Faculty and staff discuss Great Place Initiative next steps

By Mike Porter

About 150 faculty and staff members attended a town hall meeting on Oct. 15 to discuss next steps in VCU’s Great Place Initiative, created to promote employee excellence, celebrate current university benefits and consider improvements.

Beverly Warren, Ed.D., Ph.D., provost and senior vice president for academic affairs, thanked the crowd for the strong turnout and said it was exciting to see so many people coming together to help VCU become an even better place.

“Today is your day,” Warren said. “It’s a chance to share your thoughts.”

Maike Philipsen, Ph. D., Great Place Initiative steering committee co-chair and foundation of education professor, provided the audience with a summary report of the initiative’s progress to date and reviewed data collected from a climate survey of faculty and staff members and in-depth focus group discussions held earlier this year.

“In the spring, we took the temperature of the community, and in the summer, we analyzed the data,” Philipsen said.

Philipsen’s presentation of the responses from the climate survey and focus groups showed that faculty and staff consider the university’s strengths to be its people, diversity, inclusion and working environment. But the feedback also cited compensation, recognition, trust, advancement and communication as areas to be improved.

The steering committee and the university’s senior administrators are now ready to implement programs and policies that address some of those concerns and will first focus attention on improving recognition, trust and communication.

Philipsen detailed proposed initiatives to address those concerns. Initiatives included:

Recognition:
•  Strengthen support for employees who seek national recognition (through Academic & Faculty Affairs and other offices)

•  Improve research and publicizing of available national awards

•  Launch process to report on/recognize faculty and staff personal achievements, continuing education, special awards and personal development

Trust:
•  Explore consistency of employee evaluation process

•  Provide professional development to supervisors/chairs/directors on how to provide constructive feedback and evaluation

•  Strengthen mentorship programs for faculty, staff, administration Encourage meet-and-greet opportunities within units to enable faculty and staff to meet/talk to supervisors in person

•  Provide mandatory leadership development for chairs/deans/supervisors

Communication:
•  Standardize meetings and communications at the department and school levels (a mix of regular written and face-to-face communications and opportunities for discussion)

•  Encourage units to pursue best practices for engagement and communication (open the doors to consider changes)

•  Promote at all levels that active, two-way communication is encouraged and valued

Some members of the audience asked why salaries weren’t being addressed now and Assistant Vice President for Human Resources Cathleen Burke explained that compensation is being considered separately in a two-year study to evaluate how VCU faculty and staff salaries compete in the regional market.

“Compensation is a complex puzzle,” said VCU President Michael Rao, Ph.D. “We are committed to addressing it and know that it’s on everyone’s minds.”

Philipsen called on those in the audience to volunteer for an ad hoc committee to research best practices on recognition, trust and communication.

While many in the audience understood that some of the proposed changes will take time, they appreciated that VCU is making the effort to identify concerns and make improvements.

“I applaud our university for bringing this to the forefront and giving it a platform,” said Shajuana Payne, executive director of advising at University College.

Those unable to attend the town hall will be able to view a video of the meeting on the Great Place Initiative website.

 

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