Background

RHB undertook a Future-Ready Organizational Capability Assessment using The RHB 3-5 Design with Calvin University, a 3,000-student Christian university in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The University, known as Calvin College until 2019, has historically had a strong academic profile and in recent decades has been recruiting more-diverse students, faculty and staff.

The institution claims a position in the “messy middle” of American culture, referring to the space where its community aspires to engage in difficult conversations with “curiosity and conviction” and to disagree while still sharing the same space. An interviewee said that they are adept at “holding the tension while inviting others to hold that tension.” Other interviewees told us that they “teach students how to think, not what to think” and that “something special happens in the middle.” Helping audiences understand the relevance of that middle place is an essential part of the work of marketing and communications.

Challenge

When we began this project, the institution also resided in the “messy middle” with regard to its communications and marketing function. Its Division of Marketing and Communications (MarCom) was under the leadership of its highly capable vice president for enrollment. MarCom staff reported they were working hard “on the edges of our desks” and trying to serve a more strategic purpose for the institution but in reality operating largely as a service function to meet the needs and requests of campus partners and colleagues. MarCom staff were also tasked with meeting emerging demands resulting from the creation of new academic schools and programs, including online ones—part of Calvin’s 2030 vision to become a Christian liberal arts university with an expanded global influence.

Solution

We began with a current state inventory including a data and document review, the first of three methods of inquiry we use in The RHB 3-5 Design. We collected enterprise-level plans (such as the strategic plan and visioning documents) and samples of MarCom’s work and internal plans. These important pieces helped us understand where the institution was at that moment and where it would like to go in the future—and where opportunities lay for MarCom to participate in that movement.

The most-recent strategic plan, the Strategic Plan 2025, and a longer-term plan, Vision 2030, follow the institution’s transition from a college to a university. That change also entails shifts in institutional behavior at all levels. Strategic Plan Goal 10 directly invokes MarCom, urging them to compel audiences to act on the institution’s behalf by telling inspiring stories about the work the university was doing in the world.

One of Calvin’s great ambitions is to increase their global influence, writing in Vision 2030 that they aspire to become a trusted educational leader around the world. In keeping with that vision, they selected a new president who is a graduate and a former corporate officer with a global energy brand. That new president joined the university toward the end of our assessment so we were able to engage him regarding our progress and collect his input as we developed final recommendations.

MarCom in its current state was oriented more toward services, and campus colleagues (or “clients” in their lexicon) mostly assessed the division based on its capacity to meet their needs. In this situation, clients will then judge the effectiveness of MarCom by how many outputs it produces, rather than by the outcomes it affects. Based on the direction of the institution, Calvin needed MarCom’s strategic capabilities, and MarCom staff members wanted to exercise them. However, the output orientation and expectation served as the driving force for their work.

While there were lots of exciting things happening in support of building a global profile, there was a gap in consistent internal messaging. During our qualitative research, we heard a refrain that “we don’t know who we are” and “we haven’t decided who we are.” This is not an unusual circumstance at an institution that has recently moved from being a college to a university, but it does need resolution.

We observed this lack of clarity around institutional identity when we collaborated with Calvin to create a list of 10 benchmarking institutions. The suggested institutions ranged from a local community college, to several institutions like the client that were also located in the region, to larger, secular universities. The institutions we ultimately included were either key competitors of Calvin or ones about which they held aspirational curiosity, rather than a representation of all the choices prospective students could make.

Finally, we learned that MarCom had ambitions to become a “progressive” function, meaning that they would continually increase their capabilities, including through their use of technology. Digital innovation is critical to attainment of Vision 2030 and enacting the strategies in the Strategic Plan 2025. The institution used a variety of “bespoke” technologies for which users had developed a strong loyalty. The university’s internal constituents recognized that technology is a tool that can only accomplish the purposes to which it is applied, to the level of skill of the people who use it. They also recognized that investing in change management was essential to moving everyone onto shared platforms.

In all, we encountered an institution that could boast of a devoted population of faculty, staff and alumni and an expansive ambition. They were also at an inflection point where a renewed MarCom would be a necessary component for moving into a new institutional life with strategy and clarity.

Results

STRATEGY

We recommended that OCM evolve toward a more strategic function whose work is directly aligned with the university’s strategic priorities and its most important audiences. The division’s own strategic plan should explicitly ladder up to the university’s strategic plan. In addition, MarCom’s strategic plan would benefit from clearer success metrics for its division-specific set of priorities.

Our other central strategic recommendation for MarCom was that it distinguish between brand and market position more clearly and help the institution select a market position as they decide who they are relative to others going forward. Selecting and consistently communicating and living into that market position is a critical commitment for internal communications, helping the community to unite around that position and ultimately shape brand. A clear market position is also an element of a strong institutional strategy, which was an opportunity for the incoming president.

STRUCTURE

We recommended the addition of a Vice President for Communications and Marketing and outlined a vision for this cabinet-level role. The lead marketing and communications position was at the director level reporting to a vice president for Enrollment Management. The university’s strategic plan would require, according to our analysis, a more significant role for the marketing and communications function in moving the institution forward.

STAFFING

We helped Calvin identify priority positions for the maturation of its MarCom function, and we reimagined specific roles to align with its future state, such as an associate director role evolving from “client strategy” to “enterprise marketing.”

We also recommended focusing renewed attention on transparent and consistent internal messaging that tracks the university’s efforts to communicate what’s happening at the university. We further suggested ways to build joy and grace back into work processes. Finally, we discussed diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging as a complicated theme of our interviews and recommended that they seize this moment to reorient the passion of MarCom—and all of their community—around a shared, deep desire to create change that better serves the world.

SYSTEMS

Achieving global impact is predicated on smart use of technology. We recommended movement to a single enterprise CRM, rather than continuing to use bespoke technology. We also discussed the need to use change management principles to deal with resistance around adopting new technology.

SPEND

Our benchmarking demonstrated that investment in marketing and communications was on the low end of the set of institutions we examined. That framed recommendations we provided on increasing effectiveness and efficiency and on doing the hard work of setting expectations with partners about what can be achieved at the current level of investment.

Following the delivery of our final report, the university leadership did move forward with adopting several of RHB’s recommendations, including establishing a vice president role to lead marketing and communications. The search for the right candidate began the following semester and culminated in the hire of the first Vice President for Marketing and Communications who is currently in place.

“I was impressed by RHB’s expertise in marketing team structure and cultural assessment. This led me to advocate for an investment from our leadership in a process that could guide the optimal resourcing of MarCom to support our transition and growth into a university structure. The thorough and professional process by RHB produced insightful recommendations that were well-received by our president’s cabinet. As a result, our Marcom division is now embracing a new identity as strategic partners, moving beyond traditional service providers.”

–Tim Ellens, Director of Marketing and Brand Steward