University Business - May 2008 - (Page 53)

last ﬁve years particularly might come for entry level and then move bate ideas within the university and take them out into the corporate on—not in the academic area as much, but in the administrative world, and vice versa. Within a university you can get fairly insuand business services divisions. We ended up revising our new em- lated; it can be like living in a bubble. To attract and retain outside ployee orientation program, making it more robust and making the talent, you have to have a brand. We’re working very intimately with hiring managers more involved in the assimilation process. That’s hiring managers within the university so that they begin to use the a pretty good example of the contemporary approach to an HR language associated with our brand and our online job posting tools as they shape their candidate pool. system challenge. SMU stays fairly competitive with ‘We have signiﬁcant what we can oﬀer salary-wise. We’ve What has absorbing the ever-increasing resources available to us got a terriﬁc senior compensation specosts of employee beneﬁts meant at cialist. Where I think we’ve gotten our your institution? on our campuses—food most mileage is by partnering with an It biggest service, ﬁtness centers, health Strese:faceisinone of the10 years.challenges SMU division to come up with justwe will the next You can’t in-time data. We just updated salary clinics, etc. We need to take just keep raising tuition, because then your ranges in our libraries so as they move consumer is advantage of those resources studentgo somewheregoing to say, “I’m goforward in hiring librarians in the next ing to else.” Fortunately, we ﬁscal year, they’re going to be able to and become national examples have a strong student enrollment, but we’re work within current strategic data for a business as well, and we’ve got to become for wellness initiatives.’ their speciﬁc niche. If we just did a more and more eﬃcient with the resources survey for all administrative assistants we have. If we’re not proactive and we don’t —Lori Mulder, Hope College universitywide, that may mean one evaluate the trends on health care costs and thing for the law school and something employee retention and use a really good entirely diﬀerent for IT. business sense about how we deal with those kinds of issues, ultimately it will aﬀect, in a negative sense, student recruitment and retention. We have to be very assertive in helping our institution give Do you think colleges and universities are missing the absolute best service we can and in the most eﬃcient way. opportunities to sell themselves as employers? Davis: Yes. I think the focus in most colleges and universities is Mulder: We are continually reviewing our plans and have implepromoting our product—student learning and education. In many mented cost sharing along with modifying plan designs. It is exlocations, the college or university is also one of the largest, if not tremely important to communicate and be as honest as possible the largest employer, and generally oﬀers competitive wages and with your employees about this issue. We all desire excellent benbeneﬁts plans. Higher education contributes signiﬁcantly to the eﬁts, and only by working together with open communication can solutions be realized. economics of our respective cities and counties. Lee: Overall they do a good job, but many are starting to do a better Lee: We’re in a state where the system controls the beneﬁt package. job, or they’re starting to take on Madison Avenue kinds of charac- We know that health care costs are certainly important to everybody and overly important in the ability to attract and retain faculty and teristics in their “branding.” They’re learning the value in that. Mulder: I see institutions doing more to market themselves (such staﬀ. The costs nationwide have risen so much that if you have a betas hiring marketing directors, spending more on promotional ter beneﬁt in that one item, it can make the employment decision materials, and engaging in more proactive eﬀorts to identify and for somebody. promote distinctive qualities). It is also important to consider the Davis: Fortunately, our college is part of our state’s insurance provalue your website can bring. The majority of applicants are coming gram, and our state has had the luxury of a surplus budget that has from online advertising rather than print media. Local applicants made signiﬁcant investments in our state’s employees, including at search out our institutional website for open staﬀ positions. Faculty the colleges and university. If we didn’t have that safety net, we would applicants are applying based on online postings with professional be looking at reducing programs and services, cutting beneﬁts, or signiﬁcantly increasing tuition and fees to keep up with the costs. journals and associations. Strese: We’ve done some local research, and SMU is considered a preferred employer because we’re small enough yet well-known. What kinds of work-life programs and other employee We recruit very actively and go to job fairs in the Dallas market beneﬁts and perks do you think higher ed institutions will be area. You can’t just do it through Monster. We’ve put energy and adopting more and more in the future? resources into creating a brand for ourselves. Davis: Wellness is the buzzword in many industries, including I do a little bit of consulting on the side, and I’m an adjunct in higher education. Our college oﬀers staﬀ wellness time—up to the business school. These activities have helped me stay in touch three hours per week to full-time employees to participate in a wellwith the business community. I’ve been able to generate and incu- ness or education activity. Many use that time to work out—say, to universitybusiness.com May 2008 | 53 http://universitybusiness.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of University Business - May 2008

University Business - May 2008
Contents
College Index
Company Index
Advisory Board
Editor's Note
Stats Watch
People Watch
Sense of Place
Viewpoint
Money Matters
Financial Aid
Human Resources
Community Colleges
Art Appreciation
HR Directors Speak Out
Marketing: The Big Questions Answered
Top 5 Reasons You Should Attend EduComm 2008
What's New
Calendar of Events
End Note

University Business - May 2008