Try not to bother Nancy L. Zimpher with something that doesn’t concern improving the University of Cincinnati. Sure, Zimpher,
president of the university, probably wouldn’t mind having a conversation about something else, but as a leader with a budget
of more than $1 billion, she uses every moment of the day to push the academic institution forward. For Zimpher, her main job
as a leader is to spark the action that will drive the university, and that’s her priority when it comes to everything, so if you’re not
on the same page, you probably won’t end up on her calendar. Smart Business spoke with Zimpher about how she inspires action
and how she interacts with her 14,000 full- and part-time employees.
Don’t just listen, interact. You need to use the
common courtesy of an interaction style,
and that is respectful and, at the same time,
responsive. Notice I did not say listening,
because listening is a one-way street.
People want to be heard, and that’s what
I mean by being respectful, but they want a
response. They want to know, ‘Is what I
said to you making any sense, are you
going to do anything about it?’ and that’s
the responsive part, and you have to do
that every day.
It’s all about getting something done, and
people need visible signs that things are
moving forward for the better. So when
you respond and say, ‘I’ll follow up on that,’
or, ‘I’ll send you an e-mail on that,’ or, ‘I’ll
take that issue to another department,’
they want to know that you’re going to do
it. It’s all about action, and that builds confidence and keeps hope alive, and it says to
people, ‘Boy, eventually this is going to
work. This is hard, but I think we’re going
to get somewhere.’ That’s human nature;
everybody wants betterment.
Lead by creating action. You have to have a
sense of who you are and what you believe,
and that provides the context for your day-to-day actions. Leaders are expected to be
visionary, to have a big-picture idea of
where the organization is going, and to
inspire others to move in that direction. So
beneath all that is a need to be action-oriented and get things done.
Every day is organized around how to get
things done, how to take the big idea, the
vision, and that makes organizing the day
really very purposeful. You have to work to
have the right people in a room and agree
on the next steps in the action plan to really move forward.
Remember that you’re always in the spotlight.
Everything is a committee meeting. Even a
dinner is a committee meeting. If you have
a group of diverse people at the table,
you’re trying to get something done.
I spend a lot of time meeting with groups,
with policymakers, I lead organizations at
the national level, and I go to a lot of events
and performances. What I carry with me to all of those is the plan, and I try to see our
strategic plan as scaffolding. Then the
meetings I go to, the speeches I give, the
groups I engage with, need to hook onto
that scaffolding, or I don’t go there. You
have to constantly say, ‘Is this thing I’m
being asked to do instrumental to the goals
that we’ve set for this university?’
I’ve always felt that you are the key
spokesperson for the institution; you are
the personification of the university. I have
a lot of red and black in my wardrobe, and
I’ve had people tell me it looks like I’m
wearing the brand, and it almost comes
down to that because wherever you are,
people see you as a representative of the
institution; that can be at a casual dinner at
a local restaurant or that can be at a meeting of the chamber of commerce. I don’t
think you can avoid that.
Hire to fit your plan. During a 16-month period, we recruited four new deans, and we
told them about our strategic plan. In
every instance, what we did during that
recruitment process is selected someone
who understood the context of that plan
and eagerly embraced the opportunity to
craft a vision for their individual college
unit that would be complementary or
aligned with the larger plan. They may
have small variations on the plan, but
there would be enough alignment that
they would be leading us on the same
path to a new future for that particular
college.
We have a pattern of using one dean to
recruit another dean’s position, which
really works well because that lateral
person can really be the authentic communicator to prospective candidates
that, ‘This is how I work within the university, and this is something like what it
might look for you.’ I look for integration
from potential candidates. We are looking for people with a great track record
of getting things done in similar environments.
By and large, the candidates we want
are going to be people who understand
this establishment.
Focus on today and tomorrow. I don’t know the
true shelf life of a strategic plan, but we are
in about the fourth year of a plan that probably has about a six- to eight-year shelf life.
At the same time, I personally have been
participating in some futures workshops
and have set some time away from the dayto-day to engage key leaders to do some
visioning work around the future of the
university.
I know that while the plan we are working on has currency today and even tomorrow, it might not have the same currency a
few years down the pipe. Most of my life is
defined by the notion of a ‘yes and’ strategy. First, you have to articulate this plan to
get it done, and then you have to keep an
eye on the future.
HOW TO REACH: University of Cincinnati, (513) 556-6000 or
www.uc.edu