Telling Your Story: A Key to Success
Evidence of strategic planning includes regular environmental and SWOT (strengths-weaknesses-opportunities-threats) analyses, benchmarks and progress reports, unit self-assessments, and a clearly articulated mission/vision that focuses the in-plant’s resources on the needs of the organization.
Two more points about planning. First, consider using an external expert to evaluate your operation. This is something higher education does very well with academic programs. The entire accreditation process at both the institutional and departmental levels is based on a self study validated by a review by external experts, and many colleges and universities are applying the same model to support (non-academic) units.
Ray Chambers, CGCM, MBA, has invested over 30 years managing and directing printing plants, copy centers, mail centers and award-winning document management facilities in higher education and government.
Most recently, Chambers served as vice president and chief information officer at Juniata College. Chambers is currently a doctoral candidate studying Higher Education Administration at the Pennsylvania State University (PSU). His research interests include outsourcing in higher education and its impact on support services in higher education and managing support services. He also consults (Chambers Management Group) with leaders in both the public and private sectors to help them understand and improve in-plant printing and document services operations.
