Education
SEASON 2, Ep. 14 Building Trust and Driving Change with Thom D. Chesney, President of Southwestern College (NM)
In this episode of Higher Ed Leaders, Thom D. Chesney, President of Southwestern College, shares his unique journey through higher education and the transformative mission of his institution. He discu...
SEASON 2, Ep. 14 Building Trust and Driving Change with Thom D. Chesney, President of Southwestern College (NM)
Education •
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Interactive Transcript
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Welcome to Higher Ed Leaders, the podcast for college and university professionals looking
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for real tools and real talk to amplify their impact.
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If you believe that higher ed is unparalleled in its ability to transform individual lives
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and society as a whole, you've come to the right place.
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On this show, you'll hear from presidents as well as VPs of enrollment, advancement strategy,
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academic affairs, student affairs, finance and more about their higher ed journeys and
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what they're doing to lead at their respective institutions.
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And this season we're focusing specifically on entrepreneurial leadership, so things
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like what we can do to pick up the pace, make decisions based on imperfect data and say
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no to initiatives that don't align.
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Let's dive in.
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Tom, welcome to the podcast.
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It's so great to have you.
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How are you today?
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I am doing great, Susanna.
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It is great to be a part of this.
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Thanks for the invitation.
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Yes, super excited to start out by hearing about your higher ed journey.
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You are on your third presidency right now at Southwestern College.
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So can you tell us about your journey and how you ended up in the role you have right now?
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Yeah, it would be a delight to do so.
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I've shared in a number of settings over the years what I call my circuitous journey through
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higher ed and really when I reflect on it, I spoke to this with somebody the other day.
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Since 1984, when I started undergraduate school at Washington University in St. Louis,
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I've been on a college campus every year thereafter.
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So depending on whether work study counts or not, I have a 40 year career in higher education.
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You know, my formal education is a degree in Spanish, which could not be a more useful
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and artistic kind of degree from WashU, a creative writing degree in Minnesota.
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What is now Minnesota State Mankato.
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And then I did my doctorate in modern British post-colonial literature.
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I'm an Orwell scholar, which is super relevant these days in the US politics and just in living
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and seeing what's going on around us.
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I did that at Florida State.
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And then I started the traditional route of a faculty position at Whitman College and
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Walla Walla Washington, so a small private institution.
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And that's my wife on the music faculty there.
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And we went together after one year positions by design,
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went there to East Tennessee State University and both taught there.
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And to Texas Wesleyan University, so a regional public now to a private religious
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affiliated and Wesleyan institution and to Pennsylvania College of Technology in
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Williamsport, Pennsylvania, a two year institution that was affiliate of a public system.
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As an administrative role then, it was my first, it was an assistant dean.
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Then went back to Texas and was there for quite some time.
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I was a dean and a provost at large multi-campus community college,
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Colin College there went to work at University of Texas at Dallas in a totally different role.
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Kind of downshifted and became a accreditation liaison, academic support services,
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associate provost in that role.
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I was teaching creative writing again.
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And then that first presidency, you mentioned that came along at Brookhaven College
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in the Dallas County Community College system.
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Seven independent colleges, which today are now part of one Dallas College,
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was there eight years as a president before going to a small liberal arts college,
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a slack at Clark University in Dubuque, Iowa,
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moving out of Texas and doing that for four years.
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Before I took the first break, I call it my sabbatical.
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I'd never had one in any of those roles that I'm briefly touching on.
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It did some discernment and listening and thinking about where to go next,
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more so than what to do and low and behold in that discovery process.
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I rediscovered in some respects, Southwestern College here in Santa Fe.
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New Mexico where I started as president of July in 2024.
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So differing roles, different places, different sectors,
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which really in many ways has enriched my experience certainly,
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but also my perspective, my point of view of how I look at higher.
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How I look at it is the spectrum of education students come in and out at different spots.
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And I don't sectorize much with public and private and two year and four year.
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I just sort of look at it all as it's all post-secondary.
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And how do we work together? What can we do all for the greater good if that makes sense?
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Yeah, wow, wow.
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Southwestern College has this really fascinating mission to me,
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which is transforming consciousness through education.
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Tell us a little bit about that.
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That seems a little different to me that mission than what we're seeing
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from a lot of other institutions.
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And then the location in Santa Fe is also really appealing.
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So what is Southwestern all about?
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And what was it in the past and where are you trying to take it
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for the future?
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Yeah, so, you know, founded by visionaries who, you know,
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first looked for a space to found a library and bring some research and study of consciousness forward
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back in 1976 and initially in Alamagordo, New Mexico.
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And just a few years later, by some good fortune and good luck in finding a space in a place
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where we are to this day on Santa Fe's health side.
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Those founders saw that vision.
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You really come to fruition in transforming consciousness through education.
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Peace of that.
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And what are the different kind of roles that would emerge out of those kinds of studies?
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And where we are today, a significant part of what we'll carry forward is in the art therapy
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and counseling.
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And there's even a school counselor track.
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And then our PhD in visionary practice and regenerative leadership is new.
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It's a three to four year program while our first graduates is coming in November in that.
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But that consciousness centered peace is rooted in everything.
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I said to someone the other day that, you know, Southwestern College is all
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in on AI.
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And there's some of the AI we all think of artificial intelligence.
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But AI for us also means altruistic intentions.
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So, you know, when you go into your learning and it's all graduate programs,
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master's degrees in the one PhD, for example.
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And first, look into study of self and understanding why am I coming into this?
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And also, what am I bringing into this?
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So I'm thinking about being a therapist.
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And I've been an artist.
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I've been in other careers doing, you know, doing something else like that.
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I better first understand who I am.
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So courses in altruism.
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You know, we have a master's degree that's consciousness in action as well, just focus on that.
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So imagine for anyone who's maybe had some experience in therapy or counseling.
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And I have myself, it's hard to navigate higher ed for 40 years at not some point.
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One other voices, one other guidance as to how you do that.
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But all of our students, for example,
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as part of their experiential learning, their portfolio learning,
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that they go through, they'll go through counseling therapy as well to really understand and unpack some things.
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One of our graduates said last November, my first graduation, you know,
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when she came to the stage and they each actually share a little something as they cost the stage.
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Just a beautiful ceremony and expression of consciousness centered learning.
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She said, I learned so much and I let go of so much.
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So that's a transformational learning experience.
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That's consciousness centered learning in a very focused nutshell.
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But that's what we bring to the work that we do with each other.
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It is very common here for us to weave into just a regular conversation, a meeting conversation,
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anything we're doing, talking about our core values of service, powerment,
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mindfulness, partnership and love.
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Never been at a place that boldly put forward and you know,
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one of our core values is love.
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So imagine Susan going, you know, interviewing and having someone say,
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how do you see love coming forward as our president and you modeling those values, for example?
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It has to be natural and authentic and be a part of what you do because those graduates of ours, for example,
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they go into the workforce, they all want to have jobs.
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They all want to be part of a maybe it's a private practice.
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Maybe it's part of an agency, a healthcare system, whatever it might be, 96% of them.
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We've got the statistics are in the field during what they came here to do.
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But they're doing it in a very different way when they sit down with someone and give their space to a client's space.
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They can say, I've been in your shoes.
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I have that and that's different in some cases from some clinical programs for very similar degrees or degrees with the same names.
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And I love that.
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Gosh does it feel good to come into that kind of energy, that kind of space on a daily basis?
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Right. Oh my gosh, that's so compelling.
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And so can you just help us understand the audiences that you're mostly focused on grad,
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but what is the breakdown? You have undergrad programs also?
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We have no, we have no undergrads.
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Fleet graduate focused institution, master's degrees and the one doctorate.
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We have a new master's degree coming online next year for its first cohort and transformational teaching learning and leadership.
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And that will be widely appealing to educators and different roles of different types, for example.
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Still a consciousness focus, though, as well to that.
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But when I say we're like a graduate institution, well, we are.
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That's where identified and that's what the higher learning commission accredited us at.
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We are thinking about all of the same things goes back to my experience that we talked about as well.
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We're looking at what are enrollment trends.
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You know, someone says to me, do you care about the enrollment?
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Let me, oh, you don't have to your graduate school.
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Oh, no, that's event horizon.
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What's happening out there? What's coming to us?
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What do we have to pay attention to?
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And there are some things happening in our own state where we're located as well.
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Although, you know, about two thirds of our students are online since the pandemic.
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We flipped from totally on site to online and on site.
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And now it's significantly changed this.
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But the attention to behavioral health, brain health, healthcare is so intensified,
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not only here, but in other parts of the country, that we're having to come forward and really say
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we have some solutions for that.
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We have a means to that.
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And, you know, it starts with what we talked about being conscious and centered and bringing that forward
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so that our graduates bring that forward to the people.
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I mean, that's really differentiating.
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I mean, that you don't have the problem that most institutions have, which is who are we?
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And what do we do?
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And how is that?
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You have that figured out and you have even a really strong focus on grad.
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I guess I'm curious.
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I would just love to know sort of how many students total and are they mostly from the Southwest?
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Are you now that your two thirds online?
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You're drawing them from all over the country?
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Are they international students?
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And then also, are you thinking about potentially breaking out of grad?
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Given the enrollment cliff and all of that?
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And maybe even doing professional learning?
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Are your students typically adult learners who are already in their careers?
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Or are they fresh out of undergrad?
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What's some meat on a bone for?
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Sure.
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You are setting that up.
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It's like, oh, and I was a kid and played T-Ball the only way I could hit a baseball if it wasn't moving.
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So you set that out so perfectly for me.
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We actually already have a continuing education arm, which is really vital, especially here in the state of New Mexico
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for providing licensure and reliciture continuing ed.
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So those CEUs that you would expect and certificate programs as well, like Echo Therapy, for example,
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and Sylasybe and Therapies, which are emerging as well right now,
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got a bill following in the legislature to actually approve those therapies in the state of New Mexico.
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But understanding how those things work and some community education as well.
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We're talking about Southwestern College in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
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There's a real interest here as well in those consciousness studies.
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And some people would like an entry point into that.
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So our new Earth Institute, which is part of Southwestern, is a vital education arm to that.
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And those programs fit in and dovetail beautifully into the graduate programs that we have.
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So that professional school within the school is there.
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Very importantly, also is our chair in a way of a counseling center.
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So a training and education arm of the college.
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So think of our therapists and counselors needing those clinical settings,
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practicums, internships, those kind of roles that have to be a part of the accreditation of those programs as well.
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They can do the bulk of that if they're on site students right here.
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We arranged for all of the off-site and distance students for that to happen in the states where they work as well.
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But on site, chair in a way of a counseling center is seeing over 500 clients a year, 7,000 appointments.
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Right here in a community that is vastly underserved for behavioral health services.
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So we're an educator, a community partner, a lifelong learning arm as well.
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Some of those differentiators you're talking about.
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You know, we're really in the midst of bringing that forward in a way is to about smart growth.
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How do we bring that to other audiences?
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So on the one hand, the pandemic forced our hand.
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And here we are.
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48 states very neatly and tidally, you know, take our programs so that our graduates there can go right into practice,
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take lessons, you're sick for exams and things like that.
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And then there are a couple of others where we help the students make sure if you're going to practice there,
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you may have some other things to do because of what the state requires, for example.
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By and large, growth happened to us.
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And now it's strategically managing and thinking about that.
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So that ratio of 70, 30 online and on site, that ratio could very well stay the same as we continue to grow with more students in those program,
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aligning that with growth and faculty, academic and student, you know, a fair support.
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Our students as graduate students may sound familiar to anyone who would be listening and talking about undergraduate.
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All have mentoring, coaching, academic support, and to be evaluated to their needs.
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So they're checking in with them regularly.
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We're taking some of the best practices, high impact practices of undergrad.
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And this predates me.
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I'm just coming in and saying, well, let's make sure we have the resources to continue to do this.
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Taking those best practices and doing it to the graduate level.
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Because graduate schools, we want to unpack that a little bit, have some of their own retention, persistence and success issues.
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You hear, you used to be kind of the joke of all the ABDs, all but dissertation, you know, graduate students that are out there.
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Never quite finished, couldn't get through something.
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We're not about that.
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The need is too great for the types of graduates that we, you know, have come through our educational experience that we don't want to lose someone along the way.
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And actually on the front end, you see some of that as well.
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We are not in the business.
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Oh, let's get another student into a cedar, into a cohort.
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The interview process, the experiential process of just coming into Southwestern matters as well, because we don't want someone to come here and then say, I didn't know what I was getting into.
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I didn't know this was consciousness centered.
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I didn't know it was going to have done pack myself before I could unpack others.
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You set up so many balls on the teeth.
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I mean, I mean, I mean, we're done.
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You did absolutely hit a ball because we were curious about is there a sort of a professional learning element, but you were talking about just sort of the general charge of growth.
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And is that sort of when you came in as the new president, what you were charged with?
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And to me, whenever there's charge to grow, that's an entrepreneurial endeavor.
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So curious, where are you looking to grow?
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And how are you doing that?
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What hurdles do you have to remove to be able to meet those growth goals?
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That's viihide.com.
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Back to the episode.
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So we have put into place, and again, we're going to 48th into our 49th year, right?
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Some things are happening for the first time, and I hear myself saying this all the time here in Santa Fe.
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So many things have happened wonderfully here, sort of organically.
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The things that have just sprung forward have been an opportunity.
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We often say, you know, it just, it comes from the heart.
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We talk about our mission and values, for example.
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Part of my coming in and the, the ask of me was to bring the head and connect the head to the heart.
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So bring some structures that would make sense.
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So if you're going to talk about growth, let's have a strategic enrollment planning, you know, working group.
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And have that be integrated and inclusive.
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So the things I talked about, who's at the table as we plan for those next many years?
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And it is the clinic.
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It is the continuing Ed arm.
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It is, you know, a faculty in our provost, you know, role.
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It's our library and educational services.
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So much of that's gone digital.
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We've got to have that there.
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It's IT.
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My gosh, do we have to have a strong IT backbone to support all these things we do?
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And it's marketing and it's enrollment services.
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And at a small place with, you know, about 300 students right now.
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Only 180 or so before the pandemic.
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So just growth that just happened, but that's exponential.
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What you think about it, right?
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You know, if you take the example of an 1800 student to 3000, it's the same thing, right?
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It's like, wow, that's a lot of growth coming in sort of as the aftershocks are still ready.
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Like, oh, what happened here?
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Yeah.
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And so that's still to some of the conversations like we didn't see this coming.
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We didn't know thank goodness we were able to flip that switch.
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And, you know, nobody flipped the switch like that, right?
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What in the pandemic to move forward?
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Great decision making by my predecessor president and the provost who came in with distance learning skills.
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And an IT goddess, that is what we call her, who had been building the infrastructure.
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So now we can strategically sit and think, hey, what would this look like?
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What else could we be doing?
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What are the other audiences?
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And how do we take?
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It's funny.
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Third institution, I've been a president at work in the external world.
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They often hear, oh, you're kind of a best kept secret.
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He shouldn't be considering what we're doing.
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How we go about it, the demand for it.
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But all right, don't let best kept secret though, turn into mass produced, not as experiential,
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depersonal eyes.
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So do we want to grow?
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Yeah, we want to grow and be smart part of the all tourism aspect of putting others before self is also putting others in the position where they can receive.
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From us, the kind of transformational educational experience we hope they would have.
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So let's do that.
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Let's do it in a way that sustains the very best of how we did that for 180 students 250 now 300.
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We have no number set yet, but say across all those programs, you know, growth to about 500 made sense embedded in that will be the people, the fiscal resources, the campus based resources, all of that.
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We have to think through all of that fits together.
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And it's pretty rare you get to do that.
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I mean, you had the exponential growth because of the pandemic where you were able to accommodate it to a certain extent because you had online available to you so you can scale maybe class sizes and.
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One faculty member is able to serve more learners, but at some point that's going to hit it ceiling and now you have to plan for a case we're going to continue growing.
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Do we need additional faculty members degrees and courses and how does that revenue wise all hang together and is it grad that we're growing or continuing at or something else or are we integrating them to be talking with you or anyone.
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The part of it that I get to do, which is sometimes messenger storyteller, you know cheerleader fundraiser all of those different different elements right to be doing that through the lens of the success that we've been having to be a.
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Small and compact campus we have six and a half acres some of it is undeveloped in entirely we're carrying no debt.
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Stop down right there how many conversations does anyone have with any institution carrying no debt even if it's smart really smart debt knowing how it's structured and so for we don't it allows us to do this thoughtful exploration of what is the next 50 years look like because we absolutely believe what we do is vital to the wellness of our community, the wellness of the world.
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It is you know changing lives you know it's transforming consciousness through education.
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Yeah, sharing that forward though in a resilient revenue streams and in a way that retains the authenticity of why the why of our existence that's the challenge and it's a fun one to take on it really is.
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For sure and what is the culture like on campus because a lot of higher editors that I talk to are focused on we need to do things quicker we need to do things a little bit more nimble we have to be more comfortable making decisions within perfect data sort of those entrepreneurial leadership principles is that relevant at Southwestern College to her has the culture always been really nimble and ready to move with the market if you will.
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It's it I would say it's a blend of the both I'm glad you mentioned the second part of it is always been kind of nimble size helps sometimes with nimbleness where you don't necessarily getting you know all inputs from all corners but the other part of us being a being built and you know living our core value of partnership a partnership relationship with colleagues means really trying to think through if the individual in you decision is yours you still need to think how does that ripple out impact others even knowing if this is my decision.
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We still have those moments of where we think about that because that partnership piece how we're in service to each other and and to our students to the entities of the college itself so the space is definitely there for that the group that's working right now for example on complete redesign of our website we haven't done it in 14 years and Suzanne you and I are talking about things like if someone comes to our website what do we want them to feel we want them to feel like this is different and that they need to say I want to know more about this class or this course or about your college.
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Whatever it might be so we've been able to move quickly on that because we can quickly get people together to say you know what we know we can improve do better and then sometimes it's just a case of let us know how we can help and that that is part of the culture is that expectation that people will come forward from all walks and all roles and say I've got an idea because many of my colleagues we sometimes call ourselves unicorns you know have other experiences other work that they can bring in and you know inform a part of what we're doing that's not the
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necessarily part of their role and I've worked at Plenty of places where Stan your lane is the best way to get paid maybe even get promoted here we need people to speak up and we expect it to happen and have been in some incredibly rich conversations personal conversations where something comes forward a crucial difficult conversation at the end of which we say isn't it great that we're able to have a conversation like this and we're not leaving wounded or wondering or not feeling we have all the information that we need because we were able to pull all that out there
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without judgment that if it feels a little bit altruistic or a little bit utopian it's not the altruism part is there of course but it is a culture of share and be heard and that's not always the case I think it's safe to say in high red
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pretty safe to say that yes well how did you when you first got there as the new president how did you get together with faculty and maybe even students and staff to build that trust and hit the ground running
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is there anything specific you did that you could pass on as advice your president so one thing I'll say is some of that was built before I got here so the interview process was unlike any I've ever been a part of I mean in terms of just the layers of it the transparency of it so I sat in sessions two different sessions with students alone and different sessions because the distance learning piece right different times of day and formats forever came to campus for a visit where I was being asked
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how will you bring our values forward Tom you seem to have experienced a different institutions or the enrollment challenges or whatever tell us about that what might be your vision for us real deep dives into what have you learned about us in your exploration of southwestern so that often happens on the walk and talk and share and learn tours and I don't dismiss those that all have been part of many of those when you're on campus when you've been announced sometimes with great surprise to an institution and the chancellor is the president is you know
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so and so and half the room or more is finding out for the first time who's this now and they're googling on their phones there was none of that here I knew I was coming in to have a wonderful preceding president and was going to be here to be a director of the program she developed towards the end of her tenure and I would have hers a resource but all that was up front I started getting to know and feel you know the stories of the place the culture the history the readings that I were given were front loaded and focused on mission values history are founding but also
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that from president to president here at southwestern they're basically been the the changeovers occurred when it was someone has taken us to this place where we need to be and you'll come in and it was like that my one of the phrases I left sometimes leading means leaving that's kind of been the institutional history here if someone's saying you know what I got us here am I still the right president for where we go next no time to go on really rarals in higher education can you be reflective in your position whether it's president or anything and say
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I think it's time for me to think about something else so I knew a lot and then was you know of what to kind of expect and felt like some of the trust building was happening during that process arriving then on campus and getting into conversations and I tend the monthly staff meeting for example just with everybody else and it's not my meeting I can contribute I might have a share we might do something together as a collective experience but it's to be there and be present.
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This has been the easiest college by,
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I'm gonna say easiest college by far,
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to continue something that started back in the 90s
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when I was a faculty member and I have to this day.
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And that is to say to someone,
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I'm the only reader, a recipient,
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and a responder to the emails that I get.
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That was really hard at a community college
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with 11,000 students, you know,
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part of a big system in Dallas, for example.
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But I always sustain that.
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No chief of staff, no one with reading privileges,
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anything like that.
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It's Southwestern that really matters.
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If somebody drops something in and pops by my door,
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or whatever the case may be,
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they're expecting that they're meeting with you.
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They're talking to you.
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And it's an interesting one.
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An interesting one.
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I haven't heard a president bring that up to me before,
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and it does have implications that is an accessibility
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and trust and said personal attention
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that really matters in the culture as well
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is that kind of why you care so much about that?
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Yeah, absolutely.
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I've always thought that, you know,
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I wasn't trying to make it a personal difference maker.
spk_0
It's really, it's a cultural thing.
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What is the environment that you create
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for the communications that you're going to have
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to have the relationships that you're going to build?
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And knowing that,
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there are always going to be challenges and disagreements
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and things like that.
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But when those happen in a space of trust
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and mutual respect,
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civility, other things like that,
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and really a mission-centered values,
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you know, centered experience,
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it's just pulpable here.
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Yeah.
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Walking in this morning and being a little bit of time
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with Eric and Alan are incredible grounds crew.
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And just talking about how the campus is coming to life,
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leaves and buds and, you know,
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the lilies are coming up in a previous life.
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I was a landscape or two,
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but we were having that same conversation
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through that same lens of our identity,
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transforming consciousness, right?
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That happens when you come into a space
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that makes you feel good that you care about.
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And they were saying,
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here's what's coming up and here's how that maps out.
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There is every bit a part of delivering on our mission
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as faculty and staff as certainly as I am.
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And to know that we can have that moment together
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and talk about that in any time that it happens,
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like it did this morning for 10 minutes.
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Wow, that hits you right here.
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You just say, that's belonging
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and belonging is a big part of what we talk about
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in higher ed right now for our students, for our employees.
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If you don't have that sense of belonging,
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but you're gonna stay there,
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are you gonna succeed there
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and will your institution be successful?
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Probably not without a sense of belonging.
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I love that so much.
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So you've had this incredible career.
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You started out as an English major, it sounds like
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and that has had maybe less relevance
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than some incoming English majors hope,
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but you still have those roots, right?
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The deep care about humanity
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and I think a lot of the themes that you're working on
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and your presidency track back to that humanity
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is liberal arts foundation that you had, would you agree?
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And the way you lead now roots back to that as well
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and the institutions that you work with have been different,
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but there's always been this common thread
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of just like radically human
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is what I'm getting from you, you know, and the liver.
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Yeah, I think it probably predates that.
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Some of it is, it's like, how are we raised?
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What were we exposed to?
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What did we get to do?
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Did we get to fall on our face
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and make some of our own mistakes
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without someone immediately picking us up
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or whatever?
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I give some credit to my parents.
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I've been my K through 12 teachers
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and just some of that value
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was oriented kind of experience.
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Or even before your high-end journey fully began,
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are you already formed in many ways?
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I didn't know the term servant leadership
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until many, many years later
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and then somebody kind of identifies you.
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That seems like you're really a servant later.
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What does that mean?
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And so it's different than to come out of textbooks
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and come out of class to just came out
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of kind of how you go up.
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But I've had this tagline in my social media
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for more than a decade, goes way back.
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And it's been the story of my own life.
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I'm not the main character.
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So I'm a writer, and I still do a lot of writing, right?
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But I really believe in that.
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And way before I ever got here, for example,
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and talking about altruism
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and putting others before you,
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it's like that has been my joy,
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is to see my success comes through someone else's success
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or being successful or whatever it might be.
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I'm just a helper.
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And an imperfect one, always learning, life-long learning.
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You're right.
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But yeah, that humanities-based liberal arts experience
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that I had, I had a lot of experiential learning.
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Now I'm at a place that bases its transformational learning
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in experience.
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I just lucked into some things by where I went
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who I got to know, saying yes, a lot,
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when somebody invited me into a space.
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You know, and said, hey, would you like to try this?
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And say yes.
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You know, a lot of DIY learning.
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I have a son who's 24 years old
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on the autism spectrum.
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Separate graduate degree that my wife and I earned
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by getting to be a part of his life,
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having that gift of him teaching us
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when we did know where we were being taught
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or we did know what we needed to know,
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those kinds of things.
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That informs them what I bring as a leader,
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as a teacher, as a learner.
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Love it.
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If you think about others who are currently
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on their own journey towards higher ed leadership,
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maybe they have an intention to one day be a president
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or lead as a vice president at an institution,
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is there any advice you would give them?
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I think there was just a lot of advice
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in what you said, or we could say,
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wow, that's really smart.
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We should try the same mindset of we're not the main character.
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We're learning through others,
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or leading through others,
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but anything else that stands out to you.
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Yeah, maybe a couple of things I would add to that is,
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you know, if you're on that journey and are aspiring and saying,
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I might like to try this or do this.
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Sometimes you can't wait for the invitation
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for a seat at the table and or ideally a voice at the table as well.
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I encourage mentees that I'm working with,
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and some of the coaching that I do on the side to invite yourself.
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It is remarkable how often,
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and this is not just for me.
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It's for many of my colleagues just reaching out to someone else
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and saying, I'm curious about what you do in your role as,
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and maybe something totally different from yours.
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I've talked to CFOs, for example,
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that is not my expertise.
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I'd like to know more.
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Can we just have a cup of coffee?
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Yeah, you don't jump into job shadowing,
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but connecting with a lot of the information I gained on advance,
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but for example, fundraising came through working in public radio and TV
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as a part-time job.
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For example, just taking on something else, exploration.
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Do some of those explorations to get a taste of whether or not you want to do that,
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you want to move into those roles.
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So making connections in that way, sometimes that's a cold call.
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You respect somebody that you see on LinkedIn
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who's really saying things that resonate with you.
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Well, move up from liking or saying it's insightful to a very thoughtful response,
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saying if there's any chance we could talk through in mail or something like that,
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and it's stunning how often that personal respond and say,
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yes, even sometimes say it also you like to meet someone else in that.
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So it's using those things just erasing some maybe some imposter syndrome
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and just putting yourself up there and saying,
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I'm as a curious person, as a curious colleague, and connecting in that way.
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And that can do a lot, especially over time, if you develop something.
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And the other thing at the point would say is,
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insist on wherever you are,
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I'm being able to take part in professional development, whatever that looks like.
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So I attend a lot of webinars and I'm in the chat and so on that.
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Those kinds of things like that.
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Connections happen there as well, or someone realizes
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this person just asked a great question.
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Who are they?
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Where are they?
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I want to talk to them some more or in a face to face,
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an in-person conference setting.
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You know, be the person who sits at the front of the room that's always half full
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at concurrent sessions or the keynote speaker.
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Nobody sits in the front row.
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It's a great place to take a picture to show you were there in post-it and social media.
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But it's also the position to be in afterwards to thank someone for what you learned
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to maybe make a connection there.
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Those are small things that can lead to far-reaching relationships.
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So it's things like that.
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I guess a lot of that's kind of social engagement relationship.
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But that starts with outreach.
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That starts with an ask.
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It starts with, hey, my name is...
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It means the level of boldness required that maybe people might naturally shy away from,
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but that without that, it's really tough to get access to the next opportunity
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or beyond people's radar, right?
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I love what you said about reaching out specifically to CFOs and advancement leaders
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because there's still two areas for me as a marketing enrollment person where I'm like,
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I have a lot to learn.
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I have a lot of questions.
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And I feel sometimes ashamed.
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I don't know all these things, but you inspired me just now to maybe just say,
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hey, can you explain to me how this works?
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And I'm sure I could find a few people to help me out there.
spk_0
So thank you for that.
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Sure.
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No.
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And like I said, you know, that the ability to have conversations like this happened beyond
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a podcast.
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They happen for someone who maybe listens in and says, I'm intrigued by.
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But, you know, oh, I'm sure they're too busy because they have a podcast to respond,
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shocking how often that's not the case.
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The number of cold calls that I make through email, I mean, well-constructive, thoughtful
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use of someone's time with just saying, I saw you at this time do this, didn't have a chance
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to connect.
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I just wanted to let you know how important and valuable that was to me.
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The number of times that a response comes back from that.
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I'm still to this day at this stage of my career, really surprised sometimes,
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considering who I might have asked or just shared gratitude with,
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and then get a response.
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And now maybe there's a space for some thoughtful dialogue.
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I learned a huge, I wanted to say, I learned a huge lesson from my Marcom director in Texas.
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Very first presidency, very first semester.
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When I was doing that listening tour and I was asking people, what do you do?
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How do you do it all that?
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And at one point along the line, I said, I have a curiosity question and then I asked
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whatever it was.
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And she told me afterwards, you know, it's also great.
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Take feedback, take, take guidance from others who are somewhere else on the org chart or whatever.
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And like, absorb it, take it in.
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Meredith said to me, that's it.
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From now on, when you meet with other people, when you go in, you're wearing the title of president.
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And when you say, I have a curiosity question, it changes the room from, how do you do this?
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Why do you do this to?
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I'm curious.
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So I lead from curiosity.
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I've always been a curious person, but I didn't realize that just articulating that can make a difference.
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I think that's something I would share with others too.
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Be curious, let people know you're being curious.
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Yeah, I think if you're at the president level, it changes the whole dynamic because you have
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the humility to say, I'm curious and I want to learn from you.
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That's really rare.
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So first of all, that's amazing.
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And then if you're not yet at that level or even, you know, a leader, I don't even have a leader
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title, it changes the conversation too.
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Because if you can say, I'm curious, I want to learn, rather than I'm trying to hide what I all
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don't know yet.
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That's equally important in a level setting.
spk_0
So I love that so much, so inspiring.
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Thank you for your time talking with me today.
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Oh, Sussan, you're so welcome.
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Thank you for inviting me.
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Easiest yes I've ever had.
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Thank you so much.
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Topics Covered
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