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Zimpher introduced via Web cast
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“For us to be the best we can be, we must have audacious goals and we must do it together.”
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Nancy L. Zimpher began her first day as SUNY Chancellor on Monday introducing herself to SUNY constituents and sharing her own view of leadership.
Speaking via a Web cast from SUNY Plaza in Albany, Zimpher told viewers that she looked forward to meeting them when she crisscrosses the state on her 64-campus tour that will begin on Wednesday with a stop at Cornell University. Cornell hosts the New York State colleges of Agriculture and Life Sciences, Human Ecology and Veterinary Medicine, and the School of Industrial and Labor Relations. From there, Zimpher plans to go to the University of Albany on Thursday, Mohawk Valley Community College on Friday and Binghamton University on Saturday.
“Then on Monday, I start all over again,” she said.
She will visit UB on June 23.
While the campus tours provide a vehicle for Zimpher to meet campus constituents, they also serve as the beginning of the strategic planning process, which she called her “job one as given to me by our Board of Trustees.”
The central question of the process, she said, is “how can we together be greater than we are as individual campuses—what is it about our work together that will make us a strong system, a strong player in the future of the State of New York.”
Zimpher said the campus visits will provide background information needed for the planning process. Once the information gathering is completed, groups representing various constituencies, including campus presidents, faculty and student leaders, elected officials, alumni and community representatives, will meet five or six times from October through mid-March “to actually craft the goals and the strategic actions that will need to be taken to realize the aspirations of SUNY,” she said. A draft of the plan will be circulated, with a final plan expected by early spring. “Then we will work diligently to accomplish the components of this plan.”
Zimpher noted that the 2010-11 budget process will begin in earnest in the fall—simultaneously with the planning process. “We will be working hand in glove, side by side with the Legislature to get its input on the plan and to think about the financial implications of our planning.”
She said she welcomes feedback regarding the strategic plan, and can be reached at chancellor@suny.edu.
She also offered her own five-pronged view of leadership, calling it her “theory of action”—how to get things done in a large, comprehensive system like SUNY and in a state as large, dynamic and complex as New York:
• Vision triumphs everything, and a well-articulated and ambitious vision must exist for an organization to be effective. She cited the book “Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies” by Jim Collins and Jerry Porras, and its reference to “big hairy audacious goals.”
“For us to be the best we can be, we must have audacious goals and we must do it together,” she said
• Vision is derived at the hands of many. “It’s very, very important that we engage the key constituents of the system in this visioning process. Some, she said, see this process as “large, cumbersome, complex and confusing. I see a diversity of opinion that we absolutely need and must protect.”
• Vision is derived through action. “It’s fine to have a vision, but you don’t really know what that vision means until you begin acting,” she said. She noted the euphemism “once all is said and done, more gets said than done.”
“I guarantee you that won’t be the case for us,” she said, adding that once an action plan is in place, “we are going to act and we are going to hold ourselves accountable.”
• Financial resources are needed to meet aspirations. SUNY will be the best possible partner it can be with elected officials, she said, and will develop a relationship “almost like a compact that delivers a return on the state’s investment and, in tern, helps us become the economic engine for this state.”
• Constancy and persistence of message. Zimpher said she understands the importance of having a consistent message about SUNY and vowed to be a “tireless spokesperson” for SUNY.
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