In the sixth year of my presidency, I can confidently say that our CAO and CFO view their relationship with each other as central to the success of our institution. The budgeting process for this academic year was a difficult one for all institutions because of the recession. Tensions were high.
In the end, we did well in enrollment—and in expected net revenue—so we are facing a budget revision process where we must decide whether to save or spend some of the net dollars. At the moment, the CFO and the CAO don’t completely agree. I asked both for a meeting to discuss their differences. Five years ago I would have been the referee and the solution broker. Instead, by the time of our meeting, they had already solved the problems and were prepared with a solution and a plan. This is every president’s dream.
How are these relationships built?
• Presidential modeling. At small, independent institutions, the president has opportunities to interact directly with the faculty. She or he should take every opportunity to demonstrate openness to sharing data and discussing financial issues with the faculty. This sets the tone for institutional trust and demonstrates to the CFO that faculty can actually be reasonable. The CAO sees the president say “no” and maintain favor with faculty without needing to blame the CFO.
• Faculty inclusion. At our institution we bring the faculty into close contact with the CFO in formal and informal decision-making settings. Faculty members serve on the primary budget and planning committee as equal partners with the CFO, CAO, and other cabinet members. The provost chairs this committee, ensuring that the centrality of the academic program is clear to all. This is in contrast to a common model in which faculty members serve on an “advisory” committee and receive reports about decisions, sometimes after the fact. Last year, in recognition of challenges caused by the economic downturn, we invited faculty leaders to our Cabinet meetings as well.
• CAO as bridge. When our CAO references contrary decisions or viewpoints of the CFO in conversations with faculty, she never places blame, but rather describes reasons and rationale. The faculty trust this because they really know the CFO. In my experience, faculty and administrators are more likely to agree, or “agree to disagree” as our provost is fond of saying, if they trust each other’s motivations. I often also hear the provost asking faculty to “put on their institutional hats.”
• Shared wisdom. Our CFO and CAO present work together as professionals and scholars. For example, they both have shared wisdom about their partnership at the Council on Independent Colleges’ Institute for Chief Academic and Chief Financial Officers, an excellent venue for sharing ideas on partnership.
Use Planning Tools and Analysis—and Field Trips
At our institution we have a budget analyst who reports to both the CFO and CAO. He works directly with faculty committees responsible for budgeting, compensation, and benefits, and he serves as a resource for their work. He sometimes finds himself sandwiched by competing priorities, but he is trusted by the faculty to provide accurate information and to understand their viewpoint.
We use a fiscal planning and modeling software tool called Future Perfect from The PFM Group (http://fm.pfm.com/PFMFuturePerfect). This program allows immediate access to real data and real-time modeling so that informed decisions can be made without waiting for the CFO to leave, run the numbers, and come back a week later. For example, if some member of the group is arguing for a tuition increase smaller than others feel is appropriate, we can immediately look at the effect of different increases over time. When we all have access to the same data, we can understand each other’s perspectives even if we don’t share them.
We also have a tradition of “field trips” for our Cabinet members and for other members of the team who are working on special projects. We go on the road to visit other institutions that share common strengths and challenges or that have recently had a great success or completed an important building project. This spring and summer our CFO, chief facilities officer, and several faculty and staff cruised the country together. The ostensible purpose was to look at facilities designed by several architectural firms we were considering. The best outcome was the further development of the relationships between the CFO and faculty—which, in this case, didn’t involve the provost as intermediary.
Take the Long View
Sustaining and investing in exemplary academic programs is becoming increasingly challenging because of demographic and economic trends. There is no room in institutional leadership for diverging priorities on the part of the CAO and CFO. When a partnership develops between them, all manner of positive outcomes follow.
MaryAnn Baenninger has been president of the College of Saint Benedict in St. Joseph, Minn., since 2004. She serves on the board of directors of the Council of Independent Colleges, www.cic.org.
