TEN ENROLLMENT TRUTHS

1. There are few new issues. Ever feel like your role as an operations or enrollment leader is to turn over rocks to see what might be under them? Are you ever afraid to turn over the rock? Take heart, you are not alone! Neither do you have to be afraid of what snakes might slither out at you! Financial Aid and Admissions feuding? Advisors having trouble tracking down students? Faculty complaining about the quality of students admitted? Last minute adult student enrollment putting a crunch on your staff? Those creepy-crawly things may come out from underneath the rocks in a different order or be different colors, but they are still snakes! Generally speaking, enrollment issues at one institution are or have been issues at another.

2.There is no magic answer. The quick fix often isn’t and could end up causing more problems than solutions. How many times has someone convinced your institution if you did just this particular tactic that all your problems would be solved? How many of those initiatives actually became fully embedded in the institution’s culture? Probably not many. Solutions are culture and process specific as much as problem specific. There are a multitude of excellent ideas and initiatives than never get implemented because they don’t fit an institution’s goals, resources or existing processes. That is why it is important to consider which parts of your current enrollment reality need support and how best that can be accomplished.

3. More Heads are Better. Because effective solutions should be designed specifically for each institution, more heads are better than one when it comes to development. You need organizational commitment up, down and across. And the more radical the change, the more commitment you need! Discussion with effected constituents leads to better tactics that fit into the organization's culture. The more buy-in you create, the smoother the implementation. The faster the implementation, the quicker you wil see effective results. Many good ideas have been derailed by lack of buy-in or out right sabotage!

4. Too much of a good thing. Just like Thanksgiving dinner, too much change—even good and necessary change—can leave you with indigestion! Don't get caught up being a 'change junkie'. Give serious consideration to incremental change. That doesn’t mean you should NOT look to revise or, in some cases, totally revamp some things. Just be aware that the more you change (both in number and variance of processes), the longer it will take to see positive results. Ever implement a totally new software program? Even though it was much more efficient long-term, the initial start up probably caused significant losses in productivity (and a great many gray hairs!) until staff became accustomed to new processes. If you did this in the midst of other changes in your institution, you are fortunate to still be coherent enough to read this! Eating an elephant is pretty intimidating when you first start. Incremental change also allows you to evaluate and adjust effectiveness of each individual initiative. If you do too many things at once you’ll never be sure which one works and which one doesn’t!

5. Improve the wheel. You don't need to recreate the wheel...we've been using it for some time. But you do need to improve it to match your institution's needs. Because there are few new problems, your best sources for effective solutions are out there! Sometimes it’s easy to get too caught up in our daily routine of meetings, phone calls and emails to be objective. If you belong to a listserv or other organization where you can bounce ideas off from your counterparts you will soon collect a variety of ideas. And don’t neglect other industries! Enrollment ideas come from outside higher education as well as from within. Look to collect as many potential solutions as possible. This will allow you to mix and match—and improve upon—proven solutions that can fit your particular institution. Some of the best ideas are those taken from others and ‘tweaked’ to your particular needs.

6. There is more than one right answer…even within your institution. In fact, it may take a combination of strategies to fully resolve the issue. How many mathematical equations are there to get the answer of “5”? While “5” is the correct result…how you get there can vary and they are all correct! This is another reason to collect as many possible strategies possible. Perhaps it will take two or three ideas in combination to address your particular need. Having a variety of resources in varying industries can be invaluable to developing your personal equation.

7. Measure, measure, measure! New isn't always better! In order to be sure that your tactic is effectively addressing the issue, measure it's effectiveness on a consistent and ongoing basis. Ideally, you would have taken measures prior to implementation of new strategies so you can accurately assess the impact. Measures and analysis aren't typically tasks enrollment people crave, but they are necessary staples to strong and effective enrollment management.

8. Throw out the baby or the bathwater? If you have done your advance work well by evaluating the real issue, exploring possible solutions and getting the institution to both refine and buy-in to the tactic, you shouldn't have too many negative surprises. However, if you find a particular strategy is not working as you had hoped, don't be too quick to dismantle the entire process. It may be that you simply need to make subtle changes that will greatly enhance it's effectiveness. Too often institutions want the quick and immedidate fix when in reality slow and steady may win the race. Plan your work, train your staff, implement the strategy then measure, evaluate and tweak the process.

9. Pets don't belong at work. This is the reverse of the previous point. While you shouldn't be too quick to abandon an initiative, neither should you be afraid to dismantle things that truely aren't working. Even if those are pet projects. The key here, once again, is to be able to objectively evaluate their effectiveness through measures and analysis.

10. You can’t walk away. Effective strategies are like relationships; you can’t neglect them just because it’s not an issue right now. Have you ever had a snake you thought you’d killed crawl back out at you? Did you go back and review the process? If you did, you might have been surprised to find out that what you had put in place was no longer being done. That’s not uncommon and is especially true if you have staff turn over. You must be diligent in maintaining, measuring and tweaking everything to constantly get the most out of each process. Demographics change, expectations change, staff change. Just because you put something in place that worked at one time doesn’t mean it will keep happening! As managers, you have to continually review, evaluate, and monitor everything even if it doesn’t appear to be broken.




Integrated Enrollment Solutions 422 East Main, #210 Nacogdoches, TX 75961 888-676-5524