AUA Planning Forum

Ian DiamondUniversity of Aberdeen 9.2.12

Preliminaries

• University Planning is Critical

• All universities have a Strategic Plan

• BUT Do all universities have goals and milestones?

• AND Do all universities formally monitor these?

Preliminaries II• All strategic plans focus on excellence

• Need to enunciate what we mean by excellence

• Can we justify every penny is spent wisely

• Political and Social Imperative

Excellence : ‘Twas ever thus’

1495

‘that both clerics and laymen would readily apply themselves to literary studies and acquire the precious pearl of knowledge in such fashion that the ignorant would become informed and the uneducated learned’

2011

‘to be recognised throughout the world as a renowned international university, focussing on society’s future needs and challenges, employing the best staff and delivering a unique and stimulating intellectual experience for our students’

A Changing World• Why do Universities need planning when

perhaps they didn’t always?

Aberdeen Students Staff Budget

1495 36 students & staff £12 6s

1980 5,934 1,800 £23m

2010 16,000 3,500 £225m

Complex organisations need complex planning

• Income Sources:

Students - UG, PGT & PGR

Research

Commercialisation

Philanthropy

Role of Planners?

• Inform (Ensure?) evidence based policy making at all levels of the university

• Lead analysis of performance against plan ‘own’ good management information

• Horizon Scanning• Pushing Innovation• Evidence to advise on extent to which market leading

• Risk Management

Informing Policy in a Changing Environment

We live in a changing/unknown political context

Example: UGs in Scottish HEIs

University of Aberdeen Strategic Objective 1: A Student Experience Second to None

Challenge: Scottish/EU Capped

RUK Uncapped

International Uncapped

Scottish/EU

• Maximise Entrance Grades

• Do not overshoot in a changing UK market

• Get balance of STEM/Non-STEM; controlled subjects

• Consider WP – outcome agreements to be negotiated

RUK• Set Fees Understand Costs TRAC

• Maximise Subject to Maximise Grades/Retaining Quality

• Increasing need to understand market

• Strategies to maximise conversion

• Bursary strategy

• Consider WP

• Estimate future market potential

• Difficult, no data need to understand market!!

International

• Understand Market

• Traditional, New, TNE, Distance

• Forecast Future Numbers

• Modelling a)must be integrated with strategy; b) must involve academic structures

CIRCULARITY

Student Numbers Experience Student Numbers

Estimating future numbers requires an integrated model of the University

ASSOCIATED DATA FOR STUDENT EXPERIENCE

• Space eg Mealor Effect

• Accommodation

• Teaching Quality/Load

• Research Requirements and Needs

REQUIREMENTS FOR EVIDENCE BASED PLANNING

• An Intercollated Model of the Student Journey

• One version of the Truth (NTV)

• Knowledge & Evidence of Factors Driving Growth

Admissions

ApplicantPortal

On-lineApplication

StudentRecords

Accommodation

StudentPortal

E-RegistrationPortal

E-Payments

STUDENTMAIL

LibrarySystems

Pre-EntryMarketing

Target:-Home UgradO’Seas UgradAccessKey LearningPG TaughtPG Research

Application3rd party service

PaperApplication

E-Graduation AlumniEngagement.

Virtual LearningEnvironment

TimeTableStudent

Monitoring

FinanceManagement

Purchasing

Budgeting &Forecasting

Pre-Application Application Registration

CurriculumManagement

Business Intelligence Reporting and Dashboards

Teaching & LearningGraduation Alumni

Advising

ID Card

StudentProgression

Programme & Course Portal

EstatesManagement

Human Resource& Payroll

Student Process

On-Line Staff Recruitment

Slide courtesy of Mark Lewis

MAINTAINING QUALITY OF STUDENT EXPERIENCE

1) Resource Allocation needs a clear understanding of costs

2) Estates Planning How often are planners deeply entrenched in Estates planning?

SOME NOTES ON RESOURCE ALLOCATION

• Space Models

• ‘Service’ Teaching

• Incentivisation

• Home v Away eg Engineer takes Sociology

• What are costs? (TRAC)

• Transparency does not mean shadowing income streams

FundManagement

Research Process

Pre-Awa

rd

Opportunity

Post Awa

rdOutput

Commercialisatio

nProposals

PublicationManagement

Open Access Repository

Costing

Review & Approval

FundingApplication

ProjectMonitoring

PGRDevelopment

CommercialisationRelationship Mgt

Reporting

REFFinancial

Accounting

LibrarySystems

Slide Courtesy of Mark Lewis

Data Needs for Research Model

• Planners/Finance integrated with Academics

• TRAC

UUK Task Force on Modernisation and Efficiencies

• Economic context

• Universities recognise the national imperative to reduce costs

• Global perspective

• Increasing competition within tighter resource constraints ‘Higher Education in a world utterly changed: Doing more with less’ (OECD/IMHE, Sept 2010)

• Doing ........... with less!!

BUT

• A Continuing Agenda

• Eg in Scotland 2008/11 Universities and Colleges collectively made over £123m of cash releasing savings

Maintaining this quality!

“Scotland is above average in terms of teaching activity and with high levels of spend on research relative to GDP, performs in the top quartile on measures of research efficiency. This appears to be consistent with quantitative findings from a report to the EC that ranks the UK as the most efficient higher education system in technical terms.” (Tripartite Group, 2010)

Note: yellow highlight is my addition

Recommendations

• Interventions should fit longer term strategic aims rather than short term

Planning

• Cost reduction activities should be clear on savings and benefits expected and based on robust data

Planning

• The key area all HEIs can focus on is the development of better and leaner internal processes

Admissions

ApplicantPortal

On-lineApplication

StudentRecords

Accommodation

StudentPortal

E-RegistrationPortal

E-Payments

STUDENTMAIL

LibrarySystems

Pre-EntryMarketing

Target:-Home UgradO’Seas UgradAccessKey LearningPG TaughtPG Research

Application3rd party service

PaperApplication

E-Graduation AlumniEngagement.

Virtual LearningEnvironment

TimeTableStudent

Monitoring

FinanceManagement

Purchasing

Budgeting &Forecasting

Pre-Application Application Registration

CurriculumManagement

Business Intelligence Reporting and Dashboards

Teaching & LearningGraduation Alumni

Advising

ID Card

StudentProgression

Programme & Course Portal

EstatesManagement

Human Resource& Payroll

Student Process

On-Line Staff Recruitment

Recommendations IIData & Benchmarking• Develop better data on operation costs (finance, HR, IT etc) and

commodity costs (procurement).

• To enhance transparency around operational costs, indicators to be developed to show progress on savings being made across operational functions and reported annually.

• A common HE framework for developing benchmarks on operational functions to be developed by UUK, linking to FSSG and HESA work

links with ‘TRAC’

• Advice on implications of competition law should be developed.

Recommendations III

Shared services

• Models for developing shared services exist and good practice should be disseminated

• HEIs should look to exploit existing services with a track record of excellence rather than just looking to develop new organisational structures; and to link outside of the sector.

Recommendations IVRegulation• The govt should implement the mandatory VAT

exemption on shared services (DONE)

• The govt should clarify the position of HEIs in relation to public sector regulations in light of the new funding arrangements – balance between public/private finance in HE

• The sector should engage with post-legislative scrutiny of FoI and develop better understanding of associated costs (ONGOING)

Recommendations V

Procurement

• Develop a national body to lead procurement in England (follow Scottish APUC model)

• Set up a UK-wide strategic procurement group to lead policy, promote good practice and guide the establishment of a Centre of Excellence (CIPS/AUPO)

• Establish a minimum target for England of 30% non-pay spend to be channelled through collaborative agreements – to be revised upwards over time

The Future: A Continued Sense of Urgency

• Leadership, Implementation and Monitoring• Leading Strategic Change• Monitoring and Evaluation Panel• Efficiency and Innovation Hub

• Developing Data and Benchmarking• Identifying Benchmarks• Framework for Benchmarking• Understanding Costs

A Continued Sense of Urgency II

• Embedding Recommendations

• Action Plans across all areas

• Process Improvement and Shared Services

• Academic Processes, practice and research

Must involve planners and be evidence based

A Continued Sense of Urgency III

• Addressing regulatory challenges to efficiency

• VAT Cost Sharing Exemption

• Regulatory Practice

• Competition Law and the HE Sector

• Developing Procurement

Pump Priming

• LFHE Fund to support initiatives in Efficiency Innovation

Summary• Universities are ever more large and complex

organisations

• Large and complex organisations need to have evidence based plans

• Excellence must be the focus but efficiencies are needed and should be celebrated

• Need to look for ways of doing things differently

• All this needs planners!!!