How I Failed My First Presidency

The metrics all looked good. According to my analysis of the data, student and employee satisfaction indicators, as well as others, were headed in the right direction. Revenues were up. Over all, it was not difficult to craft a narrative that the college had enjoyed three years of success during my presidency.

That was the story I was telling myself. And it seemed accurate—until I announced I was leaving the college. At that point, I found myself in a number of conversations that led me to look more closely at the successes and failures.

I started my first college presidency at that magical time when it looked like the COVID-19 pandemic might be over. It wasn’t, and I spent the first year balancing the needs of college stakeholders, the state government and a large district with conflicting approaches to public health decisions like face coverings and requiring vaccines. Despite that challenge, first-year enrollment grew slightly, and we developed an aggressive plan to change our enrollment trajectory.

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Year two got a little better. We launched a new shared governance process, enrollment increased again and the retention rate finally started to rise. Community relationships also improved as people returned to in-person meetings and more trust developed between those of us on the campus and our neighbors in the surrounding area. We aligned new programs with community needs, and just spending time with folks gave us a lot more credibility. We were also able to move diversity, equity and inclusion efforts forward for the first time.

By year three, I was hitting my stride. Enrollment and retention continued to go up. We began an annual planning process and started to talk about a new five-year strategic plan. The executive team was finally complete, and the community was aligned with what we were doing.

But while things were going well professionally, it was clear that the community was not the right place for me personally, as I needed to be in a larger one with more professional opportunities for my spouse. We also both needed to be located closer to family, both adult children and aging parents. So I started looking for the next opportunity. I was able to land a new role that was a great fit and told the college that I planned to leave.

And that is when I really had to ask myself, “Was this leadership experience truly as successful as I thought?”

The 3 Failures

After I announced I was leaving, members of my executive cabinet, faculty leaders and, most important, the governing board agreed that things were on the right track and that the college was positioned to keep moving forward. They would find a replacement, and the progress would continue. But the more time I spent listening to the discussions around me and watching what was happening, the more I realized that I had failed in the presidency in three key ways.

1. I didn’t spend enough time solidifying the mission and vision and getting broad buy-in.
2. I didn’t connect the external work to the internal work of the college.
3. Too many long-term plans were in my head—not on paper or otherwise shared with key people around me.

I’ll explore each in a little more detail.

Solidifying Mission and Vision

Almost immediately after announcing my departure, I noticed that folks wanted to go back and talk about strategic directions and decisions that I thought had been agreed upon. No doubt, some of that is bound to happen in many cases when a president departs. People need time to process their emotions, and, like any change, a transition of this kind can produce the whole grief cycle of denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. But what I was hearing went beyond that.

That became apparent when I tried to make a couple of big decisions shortly before I left. Both decisions were met with pretty stiff resistance. From my point of view, I saw them as next steps in accomplishing the vision and mission. But many senior people at the college did not see them that way.

I will concede I might just have made bad decisions. But if I give myself the benefit of the doubt and say they were appropriate ones, I can see another reason why the resistance came: I had announced I was leaving, so people felt a little freer to tell me how they truly felt. And it was tough.

I realized that both decisions, and probably others, were not supported because I had not articulated how those decisions helped advance the college’s mission, and I had not spent the time building the necessary support even within the executive team. To me, the reason was obvious. My view was “Our mission is X. I’m doing X. So what’s the problem?” The problem was that the why is important, and I didn’t articulate it.

Solidifying an institutional mission and vision also means celebrating the wins along the way and making sure everyone remains committed. For instance, I thought everyone on the executive team saw a particular construction project as a mission-centered action. We were expanding a program into a new area where both local students and businesses had expressed interest. Two years previously, when we made the decision, we had talked about the vision, but over the course of planning the project, arguing over details and changing some aspects, we lost sight of the vision. Honestly, the project had probably drifted a bit and was not as mission-focused as it should have been. The transition would have gone better for the institution if I had reminded the team of those shared values and vision.

Not Connecting the Internal and External Work of the College

Starting in my second year as president, a lot of my work became external. I was meeting with government leaders, economic development organizations and businesses. I listened and often brought back ideas that we implemented at the institution. The problem in the previous sentence is the “I.” I wasn’t taking vice presidents and deans with me to hear what I was hearing and build relationships.

At one event, local leaders highlighted the complete lack of mental health professionals in our area and a high number of job openings. A year later, the state government provided grant funding for us to start providing a program to fill that gap. It all came together, and we started offering the program, which had strong enrollment and good community support. But few people at the college saw the link. They just knew that we got a grant, so we started a program. Most probably assumed this was simply a case of us chasing money.

Had I connected those community leaders with top administrators at the college, it would have created even greater synergy. And the program would have become sustainable well past when I left because I wouldn’t be the hub. I can think of a dozen other examples.

People often a debate how a president should spend their time and whether they should focus more on internal or external matters. I think the question is too simplistic, and my answer is that a president should be a facilitator of relationships between internal and external constituencies.

Too Much Was in My Head and Not on Paper

Not long after I announced I was leaving, one of the vice presidents came to me perplexed about how a decision I made as I was leaving fit into the overall strategy of the college. I could immediately articulate how I saw several pieces coming together to fulfill a particular strategic objective three to five years down the road. That, too, was a problem, I realized. I had never written that out or articulated it in a way that other leaders could come back to and understand its rationale.

In my short experience, a president’s job is a careful balancing act between the immediate emergencies of the day and staying focused on a distant shore. I had spent much of my time thinking about the distant shore but not enough orienting others to the map.

Starting Over

Preparing to start a new job, I have thought a lot about the habits and practices that will keep me from making the same mistakes as I did in my previous leadership position. On my office wall I’m going to post three reminders.

1. Start with why. This is my short phrase to remind myself that whenever I can, I should start with the vision—why I am making the decisions I make. That can also help draw other people into that conversation.
2. Be a Lego builder. Individual Lego pieces are boring. But you put a few together, and they can create something great. When I’m out in the community, I want to think about how I can connect more people.
3. Ask, “Where is it written?” This is a question for me as well as others. By written, I don’t always mean pen on paper. But if a key strategy or plan is not in a place where others can easily find it and refer to it, it’s not a true strategy or plan.

In the end, I think of my previous leadership experience as a failure—or, put more generously, a learning experience—because the results were not as sustainable as I would have liked. And I knew better. I have had excellent mentors and great training. I knew a president’s main responsibilities were to take care of people, set a vision and steward the culture of the college.

The happy end to the story is that the institution I left will be great, and its people will build on the work we did together. It’s a college, like many, that has a core of longtime employees who have watched presidents come and go, and they have continued to focus on significantly improving students’ lives. They also have a great core of employees who have just come aboard and are bringing a renewed sense of vitality to the mission.

I can’t help wishing I had done better by these folks and our students. But I’m happy that as a president I could learn some news lessons. And, most of all, I’m happy that I get to try again. We’ll see if I can apply those lessons better this next time around.