Research shows that leveraging the strengths of an individual is ultimately more successful than focusing on improving weaknesses. The same is true for organizations. Institutional Research can be instrumental in empowering colleges and universities to identify and leverage their strengths for continuous and innovative breakthrough improvements.
How can these strengths be accurately identified?
One common and effective way to identify organization strengths is through a comprehensive SWOT analysis. To be effective, SWOTs should be conducted across the organization for cross-departmental input. Best practices in conducting SWOTs are abundant. Also consider looking at organizations outside of higher education who do this well. (The Ritz-Carlton Hotel is one excellent example.)
Institutional Research staff can play a role in collecting and analyzing the SWOT results, but the identification of strengths does not stop here. It is not uncommon for organizations to identify strengths that are not really strengths. For example, a college may believe they have a strength of exceptional customer service, yet when students are surveyed, this does not appear to be the case. The point is that all strengths must be supported by evidence. Institutional Research is frequently the department that can provide such evidence, thereby validating identified strengths.
There are also situations when organizations are unaware of their strengths. As an example, I site visited an organization that had an unidentified strength of building and maintaining partnerships. It took an external group to see the evidence and identify the strength. Institutional Research can use survey analysis, focus groups, and other studies to pinpoint strengths that may not have emerged during the SWOT analysis.
Another effective approach for identifying organizational strengths is one I learned while following the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award Criteria. It is called identifying Core Competencies. As defined by Baldrige, Core Competencies are:
“your organization’s areas of greatest expertise; those strategically important, possibly specialized capabilities that are central to fulfilling your mission or that provide an advantage in your market or service environment. Core competencies are frequently challenging for competitors or suppliers and partners to imitate, and they may provide an ongoing competitive advantage or create opportunities in your business ecosystem.
In this sense, it forces an organization to think more deeply about its strengths, particularly in relation to its mission, strategy and competitive environment. Once again, Institutional Research can play a key role in empowering an organization to pinpoint Core Competencies with survey data, research studies, and environmental scans. The process of identifying Core Competencies causes the organization to think and operate as one integrated unit for improved student success and overall institutional effectiveness.
Organizational Core Competencies and Strengths should be reviewed annually to ensure their continued validity. Internal or external changes may require that the SWOT and Core Competency processes be repeated annually. Barring significant changes, they may be repeated on a two- or three-year cycle.
What does it mean for an organization to lead with its strengths?
Once strengths and core competencies have been identified and validated, it is important for an organization to double-down on its strengths and not rest on its laurels. This is another area where Institutional Research can keep this top of mind for the administration. For example, suppose that your college or university is known to have the best Engineering Department in the state. Institutional Research can help here by instilling a little bit of “Productive Paranoia” in the organization. I first learned about this concept when reading Jim Collins’ Great By Choice. Always keep a watchful eye on the performance of competing programs. Never assume that your strength is everlasting, find ways to make existing strengths even stronger, and importantly, Institutional Research can assist in finding ways to develop new strengths in response to student needs and drivers in the marketplace.
Organizations may lead with and leverage strengths/core competencies to address areas of needed improvement. For example, my college identified an institutional Core Competency of the ability to think outside of the box and rapidly deploy related strategies. The college led with this strength to address student success in one of its core subject areas. Faculty identified an innovative approach used outside of higher education to address this issue. The result was improved student success leading that of the county and state for this subject area. Institutional Research had been instrumental in identifying this Core Competency, instructional leadership leveraged the competency for continuous improvement, and Institutional Research validated with results with an evaluation of this innovative approach.
Leading with your strengths does not imply that areas of needed improvement should be ignored or not prioritized. It means that leveraging organizational strengths represents one of the best opportunities for your college to be the best place it can be to teach, learn, and build community.
