“It's tough to make predictions, especially about the future.”
--Yogi Berra
Used on a college campus, the phrase “issues management” is often seen as either futile fortune-telling or “spin” – a desperate attempt to put a good face on a set of bad facts or decisions. But the reality is, not undertaking issues management is akin to saying we don’t have enough time to install smoke detectors because we are too busy putting out fires. With universities’ and colleges’ reputations under fire from all sides these days, issues management becomes a critical exercise of identifying and then taking steps to reduce the chance that a potential threat will have a significant and corrosive impact on your organization’s reputation (i.e., become a crisis).
At Blue Moon Consulting Group, we believe that issues management should be a strategic part of not only protecting but also building an institution’s reputation. In our new whitepaper, “Beyond Spin—Bridging the Gap Between Stakeholder Expectations and Decision-Making,” we outline a comprehensive process that’s built around a four-part framework that we call a CASE Options Analysis. Simplified, it involves having your team analyze each of your institution’s top 15 or so potential issues to determine which of four strategic categories it falls into:
CHANGE: The toughest issues that can potentially threaten the institution’s reputation and the credibility of its leadership. Requires immediate and comprehensive action.
ACCEPT: When the cost of solving an issue is actually higher than the potential cost associated with the risk, you may decide to essentially do nothing now and continue to monitor.
STRENGTHEN/BUILD: Rather than exposing risks or vulnerabilities, some “problems” actually present an opportunity for institutional innovation or leadership.
EDUCATE: Driven by a mere lack of understanding about some aspect of the institution, these types of issues can be easily addressed by more robust or strategic communications efforts.
Issues management does take some effort, and it will take some time – but less than the time spent in constant fire-fighting and react-respond mode.
Simon Barker is Managing Director at Blue Moon Consulting Group, a consultancy that focuses on risk management. To find out more about Blue Moon’s higher-ed practice and to download other whitepapers, please visit www.bluemoonconsultinggroup.com/highered.
