Mind and Hand Associates, LLC

Strategy, Growth and Operations

Alumni Relations Strategy

A fledgling alumni relations unit had six directors within twelve years and a disengaged alumni base.  The school wanted to better understand alumni perceptions and priorities to identify opportunities, guide the creation of a new strategy, and improve alumni satisfaction and participation.  Project entailed alumni interviews and group discussions in the US and Europe, a quantitative survey of the entire alumni base, and the creation of a prioritized strategic plan and an implementation plan.

New School Strategy Sessions

The business school of a large public university was launching a School of Accounting and requested assistance in planning and facilitating several Strategic Planning Sessions.  The sessions focused on the mission, vision and timeline for the School, strategic analysis, and group consensus building.

Competitive, Educational, and Labor Market Overview

The new president of a for-profit institution wanted to determine the focus for its new academic offerings and commissioned a high-level competitive market overview focused on top competitors. Project entailed research on trends in academic degrees, employment market trends and educational requirements for fast-growing positions, and understanding underserved and emerging educational segments that client could address with new offerings.

Management Education Trends Briefing

A business school in the midst of a curriculum change and new program development initiative requested information on market trends in management education.  Project entailed a presentation on application, degree, curriculum and market trends for the MBA Curriculum Change Commission and leading a discussion about the trends and opportunity areas for a new program under consideration.

Organizational Benchmarking

Co-authored a benchmarking survey of 161 MBA programs worldwide to determine how marketing functions are structured and utilized, including reporting relationships, degree of centralization, responsibilities, number of employees, strengths and needs.  Findings were presented at the AACSB International Conference MACC Affinity Group Meeting and written up in an AACSB BizEd article (March 2009).

Presentation: Strategy and Competition in Higher Education

Presented at the 2010 American Marketing Association Symposium for the Marketing of Higher Education on Strategy and Competition in Higher Education.  Presentation focused on forces impacting the higher education industry and how colleges and universities can think about the evolving higher education landscape and improve their position within it. 

Program Evaluation

New Executive Education Offerings

A business school with undergraduate and graduate programs and a strong local reputation and community support wanted to explore opportunities in the executive education market.  Mind and Hand Associates conducted in-depth interviews with business unit heads and VPs of Human Resources to uncover the issues the companies faced, how these challenges might be met through management education, and whether the company would consider using the client school as a potential partner for these training and development initiatives.  Research uncovered areas of opportunity for the school to pursue in both the open enrollment and custom executive education market. 

Continuing Education Program Evaluation

The continuing and professional education division of a major research university sought an independent evaluation to assess the current state of one of its main programs and where there were opportunities for both quality improvement and growth.  Project entailed conducting internal interviews, analyzing performance metrics and marketing materials, researching competitive offerings and industry trends, and recommending changes in the program to increase quality, student satisfaction and marketability. 

New Dean's Review

An incoming dean wished to conduct an independent review of the school's existing executive education programs.  Project entailed conducting interviews with faculty and senior administrative directors, as well as a review of all program operations and budgets, and benchmarking against schools of comparable size.  Uncovered potential new offerings and opportunities for cross-marketing with another program, and noted underperforming programs. The evaluation concluded with a review session with the dean and his senior team, in which a new strategic direction was set.

Presentation: The Future of the MBA

Presented at the 2009 Graduate Management Admissions Council (GMAC) Annual Industry Conference in Baltimore on The Future of the MBA.  Presentation focused on trends in the management education market, including degree and provider trends, market forces, ongoing critique, and how the market is evolving domestically and internationally.

Presentation: Increasing Revenue Recognition Through Executive Education

Presented at the 2009 AACSB Deans Conference in San Francisco about current trends in the executive education market, how schools might enhance both revenues and reputation through their executive programs, and tips for how to investigate opportunities. 

Research on Innovations in Curriculum Design

While maintaining traditional efforts aimed at individual knowledge and skill development, organizations recognize a greater need to align learning with organizational innovation and growth, and this shift in focus is not without consequence for players in the field of corporate learning and education. This research report identifies a number of innovative ways schools can create more application-oriented and solution-focused executive programs that integrate learning with the core strategies of the client firm. Presented at the 2009 UNICON Conference at the University of Texas at Austin.

Emerging Practices in Executive Program Evaluation Research

Researched and wrote report on a model of learning in which program design and program assessment are no longer viewed separately, but become elements in a larger learning system, resulting in more effective organizations and more innovative products and services.  Presented findings at the 2010 UNICON Conference at New York University.

Market Research and Marketing

Reputation Research

A business school wanted to determine awareness about the school among high-potential candidates, understand the candidate decision-making process, identify attributes of a prestigious program, measure the relative importance of attributes in choosing a school, and measure perceptions of their school on each attribute relative to four top competitors.  Project entailed focus groups, voice of the customer analysis, and an international survey of high-potential candidates. Based on research findings, the school revamped its messaging and marketing vehicles to enhance awareness and understanding and within the next several years applications and yield on top-choice admission candidates improved dramatically. 

Degree Offering Research

A well-established for-profit university requested research on competitive offerings and trends to support their program prioritization and business planning process.  The research focused on key competitors and their program trends and pipelines. Based on the research findings, the university prioritized its program pipeline and launch schedule and is on track to launch a series of programs over the next several years.

Presentation: Marketing as Strategy

Presented at the 2010 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Institutional Management for Higher Education conference in Paris on Marketing as Strategy.  Presentation focused on the strategic use of the marketing function and how to use internal data analysis and outside research to better understand target audiences and create programs and services to meet evolving market needs.

Presentation: The Effective Use of Internal and Market Research

Presented at the National Association of Graduate Admissions Professionals (NAGAP) 2009 Annual Conference in Denver on Using Research for Fun and Profit.  Presentation focused on the various types of research and how a small investment in research can help schools better understand their various audiences and create programming and marketing to attract best-fit candidates. 

Admissions and Retention

Recruiting Strategy

A top MBA program attracted a disproportionately low number of female applicants and matriculants, and wanted to improve their success in recruiting women to the program.  Based on benchmarking peer outcomes, a survey of acceptors, matriculants and application abandoners, and focused discussions with female students, we found that women differed considerably in the order of importance they placed on various program and performance attributes (e.g., rankings, teaching quality, events, community) versus their male counterparts.  The admissions team made minor changes to their presentation materials and within two years of implementing the recommendations, female applications and yield increased and the program welcomed its highest number and percentage of female applicants in its history. 

Admissions Strategy: Competency-Based Screening

A graduate professional program with very loosely defined admission screening criteria had admission decision meetings that were highly emotional and time consuming.  Faculty and student services teams found many students were underperforming academically, socially, and/or in the job search process and recruiters complained about inconsistency in student quality.  In addition, the admissions process had no tracking mechanisms or results assessment.  We helped the school create a competency-based admissions process including competency selection, tight descriptions and measurements to use during application reading and candidate interviews, created scoring mechanisms and decision-making models, and trained staff in competency-based screening and behavioral event interviewing.  The new process created a common language for evaluating, discussing and choosing candidates and increased buy-in and consistency across the admissions function.  Deans, faculty, student services teams, and recruiters gave higher marks to students admitted under the new process.  Streamlined process increased evaluation consistency, resulted in a more diverse class admitted with less time and energy. 

Presentation: Measuring Student Services

Presented at the Graduate Management Admissions Council (GMAC) 2009 Annual Industry Conference in Baltimore on The Art and Science of Measurement in Student Services.  Presentation focused on various methods to track and assess results in student services.

Student Research: Satisfiers and Dissatisfiers

A school wanted to better understand the drivers of student satisfaction and dissatisfaction in academic program and student services.  From conducting student lunch discussions and quantitative surveys of students at various points in their academic program, we found that students had different perceptions and priorities than the administration thought.  Based on this better understanding of student satisfaction and concerns, the school modified the academic program, reprioritized student service initiatives, and student satisfaction increased. 

Admissions and Retention Research

The board of a private secondary school believed the school needed to do a better job of attracting, enrolling and retaining mission-appropriate students and hired consultants to address the central question: who should the school target and how best can they be attracted to apply?  Together with another consulting firm, we identified potential target markets from which the school could attract mission-appropriate students.  Project entailed primary and secondary research and qualitative and quantitative research. 

Admissions Best Practices

A business school with successful part-time MBA and other business programs was in the final stages of readying a full-time MBA program for launch.  Planning committee wanted to better understand how top full-time MBA programs recruit and screen candidates, including competency-based screening and international recruitment, and we provided this information in an executive briefing. 

Presentation: Increasing Yield of Female Applicants

Presented at the 2007 American Marketing Association Symposium for the Marketing of Higher Education in San Diego on Increasing Yield of Female Applicants to an MBA Program.  Presentation outlined the process used for researching target market perceptions and behaviors and using this information throughout the recruiting and admissions processes to increase yield for high-quality applicants.