To be coherent, however, planning for the colleges and the administrative units must fit into a broader planning process that sets directions for the University as a whole. Accordingly, the Mission Statement sets the broad parameters for the strategic plans, which in turn set the parameters for the annual plans of the colleges and administrative units. This process is displayed graphically in figure 3.1. Each level of NCSU planning is briefly described below.
The Mission Statement (discussed at length in the previous chapter) is the broadest plan of all.
Strategic plans ("long-range goals") are developed within the broad parameters set by the Mission Statement. Strategic planning is technically the province of two separate units: the Administrative Council, which is composed of administratorsthe chancellor, the provost, deans, vice-chancellors and others; and the University Planning Committee, which is meant to be more broadly representative of the University community, and which includes faculty and student representatives. Although they are meant to work and report separately, the Administrative Council and the University Planning Committee share the common mission of helping the chancellor set the University's long-range goals. Traditionally, the University Planning Committee has focused on one major area each year, but it has not convened since the 1991-92 academic year. Therefore, strategic planning at NCSU has recently been performed solely by the Administrative Council, or by an expanded version of the council that meets in the annual Chancellor's Administrative Retreat.
Annual plans are developed by colleges and administrative units after the broad strategic goals have been set by the Administrative Council and (from 1983 until 1991-92) by the University Planning Committee.
Annual planning normally begins each fall, when University Planning and Analysis and the Budget Office jointly distribute guidelines on how to prepare that year's plans. Every second year, academic departments submit biennial plans to the college dean, who combines them into a college plan. In off years, colleges submit updates of their plans. A similar process takes place in the administrative units.
The draft plans are due in February, and after some initial review by UPA and the Budget Office, final versions are submitted in March. Then in April and May, an Annual-Plan Review Committee holds hearings on the plans and requests. The review committee is composed of seven persons: the chancellor, the provost, the vice-chancellor for business and finance, the vice-chancellor for institutional advancement, the vice-chancellor for research, outreach and extension, and the outgoing and incoming chairs of the Faculty Senate. The heads of the Budget Office and UPA are present in a staff capacity. After these hearings, the administration approves goals and objectives, annual budgets, assembles change-budget requests for the North Carolina State General Assembly, and approves enrollment targets.
Because a new provost assumed office in summer 1993, some of the above processes and dates are being modified to reflect his administrative style.
Each college or administrative unit's annual plan must include:
The current planning and evaluation process has moved much closer to meeting SACS criteria than the process-oriented approach of just five years ago. This major improvement stems from a great deal of hard work by many individuals, particularly the staff of the Office of University Planning and Analysis. Despite this substantial progress, however, NCSU's system must continue to evolve in order to achieve truly inclusive, outcome-oriented planning and evaluation.
As annual planning has evolved at NCSU, it has begun to develop appropriate and needed links between program planning and resource planning. A case in point is the recent inclusion of the long-range space-allocation plan as part of the required annual-plan submission. When submitting annual plans, colleges and administrative units indicate their upcoming needs for additional classroom, laboratory, or office space. They defend these requests in terms of the programmatic proposals developed in other parts of the plan. This links annual planning to the biennial capital-improvements request process and ultimately links both to the campus physical master plan.
The development of this new approach benefited from the input of several segments of the campus community. In spring 1992 the University Master Planning Advisory Group was formed to review and recommend strategies to facilitate linkages. This advisory task force included representatives from the various planning offices, the Board of Trustees, faculty, and students. The task force recommended twelve master planning goals and planning procedures to strengthen links between programmatic and physical planning. In addition to including space needs in annual planning, they recommended development of an integrated database for master-planning information and inventories and the appointment of a Geographic Information System Implementation Team, which was appointed in March 1993. In addition, the Space Planning Office was moved from University Planning and Analysis to the Facilities Division in order to more closely connect space-resource planning to campus master planning.
The integration of physical planning into annual planning and budgeting is simply the latest example of an ongoing trend. Over each of the last few years, NCSU planning has moved closer to integrating the formerly fragmented processes of University planning, evaluation, and resource allocation. Although this integration is still incomplete, there has been clear progress [3.1.1, 3.1.2].
The Graduate School provides a particularly good example of participative-plan development. Because the Graduate School is in large part a coordinating agency, tying together graduate programs from many colleges, it is particularly sensitive to its multiple constituencies, including the Graduate Administrative Board, the directors of graduate programs, and graduate students. In the most recent annual plan (see self-study library), Goal 1.6.1, "Establish a library for students of hard-copy and on-line information on fellowships and other forms of graduate support," was in response to graduate-student requests. Goal 4.1, "Continue with the implementation of the electronic transmission of admissions and student records information," was developed in direct response to the concerns of directors of graduate programs, expressed in their annual meeting. Other annual objectives resulted from faculty and graduate-student focus-group discussions.
The College of Agriculture and Life Sciences provides a particularly good example of using comprehensive output and outcome measures. Planning and budgeting within the college depends heavily on the goals and objectives documented in the college's long-range plan ("Targeting the Future"), which was developed by a college faculty committee using departmental five-year plans and Cooperative Extension's plan of work, which was developed in cooperation with thousands of local advisory committee members throughout the state.
The College of Management process provides a particularly good example of how goals can be integrated among the various levels. For example, the first goal in the 1992-93 annual plan for the Department of Business Management was "to increase the quality of the undergraduate program." This goal was broken into specific objectives to increase the proportion of undergraduate courses taught by tenure-track faculty; adopt new curriculum; develop new courses for new curriculum. This departmental goal and its objectives were consistent, integrated reflections of the departmental mission, which is "to prepare students for management positions in a highly competitive global economy marked by rapid technological change." That departmental mission in turn fits well under the first goal for the college, which is "to provide high-quality, nationally respected management education."
Thus, University planning has a number of successful parts. But in order to evaluate the entire process, the self-study committee particularly focused on three SACS criteria:
As part of a self-study survey conducted in late 1992, a representative sample of faculty were asked about their perceptions of planning and evaluation at NCSU. Because changes were (and still are) ongoing, their responses reflect in part an evaluation of planning processes that have now been changed. Nonetheless, the faculty responses provide reason for concern. Faculty expressed a high level of dissatisfaction with the effectiveness of the planning and evaluation system. For example:
51 percent of surveyed faculty disagreed or strongly disagreed with the statement that budget decisions are based on sound planning (only 23 percent agreed; the remainder had no opinion)56 percent of faculty disagreed or strongly disagreed with the statement that resources are effectively allocated in order to accomplish the University's mission (30 percent agreed; the rest had no opinion)
When questions focused on planning within departments, rather than at the University level, faculty evaluations were somewhat less critical. For example, 55 percent of faculty agreed that their department formally sets goals and examines information on goal progress. Nonetheless, a large minority39 percentsaid that their department does not.
In addition to faculty, University staff were asked to judge the departmental planning. Although the group termed "staff" is very large and very important, it is somewhat difficult to characterize, because it includes members of both academic departments and administrative units, at all levelsprofessional, clerical, technical, and crafts. By a 74 percent to 23 percent margin, staff indicated that their departments did have clear goals.
All administrators (department heads or higher) were polled by an open-ended questionnaire in early 1993 (see survey instrument in self-study library). The survey results must be treated cautiously, both because the response rate was low (44 of 125, or approximately 35 percent) and because open-ended questions are impossible to aggregate unambiguously. Nonetheless, the results seem to suggest that many of the responding administrators (who are of course regularly involved in planning and evaluation) share the faculty's concern about the University-level process. Some results:
68 percent of the respondents indicated a concern that planning showed a lack of connection between effort and results61 percent suggested concerns that the process was not effective
36 percent mentioned a lack of focus.
64 percent of faculty disagree or strongly disagree with the statement that planning and budgeting adequately involve faculty (only 21 percent agree; remainder have no opinion)A striking 73 percent of faculty disagree or strongly disagree that University planning and budgeting decisions adequately reflect faculty priorities (13 percent agree; remainder have no opinion).
These results are consistent with a larger pattern of concern with University administrative processes. For example, the same survey indicates 51 percent of faculty do not believe that the administration maintains adequate communication; and 43 percent do not believe that organizational processes are well defined.
As with effectiveness ratings, inclusiveness ratings were somewhat higher for departmental-level planning than for the University-level processes. A large majority of the faculty, for example, say that they are involved in departmental curriculum planning and implementation. However, there is still a good deal of dissatisfaction with the inclusiveness of more general forms of planning, even at the departmental level. Almost half the faculty45 percentdisagree or strongly disagree with the statement "I am satisfied with the extent of my involvement in the planning\budgeting process" (at the departmental level); 48 percent say they are satisfied.
Faculty criticisms of inclusiveness focus upon three distinct planning stages. First, faculty have not recently been involved in setting broad strategic goals because, as noted, the University Planning Committee has not been convened since early 1992. Second, in some departments, faculty opinion is not solicited when the departmental plan is initially developed and then sent to the college dean. Third, faculty in almost all departments say that they are not kept informed and involved with the negotiated revisions that take place as the plan moves through each levelto the dean, then to University Planning and Analysis, then to the Annual Review Committee. Even a number of heads indicate that they are not consistently apprised of reactions to the plan after it leaves their college.
Members of administrative units were not polled separately about their participation in planning, but top managers of administrative units were asked to describe their planning. Participation seems to vary widely across units. Lack of participation could be inferred for the nine units (of the seventeen units polled) that indicated that planning was performed by professional staff; several others had mixed systems. However, a number of other administrative unitsStudent Affairs is just one examplehad a strong pattern of broad-based planning.
The faculty concerns about planning inclusiveness are very similar to those expressed in NCSU's last self-study, in 1983-84. The 1983-84 effort was a nontraditional self-study. With SACS's permission, NCSU focused the entire self-study on planning and resources.
The faculty in 1983, just as they did in 1992, expressed more satisfaction with planning at the departmental level than at the University level. But the 1983 faculty were nonetheless unsatisfied (in percentages very similar to the results of the 1992 survey) with the effectiveness and inclusiveness of both levels. One of the central recommendations of that 1983-84 self-study was the creation of the University Planning Committee, with faculty representatives from all colleges, to make planning more inclusive. The University Planning Committee met for the first time in 1983, and then continued to meet with some regularity. Perhaps in part because of the administrative distractions accompanying the transition to a new chancellor, it has not been convened since the 1991-92 academic year.
Appointed by the NCSU chancellor in November 1992, the NCSU Quality Steering Team includes broad faculty and administration representation. The purposes of this team are to coordinate University quality initiatives, develop training programs, and recommend steps that NCSU should take to develop quality processes for the University. The team drafted a CQI vision statement and issued a preliminary report and implementation plan in April 1993. Many planning teams, including the facilities information team mentioned earlier, have been formulated using the processes and tools recommended by the Quality Steering Team. In all, twenty CQI pilot projects are scheduled. The pilots cover a number of areas and processes, including one project that will attempt to strengthen student advising through CQI approaches.
CQI will take many years to implement fully, but it is a promising development, particularly for administrative-unit processes. If combined with appropriate training and incentives, CQI can foster a spirit of participation and continuous improvement, and this in turn could provide incentives for implementing many of the specific changes recommended in this chapter.
Recommendation 3.1: NCSU should immediately reconstitute the University Planning Committee and use it to provide faculty input on institutional planning.
To strengthen faculty confidence in the process, a majority of the UPC's faculty members should be appointed by the faculty rather than by the administration. This committee would then also assume the role now performed by the Faculty Senate's planning committee, thus avoiding duplication. The UPC should be chaired by a faculty member, who should be given sufficient release time to devote substantial attention to the committee. In order to maintain continuity, the committee members should serve overlapping three-year terms. In order to maintain ties to planning, the director of UPA would be an ex officio member, and the committee would also be staffed by UPA.
Recommendation 3.2: NCSU should move toward one strategic planning process, combining the overlapping work of the University Planning Committee and the Administrative Council.
This combined committee would include representatives from all the important constituencies of the University: faculty, administrators (including department heads and directors of support service units), students, and alumni. It would consolidate effort in planning and eliminate wasteful duplication. As a first step toward this coordination, UPC members should routinely be invited to the Chancellor's Administrative Retreat, where much strategic planning is begun. Among the committee's early considerations should be ways of integrating planning across all University levels, as well as across various University functions.
Recommendation 3.3: NCSU should require that each vice-chancellor or dean describe how faculty have participated in planning and how faculty will receive feedback about their plan's progress.
The Annual Plan Review Committee should require affirmation that feedback has taken place. Planning feedback and participation should become major criteria by which deans and department heads are evaluated.
Recommendation 3.4: NCSU's Office of University Planning and Analysis should provide more time between planning instructions (and revision instructions) and reply dates to increase feedback to faculty and department heads as the plan moves forward and changes.
Many department heads and deans cited extremely short response times as a major reason they had not been able to include more participation from faculty, staff, and other stakeholders.
Recommendation 3.5: NCSU's Office of University Planning and Analysis, Annual Planning Review Committee, and Budget Office should take immediate steps to build faculty and administrator confidence in planning and evaluation.
A substantial group of staff and faculty believe that forwarded plans are changed without reason and then disappear without effect. A possible confidence-building step might be broader distribution of substantive letters and memos. Many of those now going just to deans and vice-chancellors could also be sent as FYI copies to department heads and administrative unit managers. Another such step might be following the annual review with a memo to the members of each college or administrative unit, pointing out how the administration's decisions used the planning information, especially information on achievement of objectives. This memo, too, should be very widely distributed.
Recommendation 3.6: NCSU's Office of University Planning and Analysis should work with the University Planning Committee to streamline the current planning process.
A number of administrators have suggested that the current planning process requires so many objectives for all areas that the analytic focus is diffused: All objectives within, say, a college receive almost equal attention even though some are routine and cannot or will not be changed, while others are of major concern.
Recommendation 3.7: NCSU should integrate planning and implementation of universitywide fund-raising efforts with the work of the University Planning Committee and the Office of University Planning and Analysis.
The University's fund drives have a major impact on resource allocations, and yet they are relatively unconnected to the ongoing planning process. This involvement could facilitate coordination between financial resource availability and needs identified in annual planning [3.1.1; 3.1.2; 3.1.3; 3.1.4].
