Strategic Planning

Strategic Planning Accomplishments 1999 -- 2000

Initiative 1: People

• Implemented merit pay increases for faculty and staff
• Continued efforts to equalize retirement benefits for staff members
• Created university-wide committee to recommend non-salary incentive programs for staff
• Completed Faculty Evaluation and Reward Systems (FEARS) report on reward systems, promotion and tenure, and faculty performance and evaluation
• Developed plan, in consultation with university-wide committee, for the Center for Workforce Effectiveness to address staff training and development needs
• Prepared analysis of faculty and staff diversity on campus for planning purposes
• Presented benefits plan for mutually-financially dependent partners to Board of Administrators
• Implemented voluntary dental insurance plan, a new employee benefit

Initiative 2: Education and Research

• Created the Undergraduate Educational Council and the new academic administrative position to oversee all aspects of the undergraduate experience
• Created new residential initiative -- the Global Village -- for pilot implementation in fall 2000 and started planning for the Mississippi River Village
• Created Ad Hoc Committee on Research Support and Infrastructure to recommend research infrastructure improvements
• Created a Presidential Research Advancement Committee to set, oversee, and monitor implementation of the research section of the strategic plan, including the development of a strategic planning process for increasing competitively awarded, federally funded research

Initiative 3: Community

• Implemented new university web site
• Enhanced the university-wide commencement celebration by adding the Wave Goodbye party
• Initiated assessment process of public relations, marketing and communications strategies university-wide
• Began planning for an employee satisfaction survey to be distributed in fall 2000
• Began preliminary identification of campus needs for master plan development through school and college planning
• Increased enrollment of Louisiana students in first year of implementation of the Louisiana Focus program
• Undertook leadership role in collaborative effort to create the National Museum of the Mississippi River

Initiative 4. Resources and Leadership

• Initiated strategic planning process and creation of master plan for the Howard Tilton library collection
• Developed preliminary capital campaign plan table of needs and funding requirements
• Developed preliminary five-year financial projections to use as base case for planning and the capital campaign
• Had another record fund raising year, raising approximately $66 million, a ten percent increase over the funds raised last year
• Grew the market value of the endowment from approximately $550 million to $636 million, representing the largest single year increase in the history of the university.
• Implemented incentive phase of the Decentralized Management Center system
• Initiated administrative process improvement projects, including planning for a data warehouse, outlining improvements to Human Resources database functionality, investigating electronic workflow capabilities, and improving the purchasing and contracts processes and procedures
• Restructured the Health Sciences Center (AKA Medical Center) to achieve greater administrative efficiency and effectiveness as well as enhanced academic synergy among all academic units across the university
• Continued consultant review of Senate governance with recommendations to be presented to the Senate in fall 2000
• Continued expansion of Board of Administrators with addition of seven new members during the last two years

School, College and Unit Planning

• Completed the university-wide strategic plan, including approval by the University Senate and Board of Administrators
• Completed school, college and academic unit strategic plans.