Why Good Operations Are More Like a Waltz Than a Race

When I named my company The Optimum Department, I knew the word “optimum” might raise eyebrows. In a world obsessed with productivity hacks, relentless optimization, and squeezing every last drop of efficiency from every process, “optimum” can s...

I recently shared thoughts on applying the principles of High-Reliability Organizations (HROs) to research administration, framing our work as an adjacent high-reliability function. But what happens when you’re operating within a highly decentralized institution, school, or college where sweeping ch...

There’s a fundamental difference between strategy and strategic planning, yet too often, institutions conflate the two. Strategy is about winning, making deliberate choices to position a university, school, or research unit for success in an unpredictable and competitive environment. Strategic plann...

"Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication" - Leonardo  Da Vinci

If research administrators could distill the management and administration of grant portfolios and department operations into a single word, I imagine complex would be the most common endorsement. Some complexity is inherent in the pr...