Interview with Serena Matsunaga

LEH: Okay. So, you ready to start, or--

SM:Sure.

LEH:All right. So today is, oh, let's see, Monday, June 15, 2020. And I'm here with Serena Matsunaga for the UW System Restructuring project. Serena, could you just say your name and then spell out your last name?

SM:Serena Matsunaga. M-a-t-s-u-n-a-g-a.

LEH:All right. Just your background. So could you talk about your background with consulting and higher education?

SM:Sure. I spent probably ten years at Huron Consulting Group. So I started in, I sort of started in the strategy and operations group and spent ten years managing largescale engagements. And then I left Huron to work at a large flagship university for the provost in strategic planning. And I came back to join Huron for the Wisconsin project.

LEH: So, why did you come back to Huron for this project?

SM:I had relationships with the folks who were leading the project. And they had an immediate need, sort of a mid-project change. And it sounded interesting. I mean, I think the level of challenge was exciting. You know, it was a short timeline and a lot of activity and a lot of change. So I think that it's a combination of that. It was the need and the challenge.

LEH: So in terms of challenges, what were the things that sort of immediately struck you as the most challenging parts?

SM: I'm interested to hear what others say about this. But the timeline, right, so the announcement to when the key tasks needed to be completed for 00:03:00accreditation was an aggressive timeline. It was announced in mid-October. And then by the time I came onboard, it was March. And then we had a period of (laughs) three months before, I believe, the HLC recommendation or visit was coming. And then the action started. So, you know, it was the action planning around that.

LEH: Hmm. So, from your end, who, just sort of at the beginning of the project, I guess who, what were sort of like communications like? Who did you find yourself like the most involved with? In the project planning?

SM:Yeah, I think communications was a challenge because it was just such a large scope. I mean, probably a scope that had not been experienced in recent history. So Nicole Anspach was running communications. And she was a delight to work with. She hadn't built out her team yet, so (laughs) I think that at that point when I first got on, she was trying to figure out how to structure her support in a way that could serve the project well. And we were helping to understand what messages needed to go out and when.

And that became more complicated as you think of the various stakeholders. So you have external stakeholders, you had internal stakeholders. And this was a tremendous amount of change for a university system.

LEH:So what sort of messaging, sort of the, depending on who you're talking to?

SM:Well, we had to organize that. So the first thing that was structured was engaging stakeholders. And the one tool that worked well was a regular sharing committee meeting. So that would be receiving institutions. And working with them sort of helped to, they brought concerns and issues from their 00:06:00campuses forward. So that helped us segment the stakeholders and determine the messaging.

And then we brought together the operations leaders. So as you know, we were structured across different action plans. So we brought those folks together to understand what specific actions were going to be coming up. And then working with Nicole, we came up with a, we tried to simplify a complex project as best we could. So that people were aware of the upcoming changes and were able to keep track. And then it was a way for us to show how we were progressing and where the potential challenges might be.

LEH:So, what were sort of the concerns that people at receiving institutions were bringing up?

SM:Oh, there were a lot of them. I mean, (laughs) you name it and there was a concern. I think, at first it was people. Right? So how's this going to impact people? So it was the tactics related to human resources. There was a thread on technology. So how do we need to reconfigure our system so there's no interruption to students? And those were the large ones that came up frequently.

But then it was just for every program, it's how is this going to work? Right? What changes, and how is this going to work?

LEH:Could you expand on those? So what about the people aspect were--people (laughs) sorry, that's an oddly phrased question. Yeah. Could you just expand on the human resources aspect of that?

SM:Yeah, it was how the transition is going to work. Who would you report to next? Who reports where? And for those without, who were not going to transition, what was the plan there? So how, after the colleges were to close down, how to treat the placements fairly, how to treat the process fairly. And manage those employee communications in a way. Because I think 00:09:00there common concern about the people who, the staff and faculty. And making sure that this was as clear to them as possible.

LEH:So where did sort of your role as a consultant come in with these sorts of concerns? Yeah.

SM:So by the time I got to the project, it had already been structured. So I'll answer from my vantage point of coming in in March. Is that okay?

LEH:Yeah.

SM:Okay. So give me the question again. The role of a consultant?

LEH:Yeah.

SM:In identifying--

LEH:Concerns, or mitigating those.

SM:Yeah. So I think what we did is we had, we facilitated regular, structured meetings. Not only with the steering committee, but with the project team. And our consultants were facilitating planning on two ways. So, with the receiving institutions and with kind of the central operations planning for the different tactics that were going to be rolled out. So as we listened and participated in those meetings, we would identify common themes and we would bring them back to the project sponsor. Stefan Fletcher was the project, I forget his role now, but we would have regular meetings with him, and then regular meetings with, you know, to suss out the themes, with Nicole. And then bringing forward the major themes to the executive sponsor.

LEH:Yeah. I think it was something something within the project management office, I can't remember what exactly his title was. So I guess with your background in higher education consulting, could you speak more about how you sort of think about a system like UW just in terms of your expertise?

SM:So, you know, as far as the systems I've worked with, UW is a 00:12:00larger system. So there's more institutions. I think managing something like this was more complex because you had different institutions and stakeholders. And I think sort of taking that vantage point to change management was, we knew that change management was going to be more intense than in other projects. So bringing people together, focusing on the issues and trying to simplify as much as we can for the stakeholders was something we strove for. To help make sure that we were hitting the milestones that needed, identifying hitting the milestones that were needed and working the logistics in a way that was manageable for the project. And I mean, bottom line, Wisconsin is a large, large system. And with that comes complexities.

LEH:Yeah. Yeah, definitely.

SM:Yeah, it's good, though. I think that there is some really strong things that, strong aspects about the way the Wisconsin system unfolded. And in a lot of ways, this was a bold move to address some of the enrollment. You know, the projected enrollment issues. And you know, it just required, it just, these types of initiatives, the tactics can be overwhelming if you don't stop to plan and prioritize.

LEH:Yeah. Could you expand on those enrollment issues? What concerns were there over enrollment? What kind of part does like sort of the data aspect of this play, how does that play into the project?

SM:Mm hmm. So I'm going to speak from my perspective. So you know, I don't have, the scope was not, this wasn't an enrollment project.

LEH:Yeah, yeah, no. That's what oral history is definitely striving to do is tell things from your perspective. So, yeah.

SM:Right. No, I think it was, the predicted decline in enrollment and some of the challenges that were predicted for some of the receiving institutions. And the thought that bringing, by bringing stronger pathways to community colleges, that would create sort of a stronger threat that would allow for greater affordability and greater access. So you know, starting from community college local and transitioning to a four-year. You know, the vision was spot-on for you know, for access. And I know that is a driver for the Wisconsin, this is oral history, and I know I'm being recorded. But I think it's the Wisconsin idea, right?

LEH:Yeah.

SM:Okay. So if you think about the Wisconsin idea, what this would allow students to do down the line is access to, greater access at a lower price point overall for students with greater opportunities. So, transitioning from, meaning a transition from a two-year to a four-year. So I think that that strategy was great. But the complicating factor was many of these institutions were seeing declines in enrollments. So what we tried to do was, in certain spots the team would help with specific, I mean, I know this happened with a few of the receiving institutions with specific enrollment support to help anticipate the budgetary impact of enrollment, and start to model some of that out.

LEH:Yeah. Yeah. I think that's kind of a good segue into some of the stuff surrounding mission, and then you also mentioned earlier the challenges of accreditation. So could you expand on that?

SM:Can you repeat that?

LEH:Sorry. Could you expand on sort of what were the challenges surrounding accreditation?

SM:Oh, I mean, the challenges around accreditation was making sure that the requirements outlined by HLC were met. So first of all, as an 00:18:00accreditation body, so understanding what the needs were and organizing the project in a way to meet those needs as the deadline loomed. And a lot of it was reporting and assuring the accreditation agencies that this was, that their concerns were addressed and that the restructuring was going to go forward in a way that was consistent with their expectations. So that meant a lot of communication, a lot of identifying the needs and the requirements and addressing specifically what they asked for.

LEH:So what were they asking for? What were sort of the expectations of a project like that?

SM:Oh, I just, it's been a few years. I mean, they needed general assurances of continuity of the student experience was going to be consistent with an accredited university. So it was things along those lines. They needed to see how this was going to work. And then the challenge just was a timeline and the volume, right? So there was a number of receiving institutions and a short timeline.

LEH:Yeah. Yeah. Could you expand on that? Sort of as the timeline played out, how that went in relation to accreditation?

SM:You know, I think it was we had a great team. Great partners at the receiving institutions. And with the colleges. So, I think what we were just, you know, again, prioritizing and block and tackling. So identifying what needed to be done, who needed to do it. And I have to say, it was really a tremendous effort by the campus partners of the receiving institution who stepped up and completed everything that was asked of them, even though this was a tremendous amount of change in a short amount of time. And amazing professionalism from the UW Colleges, who were essentially being asked to sort of dissolve in a 00:21:00period of time. And they were just extreme professionals in helping to make sure that the transitions were smooth and that the handoffs occurred in the best interests of the students.

LEH:Yeah. I guess how much of your work, would you say, sort of like what were the differences in looking at something from the student perspective versus faculty? Sort of the differences in what the challenges are.

SM:Yeah. And that became a point of, going back to communications, and as we moved into preparing for fall, that's when we started to take each of the different stakeholders. We did this in a session, I remember. We had the receiving institutions come to Madison and the operations leaders. And just as a team go through each one of the major stakeholders and identify at what period of time in the next semester would concerns come up. And from there, we developed our road map. So it was intentional time to think through from a faculty and staff perspective what their concerns might be, once we knew what it looked like. And students. And starting to think through it from a whole, you know, holistic perspective across the semester. Because all your communications needs aren't going to happen at one time. So sequencing them out and spending time on the front end thinking through how things might change. And really anchoring the communications on really what the change messages were.

LEH:Could you expand on that? What's a change message?

SM:Well, just like anything, right? Like, what's going to change for a student, right? Where are you going to go for ID? I mean, are you going to be able to, if you're in a community college, what services are available to you? What services are maybe not available to you? How does your life change from last spring to this fall? And for new students, I mean, they don't, new students 00:24:00would be new to the process. But there were a number of students who were second years or third years who were going to start with a different, with a new entity. And, I mean things as, where does my diploma come from? Who sends my diploma? You know, what logo are we using? It's all of those things. But to keep it, to prioritize it based on what the major needs were for students. Like, what year are you?

LEH:Oh, me?

SM:Yeah.

LEH:Oh, I'm a grad student in library science.

SM:Oh, a grad student. So, there was a number of grad students. So if you can imagine moving from, you get a communication that your whole, your college is going to change somehow. So helping to understand what that changes for you, right? So, where do you report? How are your classes going to transfer? Those types of specifics.

LEH:Yeah. Was transfer a point of contention at all? Or was that fairly straightforward?

SM:I wouldn't call it a point of contention. I think it was a concern. Because you knew it was going to have to happen. So it's almost like how are we going to make it work? And I think that was more of the tone.

LEH:Yeah. Yeah.

SM:Can I pause for a sec? I'll be right back.

LEH:Yeah. Sure. (pause)

SM:Okay.

LEH:So I guess student concerns sort of goes into an adjacent question of community concerns. So could you expand on your involvement of sort of the communities surrounding the former Colleges? Anything that you were hearing from local stakeholders?

SM:That was Nicole's team who did a lot of that. So we would share just general concerns as a team. But Nicole's group took the lead. And they did a great job, too. I mean, I think you probably did your interview with her months ago, right? (laughs)

LEH:I actually haven't talked with her.

SM:Oh, you haven't?! She'll give you context on that.

LEH:Yeah. So were you, you were mainly focusing on the strategy side and academic affairs? Or?

SM:Yeah. I mean, it was planning for all the needs for accreditation. And then our team assisted with implementation with certain receiving institutions. So we sort of broke up at that point and we deployed to the different receiving institutions. So we maintained a very small skeleton in Madison and we provided extra help for those who needed it.

LEH:So I guess for receiving institutions, I guess maybe like what is sort of the difference in concerns between, I don't know, I guess my question is sort of more about like kind of bridging that gap between the colleges and then these institutions that they're going to. Yeah, I guess, hmm. Sorry. My mind kind of sidetracked for a minute. (laughs) So I guess what about faculty? Were you hearing anything from faculty or receiving institutions about this project?

SM:Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, because of the timeline I think there was a lot of general concerns.

LEH:Yeah.

SM:So engaging them, engaging faculty was a trick. Especially since a lot of the work was over the summer. So you know, I think the, again, my perspective was sort of that March to September timeframe. So I missed a lot of the direct faculty coinciding with the faculty coming back to campus. But, yeah, 00:30:00I know that there was a lot. So to help I think we tried as best as we could to think through opportunities to connect with them, including faculty on the steering committee, I believe. And then helping at the receiving institutions for them to, points of contact in that faculty and staff roadmap of what needed to be communicated and potentially how to engage.

LEH:Mm hmm. So you said most of your work coincided with like not the academic year.

SM:Well, a little bit. I came on, again, because of the time that I came on, I think the third week of March--

LEH:Yeah.

SM:So it was a couple of months of the academic year. Then summer. A lot of planning through summer. And then helping to launch in the fall. But then we ended the end of September. So about half of the time coincided with the academic year.

LEH:Yeah. Were there any sort of discussions about, with faculty or staff, about sort of the structure of the institutions? What that would look like?

SM:I can't recall. I know that that was somewhere, the organization was somewhere. I think that predated my time.

LEH:Okay. Let's see. I guess we sort of talked about the timelines. Do you have any other thoughts about how your work was impacted by those timelines?

SM:No. I think that you know, in retrospect, I think the timelines while the middle of it I was thinking it was aggressive, but in retrospect I think it was effective in that you didn't have a lot of time to deliberate and sort of lose track and lose momentum. You had to stay focused because you knew you had this enormous challenge to meet by June, right? Or July. July first, I think it was. So it was moving at a speed that is probably atypical for a university system. And I wonder if you've heard that in your interviews. I think that 00:33:00might be a constant theme. But in retrospect, it was an effective strategy in that it didn't go on for a year, right? Or years. It moved. And when we did benchmarking for similar restructuring projects, what we learned is some of the projects never came to fruition because in the middle of planning, something was derailed. So I think that overall, it was an intense period of time, but an effective one.

LEH:Could you expand on that? So as someone who's worked with other restructurings, what are your thoughts about this one in relation to others?

SM:Now again, I think it was effective in that the structure was there, and that it moved quickly. And I think that we did as much as we could with engagement and by having the receiving institutions at the, literally at the table with the steering committee. I don't think we lost much in participation and engagement.

LEH:Hmm, let's see. I guess we talked about the challenges. But did you find that as you were working that any priorities shifted at all? That conversations changed in any way?

SM:Yeah. I mean, as we moved through, priorities and conversations changed as events unfolded. So there was, I guess, the one thing I remember being a pivot was the student information system. So there was concern about how the student information system was going to work in the new structure. And added focus on that issue.

LEH:Could you expand on that?

SM:So, it was a structural issue with the student information system. And how to migrate from one student information system to those at the receiving 00:36:00institutions. And so the thought was that needed to be done seamlessly in order to provide no interruption to the student experience. So, you know, as the planning continued, there was growing concern that we needed extra attention in this area. So that is what happened. But I remember that was sort of one of the challenges that unfolded in the spring.

LEH:Yeah. Let's see. Yeah. So you mentioned, too, that different people sort of worked in different areas of the project. Could you maybe talk a little bit about working between different groups and sort of the collaboration aspects?

SM:Yeah. And that was a challenge with the timeline. Because things were moving quickly, it was hard to make time to collaborate. And to find the points of integration, we really needed to do that. So we ended up having specific retreats in order to do just that. So bringing timelines together and share where they, and sort of build a master timeline. So, that was, we had workshops built into the project in order to continue with those activities.

LEH:Let's see, what else? Yeah. I guess is there anything that sort of strikes you as, that just pops up in your mind when you think about this project?

SM:Yeah, I was just thinking about it, I was thinking well it's again, Madison in the summertime. So every time I'm in, it's a wonderful place to be, right? So all the time nostalgia about being in Madison in summertime. No, I mean, I think that overall it was, again, an intense period of time. And in reflection, again, I think that it was one of those projects where you worked for an 00:39:00aggressive timeline, but I think it yielded tremendous benefits in saving time down the line and making sure that the change happened without interruption or delay that would sort of derail the whole strategy.

LEH:Yeah. All right. So aside from that, do you have anything else you'd like to add?

SM:No. I mean, other than that, I think overall, again, it's retrospect, right? So, two years later. I think now you sort of forget the hectic pace. And it's just really exciting to see some of, here and there stories of how things are working and some of the positive changes that have come along.

LEH:Yeah.

SM:And I'm happy we did it then. Because I'm not sure you could have done this in a pandemic. (laughter)

LEH:Yeah. Yeah. Who knows?

SM:It would have been a challenge to manage all this over Zoom.

LEH:Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

SM:It just goes to show you, you just never know, right? Like best laid plans can be interrupted, you know?

LEH:Right. Yeah. Yeah. No one could have ever anticipated, yeah, a pandemic. Yeah. All right. So you mentioned Nicole Anspach.

SM:Yeah.

LEH:Okay. Sorry, what?

SM:She works for UW. I think she's moved on now. She was on a project team.

LEH:All right. And is there anyone else that we should interview for the project?

SM:Did you interview--how extensive is your project, though?

LEH:It's pretty extensive. I've been trying to interview people from basically every area of involvement. (laughs) Yeah. So.

SM:So you probably have UW covered. I would recommend (laughs) although she's going to give you, I'd love to see this interview, but Joanne from Platteville, who's interim provost, if you haven't interviewed some of the 00:42:00receiving institutions. The provost and those who served on the steering committee, I think (laughs) I would love to hear what they think about now in retrospect, you know. From a Huron perspective, have you interviewed Mike Cogan and Colin McWilliams?

LEH:No. Sorry. Is that Mike Hogan?

SM:Cogan. C-o-g-a-n.

LEH:C-o-g-a-n. All right.

SM:Yeah.

LEH:All right. Well, thank you for talking with me.

SM:And Adam Fennel. Have you already talked to Adam?

LEH:Yeah. I have gotten in touch with him. Yeah. Yeah.

SM:Well, thank you. That was great.

LEH:Thank you.

SM:Yeah, it was a great project. I'm proud of the work. And it was, again, great people to work with.

End First Interview