Information: Getting from Concepts to Results

A Nuventive-NCCI Professional Development Certificate Program Focused on Information Strategy
for Institutional Improvement

Information is central to how colleges and universities achieve their missions. As higher education’s network for change leadership, the Network for Change and Continuous Innovation (NCCI) has an important role in guiding practitioners on how to effectively apply information to every aspect of their work—whether that involves incremental or transformational improvement. Information plays a role in strategic planning, enhancing institutional performance and effectiveness, supporting day-to-day decision-making, promoting innovation, assessing outcomes, and guiding continuous improvement efforts.

A great deal of potentially useful information is available within our institutions and from external organizations and resources. However, most institutions have too few leaders and facilitators with the competencies, skills, and tools necessary for identifying the right information and for effectively curating, analyzing, and disseminating it to guide effective decision-making.

NCCI and Nuventive are collaborating on a program to address this issue. Through this program, which has now been refined based on our experience with the recently completed first iteration, our aim is to equip participants with the knowledge and skills necessary to facilitate more effective and use of information, information tools, and information strategy within their institutions. The deadline for registration is Friday, October 6.

Member: $750 | Nonmember: $1,500

Register Now

The program is organized around information usage in strategy setting, decision-making, and problem-solving within higher education institutions:

  • What information is needed and from what sources?
  • Who needs this information?
  • What is the best way to organize the information and make it accessible?
  • How can barriers to the use of information be overcome to facilitate effective use by those who need it?
  • What role can information strategists play in facilitating this work, and how can this knowledge and skill set be used to advance a culture that makes better and more systematic use of information?

The program consists of five online, interactive modules offered synchronously. Modules 1–4 are 90 minutes in length, and Module 5 is 120 minutes in length. Sessions consist of a blend of case studies, examples from participant’s institutions, group problem solving, and “lecturettes” to explore approaches, alternative strategies, and to identify best practices. The program faculty members have broad-ranging experience in institutional effectiveness and improvement, with an emphasis on information, information tools, and information strategy. Participants will gain knowledge and skills to apply on their own campuses. Formal certification will be provided upon completion of the program, and in addition, a supportive, information-sharing network will live on as a community of practice for program participants.

The goals of the program are to: (1) enrich NCCI programming and (2) equip program participants with skills to become high-impact campus leaders and facilitators in the strategic use of information to improve analysis, decision-making, and action. The program will explore approaches and best-practice applications in administrative, academic, and service units across an institution.

For NCCI members, the collaboration will:

  • Establish an innovative professional development and networking opportunity
  • Expand participants’ expertise as key campus thought leaders, influencers, and facilitators of institutional innovation and change in the role as information strategists
  • Provide access to state-of-the-art ideas and influential thought leaders in an area of recognized and growing importance
  • Stimulate the growth of a community of skilled practitioners who share their knowledge, skills, tools, and outcomes with each other

For NCCI, the collaboration will:

  • Offer an innovative professional development option to add to the NCCI portfolio serving current and potential members
  • Broaden NCCI member opportunities
  • Expand NCCI interest area boundaries
  • Enhance membership recruitment and continuity
  • Establish a unique model for partnering with higher education corporate thought leaders

Module 1: Becoming an Information Strategist for Your Institution: What You Need to Know and Do
October 10, 1–2:30 p.m. Eastern | Brent Ruben, Dave Raney, Dave Teske

Module 2: Determining What Information is Needed and Where to Get It
October 24, 1–2:30 p.m. Eastern | Andrew Jones and John Voloudakis

Module 3: Identifying and Working with Individuals and Groups Who Need Information
November 7, 1–2:30 p.m. Eastern | Bill Dillon and Brent Ruben

Module 4: Selecting the Best Methods and Formats for Making Information Accessible and Actionable
November 28, 1–2:30 p.m. Eastern | Dave Raney, Angela Song, John Voloudakis

Module 5: The End Game: Creating a Data-Informed and Action-Oriented Culture
December 12, 1–3 p.m. Eastern | Bill Dillon, Richard Katz, Brent Ruben, Dave Raney

Bill Dillon, prior to retirement, served as executive vice president of the National Association of College and University Business Officers (NACUBO), business officer at both Carnegie Mellon University and Chatham University, and national vice president of market development for the ARAMARK Corporation. Dr. Dillon holds a bachelor’s degree in industrial engineering from Carnegie Mellon University and both an MPA in public and international affairs and a Ph.D. in higher education administration from the University of Pittsburgh. He has taught undergraduate courses in finance and operational analysis at both Carnegie Mellon University and Chatham University and in the MBA program at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Dillon has also published articles related to a wide range of business and educational issues and has been a speaker at numerous higher education gatherings.

Andrew C. Jones, founder and CEO of Creating Futures, LLC, served as an executive administrator in higher education for over 30 years. He most recently served as interim president at Los Angeles Trade Tech College and previously as chancellor of Coast Community College District (California), president of the Community College of Baltimore County (Catonsville, Maryland), and provost at Sojourner-Douglass College (Maryland). Dr. Jones has led state and regional initiatives to address the declining role of minorities in small business and entrepreneurism, and he remains involved with state and regional workforce efforts. Currently, he is working on projects to include blockchain use in education and business, employee competency mapping, and deploying AI and VR environments in broad-based environments and domains. 

Richard Katz is founder and president of Richard N. Katz & Associates, which provides advice and consulting on education, information, and IT strategy, as well as on institutional performance management to colleges and universities worldwide and to corporations, foundations, and associations that support higher education. Katz served as chief technology advisor to the Deputy President of the National University of Singapore and executive vice president of Nuventive, LLC. He has served as vice president of EDUCAUSE, and in 2018, was recognized with the EDUCAUSE Leadership Award for impact and influence in higher education technology. While holding senior leadership positions at the University of California, he received the award for innovation for his work leading the university’s business transformation. He is the author or editor of seven books and more than 80 articles and monographs on a variety of management and technology topics. His book Dancing with the Devil was named one of the year’s 10 most influential education books by Lingua Franca. Katz’s videos “EDU@2020” (2007), EDU@2025 (2012), and Edifice Rex: The Place of Place (2014) are examples of how his work transcends information technology to raise awareness of higher education’s role in building lives of impact. He holds degrees from the University of Pittsburgh, UC Berkeley, and UCLA.

David Raney has provided strategic and operational leadership for Nuventive since its inception in 2000. After completing his fellowship, Dr. Raney founded two innovative programs at the Children’s Hospital of Denver. Dr. Raney joined the faculty at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center in 1993, where numerous new programs and business units were created under his leadership. In 1999, Dr. Raney left academic medicine to focus entirely on entrepreneurial endeavors. In addition to serving as CEO of Nuventive, he led the growth of a medical software line and a human services software and consulting company. Dr. Raney holds an MD degree from Vanderbilt University and a BA in psychology from the University of California, Davis.

Brent Ruben is a distinguished professor of communication, founder and senior fellow at the Center for Organizational Leadership, and advisor for strategy and planning in the Office of the Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs at Rutgers University. He is the author of more than 50 books and numerous chapters and articles on organizational communication, leadership, strategy, assessment, planning, and change in higher education. His most recent books are Implementing Sustainable Change in Higher Education: Principles and Practices of Collaborative Leadership (Stylus, 2022) and A Guide for Leaders in Higher Education (second edition) (2021 – with R. De Lisi and R. Gigliotti), which was recognized as the book of the year by the National Communication Association, Applied Communication Division (2018). Dr. Ruben was a founder of the Rutgers Department of Communication and a founder and first president of the Network for Change and Continuous Innovation in Higher Education (NCCI). He received the Malcolm Baldrige Quality Foundation Inaugural Award for National Leadership Excellence in Education (2018) and other scholarly and professional awards from the National Communication Association (NCA), the National Association for College and University Business Officers (NACUBO), Rutgers University, and other organizations.

Angela Song has more than two decades of strategy management and organizational assessment experience and is recognized for translating complex information into easily understood, accessible, and actionable insights. She is the Senior Director of Operational Strategic Initiatives at UC San Diego, where she facilitates and leads high impact campus-and-system-wide projects and programs that drive operational excellence. Adapting and applying the Balanced Scorecard framework to higher education, she was instrumental in UC San Diego being the first university to be inducted into the international Balanced Scorecard Hall of Fame (2004). She leads Tritonlytics, an award-winning program (California Higher Education Collaborative, 2018) that delivers organizational climate and continuous improvement surveys, innovation management, machine learning, and higher education benchmarking across the United States. Angela holds an MA and PhD in Industrial and Organizational Psychology from UC Berkeley, is a Lean Six Sigma Black Belt, and is a certified Leadership Development Coach with the Center for Creative Leadership. She sits on the Board of Directors for the Network for Change and Continuous Innovation (NCCI), and is a member of the UC San Diego CFO Committee for Inclusive Excellence, where she champions campus diversity and inclusion initiatives.

John Voloudakis, VP of consulting services at Nuventive, has 30+ years of experience consulting to and working in higher education institutions, including five years at Harvard University, and education practice leadership positions with three major management consulting firms: Huron Consulting Group, BearingPoint (formerly KPMG Consulting), and Ernst & Young. He also served as an EDUCAUSE Center for Applied Research (ECAR) Research Fellow for nearly a decade and was on the Board of Western Governor’s University for several years. Voloudakis has significant experience helping higher education institutions of various sizes and missions with a wide range of planning activities, including strategic planning, operational planning, and enterprise transformation programs. His focus is on developinghigh-quality plans and planning approaches that are tailored to the specific needs of each client and their unique organizational structure, staffing, culture, and related processes. He also has deep experience helping institutions develop meaningful metrics to gauge the impact of their planning activities on their goals and working with their technology and institutional research teams to make these metrics accessible to the organization. Voloudakis holds an MBA from Boston University and a BA from Tufts University. He has also earned the PMP (Project Management Professional) certification from the Project Management Institute. 

Certificate Recipients:

  • Sherry Buss, Director of Administration, Lehigh University
  • Sarah Button, Project Manager, University of Michigan
  • Michael Dean, Manager, Student Affairs Technology Projects, Austin Community College
  • Davina Desnoes, AVP, Budget & Planning, University Budget Director, Cornell University
  • Melanie Dow, Senior Quality Advisor, Carleton University
  • Kristina Givens, Senior Process Improvement Consultant, Virginia Tech University
  • Tanya Grove, Assistant Director and Sr. Management Consultant, Cornell University
  • Ravneet Kaur, Senior Manager, Business Transformation & Program Management, University of Toronto
  • Jolie Lam, Program Manager, University of California Berkeley
  • Ari Mack, Organizational Development Consultant, Cornell University
  • Kristine Mahoney, Senior Director of Strategic Initiatives & Academic Integration, Cornell University
  • Kristi Moore, Sr. Process Improvement Coordinator, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
  • Ali Piovesan, Accounts Payable, Indiana University Bloomington
  • Alyson Pohlman, Project and Fiscal Coordinator, University of Wisconsin-Madison
  • Donna Robertson, Senior Director, Clemson University
  • Sharon Rogers, Process Improvement Analyst, University of Maryland
  • Jennifer Roth-Burnette, Director, Learning Commons, University of Alabama
  • BeYonne Tinsley, Business Process Consultant, University of Maryland
  • Adam Seid, Associate, Organizational Excellence, University of Virginia

About Nuventive

Nuventive enables higher education institutions to turn their plans into progress through the better use of information. Its cloud-based data-informed improvement platform brings business process and information together to support any improvement initiative, including overall strategy; accreditation; student success; diversity, equity, and inclusion; learning outcomes; general education; administrative outcomes; program review; and sustainability. Nuventive is headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania with distribution in North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific regions. For more information, please visit https://nuventive.com/.