Before Dr. Robert Dooley settled in as the new dean of the College of Business at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, a planning committee was already putting together a strategic plan for the future of the institution. Once Dooley had settled in, he looked at the goals and then added his “two cents worth” during meetings with key faculty.
What follows is Dooley’s summary of the plan, gleaned from his recent interview with the Hamilton County Herald. In putting together the list of goals, Dooley and his colleagues addressed issues they believe will allow the College of Business to be a premiere business school and to deliver on its mission to academically prepare students for the business world.
You said the first component of the plan involves laying the foundation of financial sustainability. Talk about that. About 31 percent of the university’s budget comes from the State. The tuition increases we see occurring at every university across the country make up the rest. So, we’re receiving less and less funding from the State, which means we need to look for alternative revenue streams.
Those could be through fundraising and endowments, such as working with our alumni and other stakeholders to see where their priorities and what we’re doing at the university and at this college fit. It could also be through executive education, where we’d provide certificate programs or other services to the business community. There are opportunities in the area of distance learning as well, where we could provide continuing education and maybe degree programs at the graduate level that would allow us to charge a differential tuition rate. We need to be creative in how we fund our operations moving forward.
What’s the second building block?
A professionally engaged faculty, which we have. They’re doing amazing things. When you came in, you might have seen the glass counter with the articles our faculty have published. Our faculty are engaged in the community as well. We have faculty working on the fiber optic economic development plan, we have faculty engaged in local entrepreneurship, in terms of helping to start up businesses, and we have outstanding faculty in the classroom, which is why Business Week regularly recognizes us. Our biggest challenge is not having a professionally engaged faculty, but retaining our professionally engaged faculty.
And the third building block?
Looking at international experiences for students and faculty, such as developing short-term study abroad. We need to build key strategic partnerships with other universities to allow our students to study abroad and to also bring students here. The setting, the campus, the environment and the quality of the education here create opportunities to bring in international students interested in studying abroad.
What else are you looking at doing?
Developing innovative curriculum and providing innovative delivery of the curriculum. When I talk about having an “innovative curriculum,” I’m thinking about multidisciplinary programs. I have a background in arts and sciences, so I believe there are opportunities to bring the arts and sciences students here. We have a minor in business for arts and sciences students, but we don’t focus on it.
And we can look at ways for our students to take courses outside of the business school. Say a student is interested in international business. It makes more sense for him to take a class in Asian studies than it does for him to take another marketing class in which he’ll do another case study on why Company X’s product launch was not successful. So we’re looking at ways of blending the curriculums. We’re also looking at ways of responding to the needs of our community, including the local business community.
“Innovative delivery” involves how we leverage the technology to enhance the learning experience and extend our reach. We want to provide our expertise within Chattanooga and beyond. If you work at McKee Foods, and you’re interested in our graduate program, you’d need to leave work in Ooltewah at 4:30 to be here for a 5:30 class. And you’d be doing that two to three nights a week. That’s not a schedule to which a lot of people can commit. But maybe we could give them the opportunity to take some classes via distance learning.
What’s the fifth component of your plan?
Building strong stakeholder relationships. We’ve got good ties with the community, supportive alumni and a supportive business base in Chattanooga that wants to work with us. We need to strengthen those ties because we need them in order to be successful. And they need the skills our students can provide. So we need to work with our stakeholders in order to provide internships for our students. And we need to bring our stakeholders to the college. We have individuals that want to participate and give back to the college. What if we post internally a list of the folks with expertise who are looking for opportunities to speak in a class?
And the final building block?
Engage, challenge, and support students. “Engage and challenge” them with our curriculum and the opportunities we provide, and “support” them with services that give them the best possibility of success, including career counseling, internship advice, outstanding advising, professional development workshops and so on. What do our students need to allow them to hit the ground running when they graduate and immediately add value to the companies that hire them?