was terminated when President Paino announced his departure.  As this position is not directly connected to the academic year and the Foundation Board plays a significant role in the search process, an external search (internal applicants are most welcome to apply) will be launched this summer.  Qualifications of the position, application requirements, and the finalized list of the members of the search committee will be provided by the end of the semester.

Organizational Excellence Advisory Group

As I discussed in the All University Address, we are establishing an Organizational Excellence Advisory Group to answer core questions designed to guide budget decision making into the future.  This group will have broad representation of faculty, staff, students and administrators including:

• Academic Department Chairs
• Faculty Senate and Executive Committee
• Staff Council and Selected Mid-Management Staff
• President’s Administrative Council
• Student Senate Executive Committee

There will be three core questions and a 2.5-hour working session for each question.  In each working session, there will be a presentation of relevant data, followed by structured discussions.  At the end of each session, recommendations will be developed.  We will discuss these recommendations and how they will guide resource allocation discussions into the future at the Strategic Planning and Assessment Workshop (SPAW) this August.

Invitations to serve on the Organizational Excellence Advisory Group will be sent via email next week.  Participation will require a time commitment from those serving in this role, and we anticipate holding three 2.5-hour afternoon meetings prior to finals week.  If invited individuals have conflicts that prevent participation, we will extend invitations to others who will provide a similar mix of ideas and perspectives.

We have exciting and demanding times ahead that require we truly work together to develop a bold and confident future for our beloved institution.  I am confident we are up to the challenge.

Whether you are able to take time off during spring break or not, I wish all of you a rejuvenating week.

Best regards,

Sue