Agenda

Notes

• Compensation Program: Follow-up/Q&A (Caitlin Goss, Hannah Ross)
  • The new compensation system is a Senior Leadership Group initiative in which HR plays a central role.
  • Individual compensation letters went out to all staff members in late June. If anyone did not get an email please reach out to Jenna Quenneville.
  • One key adjustment for this cycle was the introduction of a one-time payment to recognize discretion for staff members above their range.
  • We also added in a focus on waterfall communication and welcome feedback on how that approached worked.
    • Some areas saw significant communication improvement due to starting early with a clearly articulated timeline.
    • Some staff experienced bottlenecks and challenges receiving the waterfall communication. We want to better understand some of these challenges.
      • Some reporting lines were not included in the initial waterfall (staff supervised by faculty, some grant-funded employees, etc.) and we are going to be more careful about direct communication to these areas, including broader sharing of Leadership Alliance and/or Institute Leadership Group communications related to the compensation program.
  • The compensation budget is managed separately from operational budgets. We have accounted for skills matrix changes, market changes, and discretion all within a separate budgetary planning process.
  • How does HR handle staff role changes and compensation adjustments that fall outside of the bi-annual Ways & Means cycle?
    • For changes that have a budgetary impact, they will still follow the twice per year Ways & Means cycle. For timely budget-neutral changes, like a reorganization that looks at roles and responsibilities, there is a ‘Ways & Means Lite’ process where departments work directly with HR business partners to address changes and align with our current strategy. This includes the ability to have intentional conversations and consider whether we backfill a vacated position, promote someone, or take another approach according to our priorities.
  • Please continue to send your questions and potential solutions to Caitlin Goss.
• Institute Council OKR Report-Out: Q3/4 2023 (Jeff Dayton-Johnson, Patricia Szasz)
  • Reference: OKR Report Q3/4 2023
  • We have moved to a quarterly timeline for OKRs, and today we are reviewing work from the last quarter of the fiscal year.
  • Some of these are longer objectives and our key results are the milestones we have set out for the quarter. 
  • We categorized the OKRs from these quarters into three categories: new offerings, online infrastructure, and opportunities for existing programs
  • Part of this exercise is grading our progress on green (on track), yellow (in progress), red (little to no progress) – we have also tried to include status notes as we know that colors are not a fully inclusive grading system.
  • As you can see, there is a lot here. While there are a lot of moving pieces, we are pleased that all of the key results are green or yellow, which means we have achieved the goal or are actively making progress.
  • OKR Updates
    • New Offerings
      • Online MPA
        • We have been working with Wiley, our Online Program Manager partner, and have built up a landing page (to go live shortly), digital advertising strategy, and other promotional work.
        • The team that meets regularly with Wiley includes Patricia Szasz, Sadia Khan, Muchadei Zvoma, Hannah Ross, Charlotte Pratt, Jen Thompson, and the Trestle Bridge Consultants
        • Sierra Abukins prepared a communication about the program that is now live on our website: https://www.middlebury.edu/institute/news/middlebury-institute-launches-new-online-mpa-sustainability 
        • The first MPA courses are in development with Maha Baimyrzaeva and Scott Pulizzi, and we hope to launch the first cohort in October during the second half of fall semester
        • For these online courses we are excited to introduce the new structure of half-term sessions (7-8 weeks). We are also introducing three intake cycles of summer, fall, and spring. 
        • We have our first applicant for the program and will continue to provide updates.
      • Microcredentials
        • We are at the final stage of developing our first two microcredentials. One is focused on localization, the other is focused on financial crimes.
        • The surrounding infrastructure and policies are something we are still plugging away at. The registrar is supporting our work to recognize these microcredentials on student records.
        • Once we get the infrastructure in place we hope we can scale both the number of microcredentials and number of participants. This project was started in 2021 and we are excited to be nearing the launch of our first offerings.
    • Online Infrastructure
      • Program Management
        • The program management is largely related to our relationship with Wiley and the goal of having a more comprehensive contract that will allow us to work with Wiley on launching several more online programs over the next several years. 
        • We do have, as planned, a specific fee for service contract to support the MPA program and are learning under that rubric to expand to other programs.
      • Structure and Processes
        • We have been planning and designing a new online unit. This includes planning for how students in our online programs make choices and receive support in their programs, as well as policies for faculty to develop or deliver a course or plan and manage an online program.
        • Katherine Punteney spoke to this group several months ago about best practices for organizing an online division and designing and delivering online programs – some of this work will go to the DLINQ website and some of this will become part of an online program policy handbook.
        • We are grateful that everyone has been so open, flexible, and supportive of us trying to move quickly as we enter a new world for us.
    • Opportunities for Existing Programs
      • Translation & Localization Teaching Capacity
        • We committed to add a new faculty position to the TLM program, which has been our largest and fastest growing program – and overstretched. We conducted a search and will be welcoming Mara Martins as a visiting professor in the fall to strengthen the TLM faculty bench. 
      • Translation & Interpretation Curriculum
        • This is a multi-year process. Julie has been leading this work, which has involved multiple stages, including discussions over the summer, to take on recommendations from the external review during the 21-22 AY. We will have more updates in the fall.
  • We are developing new OKRs for the coming quarter and will be using ILG and other forums to solicit feedback in the weeks ahead. Want to remind you that if you are interested in OKRs this has been a framework we have been using in the Institute Council, the book Measure What Matters is a great resource. 
  • There are a lot of channels of work related to our on campus, online, graduate and undergraduate initiatives, and supporting those changes are changes happening in the leadership structure. We are working on a communications plan to recap these changes and to also set the tone for the next academic year as we approach the fall semester.