Graduate Program Management Made Simple
(Blog Articles By Rodney)
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Overcoming the Fear of Finance in Executive MBA Programs: A Stepping Stone to Financial Mastery
Overcoming the Fear of Finance in Executive MBA Programs: A Stepping Stone to Financial Mastery by Rodney G. Alsup, D.B.A., CPA, CITPProfessor EmeritusFounder, GME News Digest Business schools must equip future leaders with financial literacy and confidence. The core challenge is bridging the gap between theory and practical application. Experiential learning, especially immersive business simulations and gamification, offers a dynamic, rewarding solution for empowering leaders to make sound financial decisions. See how top programs are meeting the challenge.Ah, finance and accounting—these very words can cause hearts to race and palms to sweat, especially for the talented individuals stepping into Executive MBA (EMBA) programs. Picture this: these are people with rich professional backgrounds, excelling in domains like marketing, operations, or human resources. And yet, the mention of financial statements and investment strategies can seem like a towering wave ready to crash down...
Cultivating Connections: Transforming Student Recruitment Through Relational Engagement
Cultivating Connections: Transforming Student Recruitment Through Relational Engagement by Rodney G. Alsup, D.B.A., CPA, CITPProfessor EmeritusFounder, GME News Digest In the world of student recruitment and enrollment, engagement strategies often fall short because of a reliance on transactional methods. This blog post advocates for a shift towards relational engagement, where personalized help and conversations build trust and community throughout the learner's journey. The proposed "Engagement Matrix" tailors approaches to specific audience segments and key milestones, from attracting leads to nurturing alumni relations. Included is access to an extensive list of creative engagement tactics that encourage a diverse, learner-centered set of approaches to fostering engagement.Several months ago, I attend a webinar on the topic of student recruitment and enrollment. As the topic of engagement came up, connecting with the target audience was a major point of concern for the panelist....
Butts in Seats or Making a Difference?
Butts in Seats or Making a Difference? by Rodney G. Alsup, D.B.A., CPA, CITPProfessor EmeritusFounder, GME News Digest There is a need for graduate business programs to shift from a seat-filling approach to a student-centric, values-driven educational philosophy. Programs that focus on making a meaningful impact, aligning with students’ career goals, and addressing their individual needs enhances both student satisfaction and the program’s reputation. Strategies for making this transition include tailoring program offerings to meet student and market needs, active recruitment, personalized learning paths, quality teaching, and ethical leadership. The successful implementation of these strategies is likely to foster a more ethical, effective, and sustainable graduate education model, benefiting both students and the graduate program.What is your intention as a graduate program leader or team member? Is your aim solely to occupy seats, or is it to make a difference in the lives of...
Are You Using These Four Lead Capture Strategies to Grow Your Graduate Management Education (GME) Program?
Are You Using These Four Lead Capture Strategies to Grow Your Graduate Management Education (GME) Program? by Rodney G. Alsup, D.B.A., CPA, CITPProfessor EmeritusFounder, GME News Digest In today’s highly competitive academic setting, capturing the interest of potential applicants is crucial for growing your graduate program. However, it’s not sufficient to just capture their interest. You need to capture them as a lead. Lead capture, which involves collecting contact information from interested individuals for future communication and engagement, is a crucial tactic. More importantly, it is not a onetime transactional event; it is a process that often occurs over extended periods, even days, weeks, or months.Effective lead capture techniques can affect program appeal and enrollment numbers for graduate program leaders and their teams. The focus of this article is on lead capture, examining different elements that can help make your program not only more attractive to prospective...
10 Cost-Effective Ways to Attract Your Graduate Business Program’s Target Audience
10 Cost-Effective Ways to Attract Your Graduate Business Program’s Target Audience by Rodney G. Alsup, D.B.A., CPA, CITPProfessor EmeritusFounder, GME News Digest In the competitive field of Graduate Business Program Management, attracting your audience starts well before the first day in the classroom. It starts by pinpointing their knowledge gaps. The Attract stage aims to spark interest in potential learners, showing how the program turns gaps into strengths. This phase aims to make a lasting impression and lay groundwork for future engagement, encouraging learners to start their journey by arousing their curiosity. Here are ten cost-effective strategies to attract your target audience.In the complex, fast-paced world of Graduate Business Program Management, understanding and engaging with your program’s target learner is paramount. As you can see in the graphic below, the journey begins long before they step into a classroom or log into an online course. It starts by identifying...
Is Your GME Program Declining, Surviving, or Thriving?
Is Your GME Program Declining, Surviving, or Thriving? by Rodney G. Alsup, D.B.A., CPA, CITPProfessor EmeritusFounder, GME News Digest Last month I posed a question: "If your GME graduate program is here, do you know where 'here' is?" One way to answer this question is to classify your program into one of three states, declining, surviving, or thriving. This classification can be pivotal for strategic planning. Rigorous assessment and a detailed action plan are crucial for growth. The aim is to guide programs from survival or decline towards thriving, outlining steps and strategies for improvement to avoid program closure.In last month’s article, I posed a fundamental question: "If your GME graduate program is here, do you know where 'here' is?" To answer the question, let’s begin by categorizing your program as either declining, surviving, or thriving. Recognizing which state your program is in serves as a crucial first step towards strategic planning and enhancement. It is...
Your graduate program is here! Do you know where here is?
Your Graduate Program is Here! Do You Know Where Here is? by Rodney G. Alsup, D.B.A., CPA, CITPProfessor EmeritusFounder, GME News Digest Getting started on a journey to design, redesign, or manage a successful graduate program can often resemble navigating a sprawling network of streets in a large city you are visiting for the first time. Where do you begin? How can you ensure the path you choose leads to a destination that not only brings success but also brings fulfillment to all the stakeholders involved?Encountering such queries, I found guidance in an enlightening principle of design thinking described in the book by Bill Burnett and Dave Evans' Designing Your Life. They describe the principle from a life design standpoint as “starting from where you are." With a graduate program, I describe it as “starting from where your program is.” For graduate program leaders, the principle can serve as a guide, emphasizing the power of leveraging a program’s current position as the...
The Role of Data in Personalizing the GME Learner Experience
The Role of Data in Personalizing the GME Learner Experience by Rodney G. Alsup, D.B.A., CPA, CITPProfessor EmeritusFounder, GME News Digest Today’s graduate business education sector emphasizes the importance of personalization, recognizing that one size does not fit all. How can data be used to tailor the GME experience for every participant, ensuring that learning is responsive and relevant to individual needs and is more personalized? The short answer is to start by organizing and analyzing the data your systems and processes have already collected and then sharing the results with select groups of GME program constituents. To organize, analyze, and share, we must consider the roles and perspectives of three distinct audiences. Which specific demographic, psychographic, and learning needs data and information would be relevant and useful for each audience? Answering this question is the challenge for achieving data personalization. I set the stage for answering this question in...
The Game Changer- Leveraging Learner Personas for Unparalleled Graduate Program Design
The Game Changer: Leveraging Learner Personas for Improved Graduate Program Redesign by Rodney G. Alsup, D.B.A., CPA, CITPProfessor EmeritusFounder, GME News Digest Imagine a graduate program that is perfectly tailored to every learner, making them feel like it was made just for them. Achieving this is possible using well-crafted learner personas. Getting started with existing programs can be challenging. This article presents a simple approach for program leaders of existing programs to implement learner personas as an effective program management tool. You might ask yourself, “What is the best way to get started?” When dealing with an existing program, one approach is to start by concentrating on the data that is routinely gathered as users progress through the program’s learning path. Data collection is standardized through the submission of various documents, including an online application, personal statement, resume, letters of recommendation, writing sample, standardized test...
Navigating the Future: The Critical Role of Personas in Shaping Graduate Programs
Navigating the Future: The Critical Role of Personas in Shaping Graduate Programs by Rodney G. Alsup, D.B.A., CPA, CITPProfessor EmeritusFounder, GME News Digest A common challenge faced by graduate program leaders and curriculum designers is the lack of a comprehensive understanding of the specific needs of their target learners. Personas, informed by data, can act as a compass, guiding program development and ensuring it meets learner needs. In two distinct studies conducted by GMAC and Accenture, they found that there are different types of learners who are driven by factors like career advancement, intellectual curiosity, or skill development. These studies highlight the importance of understanding your program's target audience. Without clear personas, programs risk offering misaligned content, struggling with engagement, and failing to prepare students for the job market. Ultimately, attracting the wrong learners can harm program reputation and alumni support.Imagine you're...
Who is your graduate program designed to serve?
Who is your graduate program designed to serve? by Rodney G. Alsup, D.B.A., CPA, CITPProfessor EmeritusFounder, GME News Digest Or can you describe your program's target audience? Would your answers be the same or different for each question? Should they be the same or different? Or could they be the same or different? How would the major role players that support your graduate program respond to these questions?The question “Who is your graduate program designed to serve?” isn’t just critical - it is a keystone of strategic planning for a graduate program. But let me reframe this question in different ways to further illustrate its importance. Essential Inquiry: This question is a basic but foundational query that guides every decision in your program design process. It shines a spotlight on the intended audience and the respective needs your program aims to address. Guiding Compass: Serving as a compass, this question helps you determine your target demographic, ensuring that your...
An Integrated Approach to Developing an Effective Graduate Program: Combining Learner and Program Management Perspectives of the Learner Journey
An Integrated Approach to Developing an Effective Graduate Program: Combining Learner and Program Management Perspectives of the Learner Journey by Rodney G. Alsup, D.B.A., CPA, CITPProfessor EmeritusFounder, GME News Digest The effectiveness of a graduate program depends on the understanding of individual learner journeys by program leaders and faculty, as well as the understanding of the program's learner journey by individual learners.The effectiveness of a graduate program depends on the understanding of individual learner journeys by program leaders and faculty, as well as the understanding of the program's learner journey by individual learners. I explored these understandings from two distinct perspectives of the learner journey in my two previous articles. One perspective was that of the learner, and the other was that of the program’s management. This article’s purpose is to show how aligning the two perspectives develops a framework for effectively managing graduate...
From Lead Collection to Fan Creation: Guiding Learners Through Your Graduate Program’s Learner Journey—The Program Management View
Once learners realize a learning need, they usually start a journey to address it. Many times, the journey starts out as self-directed and, at some point, it transitions to a guided journey. When a graduate degree program is involved, much of the self-directed journey planning starts with a web browser and an internet search. And during any stage of their search, learners may evaluate multiple journeys, all created by competing graduate programs.
The journey the learner ultimately selects is likely the one with the best guidance throughout each leg of the journey they are exploring. From a graduate program management view, the best guidance is likely provided by a journey organized around three systems:
From First Encounters to Lifelong Advocacy: Navigating the Learner’s Journey in a Graduate Program – The Learner View
Have you ever thought about the path learners navigate when they go from realizing their need to learn to be a loyal program supporter? When both learners and program leaders really understand the path learners follow, it’s like having a roadmap to success for both. A roadmap with interesting goals like identifying knowledge gaps, choosing a program, enrolling, and becoming a committed supporter. In the following, I describe six stages that most learners follow on their journey. Improving program effectiveness and reputation comes from understanding the learner journey and these stages.
AI Use Cases for GME Programs: How GME Programs Can Streamline Content Creation
Having a consistent, effective, and simple content strategy is critical for any GME program who wants to grow their enrollments. But trying to engage and expand your audience with content is time consuming and not nearly as easy as it seems. Especially when the program team is overworked, understaffed, and trying to juggle running a program along with creating fresh content.
The good news is there are powerful AI tools that can help with content creation. The growth of AI tools can assist GME program team members with streamlining and enhancing the creation of content, whether you’re struggling with mental blocks and need some clever ideas. Or need extra support creating your output.
To help GME program team members use AI, I’ve created some AI use cases, showing how you can use these tools to streamline your content creation.
Graduate Program Leaders Are You Measuring Your Program’s Financial Performance?
Your graduate program is one of the many programs campus leaders funded. Did they make the right decision? Can you show they made the right decision? You can if you are one of the program leaders that’s measuring and reporting on their program’s financial performance.
Many graduate program leaders are not measuring and reporting their program’s financial performance. During the past few years, while talking with graduate business program leaders, I would ask, “Do you know the financial impact your graduate program is having on the B-School’s financial performance?” In most all cases, their response was, “No.”
As the conversations continued, I discovered,
Do You Know Your Graduate Program’s Return on Investment (ROI) for Graduates?
Are you communicating with applicants, students, and graduates the costs and benefits of your program to them individually? Or are you letting others provide them with ROI numbers that may or may not represent their individual ROI? The following article will help you answer these questions.
While curating content for the MBA News Digest, I discovered a resource that graduate program leaders could use as a starting point for learning the ROI of their graduate program. I’m calling this to the attention of graduate program leaders and their team members for two reasons. First, because graduate program applicants are becoming more cost conscious and second, ROI will become an important metric for demonstrating your program’s value to these applicants.
Environmental Scanning for Graduate Program Leaders
Part of graduate program management is the ongoing process of identifying threats and opportunities with the greatest potential of affecting a program’s operations and long-term success. Strategic planners commonly refer to this ongoing process as environmental scanning. While graduate program leaders must address program threats and opportunities, few have a systematic way of identifying those threats and opportunities to which they should be responding.
However, of the graduate business program leaders that have a system, many use the MBA News Digest Weekly Intelligence Briefing as their starting point. But their system often breaks down with how they use the content they receive each week. I think they need to add another round of content curation and aggregation before they can effectively identify their program’s opportunities and threats. I’ll explain my thinking in the following paragraphs.
Is Your Program’s OPM Contract About to End?
If so, are you prepared to renew, change, or end the contract? The decision you make can make or break your program, and even your career. To minimize your risk of failure, I suggest you gather information and make your decision based on four information groupings: learner journey, current contract, OPM options, and data access. The following four sections show how you can use these groupings to organize and track the information you gather for making your decision.
What Concerns You About the Metrics Used to Measure GME Program Performance?
What Concerns You About the Metrics Used to Measure GME Program Performance?Several weeks ago, I surveyed MBA News Digest subscribers asking them to tell me what their two top questions, concerns, or challenges are about the metrics they are using for monitoring and reporting on their GME program’s performance. First, the response to my request was overwhelming. And second, even though not scientifically based, the responses were very informative. I want to share my observations with you. Rankings The most informative, although not surprising, were the many respondents that made the observation about how GME program performance measurement and reporting in their B-Schools and our industry is being driven by rankings. One respondent described it this way, “Rankings tend to become metrics whether we want them to or not. So, I'd like to see programs discuss non-rankings as metrics.” While it may not be possible to shift the discussion completely to non-rankings metrics, it is possible...
Do You Know What is Happening With Your Graduate Program’s Hottest Prospects?
Do You Know What is Happening With Your Graduate Program’s Hottest Prospects?Recently I talked with a GME program leader about how they manage their hottest prospects and the processes they used to get leads to apply to their program. One thing led to another and I ask about GRE/GMAT score reports and how they handle them. I was told the campus graduate program's office receives all score reports and makes them available to campus programs when requested. They do not push the scores to the designated program when received. Someone from each of the individual programs must request the individual score reports. Why? Prospects that have their test score sent to a program are the hottest leads that program will ever get. There is a need for immediate action because test takers usually send their scores to other programs, some of which are likely competitors. So the first program to contact the prospect often gains an advantage. What if? When I hear something like this, my systems...
Do You Know Where Your Time Goes?
Do You Know Where Your Time Goes?This question surfaced during a recent radical collaboration group meeting hosted by the MBA News Digest Academy and facilitated by me. We were meeting to talk about how each program handles GME student advising and the advising challenges programs must address. During the meeting, one program manager described a process she was using to identify what she and her advising team do daily so they could justify additional staffing. Paraphrasing, she said the advising team wanted to know how they were spending their time, what activities were taking the most time, and what student needs were going unmet. Her team wanted to know where their time was going, which is something Peter Drucker said was the starting point for becoming an effective executive. In this context, an effective student advising team. Our Radical Collaboration Meeting The meeting came about because an Academy member wanted to know about advisor to advisee ratios in other GME programs....
Are You Ready to Take Control of Your Calendar Scheduling Experience?
Are You Ready to Take Control of Your Calendar Scheduling Experience? When I launched the MBA News Digest Academy last year, I started meeting with many people. Scheduling took time. I would receive an email asking to meet. I would reply with two or three available times, and sometimes it would take four or five emails to get a meeting scheduled. While I was looking forward to the meeting, scheduling was not something I looked forward to. I knew there had to be a better way of scheduling time on my calendar. So, I started searching for that better way. Here’s my better way. My Scheduling Solution I found an automated scheduling application called Calendly. This application helped me take ownership of my scheduling. Here are a few things I can do with Calendly: Share customized meeting links that give invitees a view of times they can schedule to meet with me. Set a cap on the number of meetings per day that others can schedule with me. Set time buffers that automatically add time...
Graduate Students Need Career Coaching Too!
After 10 years working with students, I’ve noticed two things. First, there is an increased interest in career coaching by graduate students. Second, not all graduate programs provide career coaching for their students. Students want to ensure their degree is valuable in the market and they are asking admission folks critical questions about degree/industry relevancy and return on investment. A career coaching program supports and guides students through their program so when they reach the end of their academic journey, they possess a clear understanding of what they can do with their degree and the personal insight to know what industries and companies they want to invest their talent in. I see three different ways of starting a graduate student coaching program, get to know your students, leverage your program’s LMS, and outsourcing.
Is Your Content Sharing Matching an Audience Need?
Is Your Content Sharing Matching an Audience Need? I receive content daily, some of which applies to me, most of it does not. Why do I get content that is not relevant? The biggest reason is the content creators have failed to match their content to me, the end user. Their assumption is that because I requested one item of content, I will be interested in all content they generate. That is not true for me, and I’m sure it’s not true for you. You can avoid making the same mistake by creating and sharing content that meets the needs of a specific audience or end user. I refer to this as matching. Why is matching important? From a content creators’ standpoint, creating and sharing content to meet a specific user group's needs is important for at least four good reasons. Junk Mail. Many recipients of unwanted email mark it as “junk mail” or “spam” rather than unsubscribing from the list used for emailing. This means that subsequent emails, no matter how relevant it may be to them, goes...