Admissions Staffing Part 2: Invest In The Right People

At a quarterly meeting this winter, a college President was told by the Board of Trustees to present a revised strategic plan focusing on the financial goals of the college over the next three years: increase revenue, reduce costs, and grow the headcount. Sound familiar?

The COVID-19 crisis has hit every college, but it has hit every college in a variety of different ways. Community colleges, public colleges, and private colleges of all sizes can tell you dozens of different stories, but one fundamental truth has impacted higher education across the board; there is no going back to the fall of 2019.

That being said, I am a big fan of the old Marine Corps phrase, “improvise, adapt and overcome”, and never has it been truer than it is today. You may have heard that saying in movies or on television, but the reality is, the Marine Corps was always on the bottom of the pecking order when it came to allocating resources and they had to make do with whatever the US Army no longer wanted or needed. Simply put, make the most of the resources you have, because chances are, that is all you are going to get. The good news is, you do not always need more financial resources to grow and improve. But if you have the same resources, or even reduced resources, how do you grow the organization and improve your financial position?

It is a common business question across all business types and all businesses have issues allocating limited financial resources. But colleges are also one of the most complicated, bureaucratic, and political businesses known to mankind. I once was having a conversation with a newly appointed college President about an exceptionally large marketing expense in their annual budget. The expense in question constituted nearly 20% of their entire marketing budget for the year and was in no way “trackable” when it came to student source attribution. I asked the obvious consulting question, “Why in heaven’s name did you guys spend that much money on this marketing channel?” The answer I received was not at all surprising, and that is the saddest part.

His reply was, “I know, I hate it. But a few of the Trustees love the ads and would go crazy if they did not see them every year.” We all know every business makes marketing mistakes, but I would be willing to bet no Fortune 500 company would ever allow 20% of their marketing dollars to be flushed away because of the whim of a 71-year-old Trustee who graduated from the college in 1972. Unfortunately, it was a political reality and no matter how much I pushed, reallocating the expense was off the table. It was time to improvise, adapt and overcome.

The next line of expenses I looked at was the staffing expense and training lines. What a nightmare! Having worked in higher education management for over 25 years, I fully understood the bureaucratic nature of the beast I was examining, but all I could mutter was, “WOW”. Please understand, I am a huge fan of training and make a living as a consultant, but I am also dedicated to outcomes-based decisions and data which can tie every expense back to the academic mission and/or the strategic enrollment plan.

When asked about a training budget, the answer cannot be, “The staff always asks for more training, so we keep increasing the budget with the hope of improved performance.” This answer does not cut it in 2021. Every training dollar you spend must be directly linked to a specific expectation and outcome or you are simply flying blind and tossing cash out the window. Regular training, especially for an admissions team, is absolutely vital to the quality of service and professional development of the team. But the purpose and content of the training needs to be tied to specific data points, such as staff retention, increased enrollment conversions, improved student retention or increased student satisfaction. High quality, focused, and consistent training helps to fill all gaps. Find the gaps in your performance and train for improvement every time. The investment will quickly pay off.

When it comes to the actual staffing budget, it never ceases to amaze me how quickly some managers could cave on the old line, “If I just had more people I could…” Feel free to fill in the blank because we have all heard it a million times. It is like saying you could make the most amazing pie if you only had a few more apples. But a good pie is not only made of apples. If the crust and filling recipe is terrible, you will get a terrible pie no matter how many apples you go through. And what if the apples are bad to begin with? No matter how good the recipe may be, bad apples will ruin your pie. When it comes to staffing, finding the right staffing model (your recipe) and the right people (your ingredients) is often easier said than done, but it is the most important investment you will ever make for your campus. Why is it so important? Because when everything is stripped away and you look at your core mission, EVERY college is in the “helping people” business and only real people create the value and customer commitment required in any people-based business.

To me, good admissions staffing is always based on value and commitment. Commitment is a dedication to a long-term course of action based on perceived value. Value is the fair exchange for something given such as a student’s time, energy and money. When it comes to admissions staffing, your people represent the value of your institution and communicate it to the public. Your staffing plan estimates the number of people needed to represent and communicate that value and is based on a “continuity of service” level consistent with every single application you receive. So, you need to ask yourself if your admissions people are simply application processors pushing paper around their desk or are they representatives of the institution’s value? Make no mistake, to deliver on the continuity of service level which you need to compete in 2021, you will need both. But though you can always train a representative to be a processor, you can rarely train a processor to be a representative. In other words, hire more representatives than processors if you are looking to invest wisely in admissions staffing.

What makes a good admissions representative? I created a model 25 years ago and it still works just as well today. It is based on five characteristics, but more importantly it is based on a principle which states, “2 out of 5, you will never survive but 3 out of 5 might keep you alive.” What are the five characteristics?

• Personality
• Attitude
• Work Ethic
• Related Experience
• Intelligence

Pick any combination of three, and they will probably survive. The more they have, the happier everyone will be. I usually use a scale of 1-5 for each characteristic with 3 being the break point. Try a little experiment on your current staff and see how they come out. In the future, if anyone you interview does not have at least three solid characteristics, do not hire them. Not as a VP of Enrollment, not as a Director of Admissions, not as an Admissions Representative and not even as an Application Processor. I have hired every possible combination over the years and I deeply believe in the principle. But there is one characteristic I look for most and pray I see in every interview, and that is Attitude. I am willing to invest time, energy, and money in someone with a good attitude and any other two characteristics you wish to choose. Like I said before, when you strip everything else away, we are in the “helping people” business and I can train anyone to push paper, but I cannot train someone to have a positive attitude.

We live in a time of limited resources, high competition, and an evolving paradigm. We should always be willing and eager to invest in good people. But like any other investment, take your time, do your research, and make sure any staffing investment you make is based on firm principles.

To be continued…

Jim Dunn

CEO, Higher Education Support

For staffing and consulting questions please visit https://www.higheredsupport.com/.