Read the full transcript here
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Hello and welcome to the Trusted Voices Podcast. I’m Teresa Valerio Parrot alongside Erin Hennessy, and in each episode, we discuss the latest news and biggest issues facing higher education leaders through a communications lens.
Erin Hennessy
Oh, hi there.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Oh, hi. Happy December.
Erin Hennessy
And to you, my friend.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Happy month after my birthday.
Erin Hennessy
Somebody said it on some social media this week: Welcome to the three longest, fastest weeks of the year.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Oh, I think that’s about right.
Erin Hennessy
It kind of feels appropriate. I am down to one class left to teach as we record today, which I’m very excited about. And I’m almost done Christmas shopping, so…
Teresa Valerio Parrot
I am just left to wrapping.
Erin Hennessy
Wow.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
There you go.
Erin Hennessy
I’m nowhere close to that, but that’s okay. I feel good. I feel, I feel solid. Anyway, enough about that. Ostensibly, this podcast is about higher education, from what I’ve read in the documentation.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Yes, yes. And it’s also about leadership, and it’s about communication. So let’s do this.
Erin Hennessy
Alright, let’s communicate about leadership and higher education. I think, as we sort of come down to the end of the semester, we’re all pushing through to the finish line, and there’s some really nice journalism dropping lately, in addition to all of the best-of book lists for the year that we are all sharing in our internal Slack.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Yes!
Erin Hennessy
But a story that I read. I read it this morning, that I know is just going to be sticking with me for a bit. Is this piece that we’ll link in the show notes, obviously, titled, “Once a Beacon, Now a Burden,” which is a really lengthy, really beautifully reported piece that is focused on Knoxville College, which is located in Knoxville, Tennessee. And Knoxville College is, man, it’s just a heartbreaker. It has been through the wringer, and currently has really small enrollment, no accreditation. They’ve had 10 presidents in 10 years. Most of them have been alumni. Those folks have also rotated through the board, been board chair, and the buildings are falling into disrepair. It’s just, rip your heart out and just absolutely break it. But it also raises these questions, some of which we talked about with Belle Wheelan and some which we’ve just talked about on our own for years and years and years of, you know, the question of, when is it just time to say it’s done, to shut the place down? And, in this case, when the accreditors have pulled accreditation, and the most recent president has resigned, and the board and alumni are just hell-bent on keeping this place going, whose job is it to finally say enough is enough?
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Yeah, I read this piece in the middle of the night because I couldn’t sleep, just because there’s so much going on in the world. And I had that same thought. And there is this reality that if you have no accreditation, and you have alumni who are hell-bent and aboard and leadership keeping it open, as long as people are willing to pay tuition, then a place will stay open.
Erin Hennessy
Yeah, and pay tuition with no financial assistance. No federal financial assistance, yeah.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
There’s no financial aid. Right. And so at some point it just will be open.
Erin Hennessy
Yeah. And the piece points to some of the other places that have managed to do the unbelievable and go from being unaccredited to earning back accreditation. And these are stories that are just heroic in so many ways, but how long do you give a place to achieve that kind of turnaround?
Teresa Valerio Parrot
I was recently talking to a campus leader. I was on a campus, and we were talking about some of these institutions and what the compounding factors are. And once you start talking about things like the deferred maintenance. You’re not even just talking about the cost of the education, but some of the safety concerns that start to occur on these campuses. And at what cost is really the question that should be asked, right? What is the quality of the education, and what are the safety concerns? And at what cost are we keeping the doors open? And literally, can the doors be held open? At what cost?
Erin Hennessy
Yeah, are we at the point where we’re gonna need to sell the doors, you know?
Teresa Valerio Parrot
At what cost can they even be open?
Erin Hennessy
Yeah.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
And that’s where I start to wonder. And I also understand, and I know that there’s another side to this. There is this emotional factor that these institutions hold for these communities, and there is a gathering space that we’re providing and the economic impact for these towns. I understand all of these, these different points that are raised, but at what cost and what is the benefit?
Erin Hennessy
Yep. I mean, it’s heartbreaking, it’s just … and there’s no good way out. I did love the bit of the story that described one of our colleagues, Robert Kelton, and his graduate students, stepping in to help Knoxville put together an application for accreditation, and I can only imagine what kind of educational experience that was for Robert’s students. I would love to hear more about that. So Robert, if you’re listening, send us a note, because I would love to dig into that process. The other thing that really thrilled me about this piece is (a) that the Chronicle is putting this kind of resources into covering a story like this. And I was just so impressed with clearly, the depth of reporting and also the writing of Jasper Smith, who is a reporting fellow at the Chronicle, is a Howard graduate and led Howard’s student paper as well. So thrilled to see the Chronicle really digging in and doing a long lead feature kind of piece on this institution and its struggles. And I really do hope that a lot of people are reading this because it is just some of the finest reporting we’ve seen around this issue, at least that I’ve seen in a long time.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
It was a really, really good piece, but I do think it raises questions about where we’re putting our time, where we’re putting our effort, and what higher education is going to look like in the future.
Erin Hennessy
And what it’s for, yeah.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Who and what it’s for, right?
EK Ad Read
Higher ed is facing headwinds like never before, and with internal teams leaner than ever, you need outside help that knows what you do and can plug into your operations to help in any way you need, from enrollment, analysis and support to bold, brand-driven, creative and elite user-focused strategies, Electric Kite can help. So yeah, it’s getting windy out there, but that’s okay, because kites rise against the wind. Visit electrickite.com to learn more.
Erin Hennessy
So to raise some other big existential questions in our industry, you may have seen this coverage. This will be the first, and perhaps the last time I will ever cite Boca Raton magazine on the podcast, but I was absolutely fascinated this morning to see that the Florida Atlantic University Board of Trustees approved a job description for their next president that does not require that person to have a college degree.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
I can see that.
Erin Hennessy
I have so many thoughts.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Well, and here’s why I can say that I can see that. I think that as we see the increased “politicalization” of college presidencies, and they’ve always been political, I will say that they have always been, will always be, especially public presidents, and especially as we see the involvement of legislatures in choosing university and college presidents, there are a number of legislators who do not themselves have college degrees.
Erin Hennessy
Sure.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
And so it makes sense that you would have them encouraging job descriptions for higher education presidents to reflect their own credentials as a pipeline for them to find those who have credentials like their own, what reflective university and college presidencies like this.
Erin Hennessy
What a very generous and subtly cynical approach to this story.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
I think if you look at what the trajectory for this presidency—what it has been, my colleague, Michael Harris and I have spent a long time talking specifically about this presidency and the search process. This is not surprising to me. This is exactly where I think this presidency would end up, and I think this reflects probably a number of different candidates that the legislature would like to see in the final pool, and I am not surprised by this turn of events. I’m not. Yeah! And your thoughts?
Erin Hennessy
I mean, I’m interested less in what it says about Florida and Florida Atlantic, and whether or not this is the beginning of a trend…
Teresa Valerio Parrot
I think it is.
Erin Hennessy
The progressive side of me says that there are a number of states, including Maryland and others, as well as the federal government, that have removed the requirement for four-year degrees from a lot of job postings within state government, federal government, and I think that’s great, and my little progressive heart applauds those governors who have done that. I also think it will be fascinating to watch how faculty react, considering that some faculty still have considerable discomfort with folks coming to higher education from outside higher education, and this is that on steroids a bit. And so I think it’s going to be a really interesting source of conversation. And I will be very interested to see senior leaders who are often pushing institutions, particularly faculty, to not do things the way we’ve always done them and to change things up, if they will continue to push for this kind of approach to job descriptions and start leaving out terminal degrees, degrees of any kind. It’s going to be an interesting trend to watch, and whether it makes its way out of red states into purple and blue states, and whether it breaks, as so many things do in our business, along the elite, highly selective boundary, as so many things in our business do.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
This is a piece and a part of a process. So you have the job description, and these are the qualifications within the job description. I would say, look at the totality. This is the piece. Who is on the search committee, and all of these pieces tell you exactly what the intention is in the greater process. So, this is the job description with the qualifications. Who is on the search committee, and how is that search committee stacked? So, that is going to give you another piece of who and what they’re searching for in this president.
And I a couple of years ago, was very intrigued to see, for example, how North Carolina was stacking their search committees, and they moved that so that it was majority among their governors. And when they shifted it in that way, that was definitely pointing to the political nature of where they were moving in their search process. So look to see who’s on the search committee. Look to see what the process is. Look to see who the search firm is, if there’s a search firm. So put together all of the different pieces, and it tells you exactly where this is going and what the outcome is going to be.
So all of the different pieces I think are so fascinating, will be the next coffee that Michael and I have to talk about, what FAU, as an example, is doing and and thinking about, there are so many of us that you know love to have—and Erin and I will have a coffee about this. There are so many of us that love to see. This is theater, and this is political drama, and this is there are so many ways that all of us should be looking at this, because all of the different pieces and the players are telling us a story. Are we paying attention to the stories and to the players? Because there is so much going on in higher education right now. Are we paying attention?
Erin Hennessy
Some of us are.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Some of us are paying attention, and all of the pieces are coming together to tell a hell of a story.
Erin Hennessy
Yep, yep. I’m just gonna keep on going down my list.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Keep going. And then I have a couple of things I’m working and planning on.
Erin Hennessy
Okay, the other piece, and I shared this with our team after I shared it with my Georgetown students, is a piece that I missed a couple months ago from Axios, and it really kind of highlights a larger conversation that we’ve been having internally about sort of what happens to our work and as trusted media, depending where you look, continues to plummet or holds flat or plummets among some people, and all to say, it’s a tough time to be reaching people through traditional media outlets.
Axios reported this quick piece on thought leaders moving to social media and most heavily LinkedIn as opinion sections continue to be cut or eliminated altogether in more legacy media, and there’s some really interesting data points in here, I thought. Talking about LinkedIn seeing a 23% increase in posts from chief executives, and that led to a 39% increase in followers for them. But the one that really blew my mind, and I’m scrolling desperately to see it, this is according to readership data that Axios had access to. And again, this is a piece from August, but they say in the last 30 days, New York Times opinion articles saw 37% more readers than its general news coverage…
Teresa Valerio Parrot
I don’t doubt that.
Erin Hennessy
…while op-eds in the Wall Street Journal attracted a whopping 571% more eyeballs than general news. Mind-blowing.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
But I’m also not surprised. I’m not surprised in part because they’re choosing some really polarizing opinions to run with. They’re going with some clickbaity kind of stuff. So that’s not surprising to me.
Erin Hennessy
Okay.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Right? Don’t you think?
Erin Hennessy
No! I think it’s hugely surprising, yeah, and I think that 571% particularly, I feel like the Wall Street Journal paywall is much tougher than the New York Times paywall to get around and get through. So how folks are accessing those is interesting to me. Particularly if they’re seeing those kinds of numbers, it leads me to wonder why other organizations are shutting down their opinion section. Why CNN is shutting it down, why Gannett is cutting back. I just think it’s fascinating.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
I feel like those two papers in particular went for clickbait, really extreme opinions in this last election cycle. And I feel like there were a lot of gifted articles of people who were outraged with some of the pieces that were run. So I can, I can see that.
Erin Hennessy
Okay. Well, what do you have on your list?
Teresa Valerio Parrot
So I started in August talking about, I was super excited about a decision-making framework that I had worked on with one of my campuses. I started this semester, because I still think of everything, everything in semesters. So I started the semester with a decision-making framework, and I’m ending the semester thinking about how I’m talking to campuses, about getting their houses in order in advance of the spring semester. So I’m really talking about that in two ways, with campuses in advance of the new administration. One is thinking about expert guides and really trying to frame those because we really had whiplash news cycles when we had the previous Trump administration. So making sure that you have your expert guides organized and you are ready to go, because there was no same news cycle in any kind of method or pattern from day to day. So every day was, you were running to catch the news from day to day, so making sure you’re getting expert guides in order. And what are you working on? What are you doing so that you have at your fingertips something that is easy to, kind of, sort through and find what you need so that you can follow those really quick turning news patterns, cycles and just quick turn days.
So, getting your expert guides in order, but not losing track of strategy, because it’s really easy for four years for all of us just to chase whatever is the news of the day. Make sure you’re still thinking about strategy. So spending the next month really clearly articulating mission, strategic plan and successes, so that you can provide examples of what each of those are. So what is all of the tactical stuff? And how can you quickly chase the news? But also, how are you going to dig in and really talk about what you do well? Now is the time to be thinking about that. So if I started the semester with decision-making frameworks, that’s great, and you’re still going to be needing to do that. But also, let’s talk about tactics and strategies, so that when we kick off the next semester, we’re really thinking about who we are, what we’re doing, who we’re serving, and our impact. So that’s what I’m doing right now.
Higher Voltage Ad Read
Higher ed is changing fast, from declining enrollments following trust in public institutions and the rise of artificial intelligence, higher education leaders have never faced greater challenges than they do now. Higher Voltage is a regular podcast hosted by industry veteran Kevin Tyler. In each episode, he talks to higher ed leaders and experts to get their take on what’s working, what’s not and what has to change. Higher Voltage isn’t just for anyone who works in higher education. Is for anyone who is interested in or cares about higher education. Listen to Higher Voltage anywhere you get your podcasts.
Erin Hennessy
I think it’s also a good time to for folks to look at their budget for the back half of the fiscal year and to think about in that beautiful, frictionless universe where extra dollars exist, where do you also need to brush up on trainings, whether it’s crisis communication, media training, whether it is thinking about thought leadership and pushing towards more of that strategic work. This is a time to start thinking about what your investments are, again, moving from the tactical to the strategic, what you can do with those dollars to really make a lasting impact for your team, for your leadership team, and for the folks that are in the trenches with you.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
I agree, and I can’t stress enough, you just made my heart so happy. I think where I’m really seeing impact right now is where people are investing in professional development. So whether it is having people read books or looking at conferences or it’s we just had a colleague who finished a certificate program in strategic communications. I think it’s investing in people, because you can never go wrong and thinking about whether it’s from a budget standpoint, a time standpoint, how are you supporting people and thinking about what they might need right now so that they can be successful and not just survive, but thrive in whatever comes next.
Erin Hennessy
Yeah, and I would encourage folks to think creatively about that. It doesn’t have to be a webinar or a conference or a certificate, although those are all worthy things, but it could also just be sending a member of your team to shadow someone else on campus and get some cross training, or to shadow someone at a different institution where you have relationships so that a younger staffer at a private institution can see what it’s like to work at a public and vice versa. There’s all kinds of ways to mix and match there. And so I think those more creative opportunities are great to think about as well.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
You’ve just gave me a segue to the next thing I wanted to talk about.
Erin Hennessy
Look at me!
Teresa Valerio Parrot
I know. I had this really cool opportunity last night, late my time, I got to be on a webinar with CASE colleagues. They were in Australia, they were in Singapore, they were in Hong Kong and in a number of different Asia countries, to talk about this draft framework that we have for measuring marketing and communications impact. How cool is that?
Erin Hennessy
Yeah!
Teresa Valerio Parrot
So I told them I was coming to them from the past, and they just kind of just rolled their eyes at me. But anyway, I got to talk to them last night about this draft framework that I was a part of helping to create, and we were rolling it out with them and asking what they thought was helpful and what we could improve upon. And they were able to come up with some suggested metrics for us within this framework. And one of the other people who helped with this framework, she was talking about how she’s using this framework, and she’s using it as a professional development tool with her team. So she’s talking with using this draft framework, which you can find on the CASE website, and it’ll be in our show notes, to use it to talk about how her team works across the campus to assist other units with their own measurement, with their own successes, with their own efforts. And she’s walking them through how they work with others, how they assist others, and how they are made stronger, and they make other units stronger. And they’re using it as a professional development tool to then also figure out how they can learn more and be stronger in their own jobs as a cross-functional unit. I loved that.
Erin Hennessy
That’s great.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Yeah, but it was also neat to hear from other MarComm professionals across the globe how their jobs are similar and different from how we approach our jobs here. It’s really cool.
Erin Hennessy
Yeah, I haven’t seen it, but I’m really interested because I know one of the things that CASE has been trying to do for years is to be cognizant that communications and marketing aren’t always marcomm, that there are differences between those two fields. And I think communicators are always jealous of the data that marketers have access to. But do you want to preview a little bit of what kind of metrics and data are in there for just straight communicators?
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Absolutely. So one of the things that we did is we talked about how strategic communications is a part of the greater, let me give the exact framing for this, brand and reputation foundation within marketing and communications. So there are six different broad categories and functions within brand and reputation that we outline in this foundational flower, we call it, within brand and reputation, it literally looks like a flower. We talk about how, over time, brand and reputation has started to create both opportunities, but also responsibilities, and therefore potential liabilities for us if we don’t have a way to talk about how we measure and also can talk about successes, of how we contribute to these different areas.
So part of why we’re trying to do this is to say how we can represent our work and also show value, so that when we are asked how we contribute, we can show that value or we have a liability that we aren’t able to capture. So that’s really the intent behind the framework, is to have us both celebrate our work, but also defend, if necessary, what our contributions are to the overall institution’s value. Did that make sense?
Erin Hennessy
It does. I think I’ll speak on behalf of you and all of us when I say we’re always trying to find something that is less squidgy than all those estimated eyeball numbers. It sounds like this is more conceptual than analytics, but I think that’s a helpful first step.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
So it actually includes three different levels of measurement. We’re talking about reporting, analysis and insights. So we actually want to get away from the squishy, because what we have found is, in the past, MarComm has had the squishy, and therefore we haven’t been able to drill down in the same ways that, for example, alumni and recruitment have been able to do. So we’re really wanting to be able to have brand and reputation have that same kind of solid number rigidity, as well as talk about what some of those other measurements look like. So we want to have the connection to brand, recruitment and retention, strategic communications, alumni engagement, philanthropy and external engagement in public affairs because we contribute to all of those. But we aren’t always able to articulate it and measure it and show what the outcome is. So if we’re contributing to it, and we also sometimes have the vulnerability. If there is accountability to be tied to it, let’s be able to talk about it, measure it, and show how we contribute to it.
Erin Hennessy
Great.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Yeah.
Erin Hennessy
What else?
Teresa Valerio Parrot
So that’s what I’m thinking about and working on.
Erin Hennessy
What’s your plan for break?
Teresa Valerio Parrot
I am going to be doing a whole bunch of nothing, and I’m super excited about it. How about you?
Erin Hennessy
I am similarly going to be doing nothing. It’s usually the time where I try desperately to juice my number of books read for the year. But I’m thinking about setting that aside, because I’m at a pretty respectable number, and instead trying to read Robert Caro’s The Power Broker, which is, I don’t know, 1200 pages? A lot of pages.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Oh my gosh! Is it so big that it hurts your hands and you have to hold it?
Erin Hennessy
Yes, but they have finally put out a Kindle version.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Smart.
Erin Hennessy
But for something like that, I want the tactile. So, we’ll see.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Yeah. I think I probably have to fess up on something that I’m going to be doing this holiday season, because if I didn’t say I was doing it, I have two people who are going to immediately contact me and say that I need to have accountability on it. I am going to start working on a book that Michael Harris and Sondra Barringer and I are working on.
Erin Hennessy
That’s great.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
I’m working on a book on presidents and boards, and I’m super ecstatic.
Erin Hennessy
Yeah, this has been a long time coming, right?
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Yes, we’ve been talking about this, and we’ve been whiteboarding it for about two years, and we finally are going to start working. So in about a year, we should be wrapping it up. But this is exciting. On my first chapter is on prestige.
Erin Hennessy
Mmm pro or con?
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Always pro. Big fan of prestige.
Erin Hennessy
Yeah, huge. Huge!
Teresa Valerio Parrot
So I am going to be spending next weekend in a library, and my geeky little heart is so excited.
Erin Hennessy
Yeah, do we have a publisher for this fine tone?
Teresa Valerio Parrot
I’m not gonna jinx us, but yes.
Erin Hennessy
We have. But how is that jinxing it? You haven’t signed the contract yet?
Teresa Valerio Parrot
We haven’t signed the contract yet.
Erin Hennessy
Ah, so we don’t have a publisher.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
We do, but I haven’t signed the contract yet.
Erin Hennessy
Okay.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
But it’s an exciting one.
Erin Hennessy
Okay.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Yeah, as soon as it’s out there, we’ll put it in the show notes.
Erin Hennessy
Harlequin. Harlequin romance.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Oh, I wish!
Erin Hennessy
I can imagine the cover shot.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
And then the movie is gonna come out on the Hallmark Channel.
Erin Hennessy
Oh, dear God.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Because that’s what Michael Harris would want.
Erin Hennessy
Gird your loins, people.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Gird your loins! [Laughter]
Erin Hennessy
It’s gonna be a long process. On that note, I think we’ve done enough damage here.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Yes. Happy Holidays, Erin Hennessy!
Erin Hennessy
Happy Holidays to you, Teresa. And thanks to every single person who has spent any amount of time listening to any of the ridiculous things we have said on this program over the past couple of months, and we look forward to being back with you early in 2025.
Teresa Valerio Parrot
Thank you everybody.
Erin Hennessy
Thank you everybody, and thanks especially to our team behind the scenes for making us sound so good.
Thank you for joining us for this episode. You can find links in the show notes to some of the topics and articles referenced, and remember that you can always contact us with feedback questions or guest suggestions at trustedvoices@tvpcommunications.com be sure to follow Trusted Voices wherever you get your podcasts. And we also invite you to check out Higher Voltage, another podcast on the Volt network, which is hosted by Kevin Tyler. Kevin explores the evolution of higher education that is happening right before our eyes. Until next time, thanks to Teresa Valerio Parrot, DJ Hauschild, Aaron Stern, Nicole Reed and the Volt team for a great episode. And thank you for listening.
