February 2022 – Engaging International Alumni: A Path Forward

Learn how to best engage the diverse community of international alumni. Senior Director of International Alumni Engagement and Communications, Office of University Development, Eun Ja Yu moderated a University staff panel who shared their experiences engaging international alumni through the global pandemic and strategies for engaging international alumni going forward.

Panelists included:

• John Copeland, ’90, Senior Director, Medical education & Alumni Relations, Michigan Medicine
• Lara Furar, Director, Alumni Engagement and Programming, Law School
• Jason X. Gilmore, ‘04, Senior Associate Director of Development, Ross School of Business
• Christine Muchanic, Senior Director, Research Relations, College of Engineering
• Liz Seger, J.D. ’05, Chief Development Officer, University of Michigan Museum of Art

A Q&A session followed the panel discussion.

To view a full recording of the event, click here. You can access the presentations that was used during this event in the additional resources section.

Additional Resources

• Alumni Relations Council February 2022 Slide Deck (PDF)

June 2021 – Volunteer Onboarding and Training: The Beginning of Lifelong Engagement

Industry experts and fellow U-M staff members came together for this virtual ARC meeting to learn best practices for managing your volunteers and ways you can use the new Alumni Volunteer platform to easily share your volunteer opportunities with alumni.

Keynote speaker Tina Gourley, Director of Volunteer Onboarding and Training at Cornell University, shared proven practices in facilitating lifelong alumni engagement from her experiences managing volunteers through a comparable digital solution—CUVolunteer—and running the annual Cornell Alumni Leadership Conference (CALC).

Following the keynote, a panel of U-M staff shared alumni engagement wins and learnings utilizing the Alumni Volunteer platform during 2020-21. The cross-campus initiative connects alumni with volunteer opportunities hosted by University of Michigan affiliated groups that honor our alumni’s interdisciplinary expertise and general passion for volunteerism.

Panelists included:

• Kerin Borland, Director, University Career Center
• Cristina Frendo, Director of Alumni Engagement, UM-Dearborn
• AJ Haduch, Assistant Director of Alumni Engagement, UM-Dearborn
• Hannah Rickers, Alumni Engagement and Mentorship Program Manager, LSA Opportunity Hub
• Kelly O’Mara, Program Manager, Maize & Blue Cupboard
• Zoe Erb, ’19, Summer Works & Strategic Projects Coordinator, Poverty Solutions
• Angela Oonk, ’94, Director of Development, Clements Library
• Katherine Obrizak, ’16, Alumni Relations Representative/Alumni Travel, Alumni Association

Moderated by Tina Chen, ‘08, Alumni Volunteer Program Manager, Alumni Association of the University of Michigan.

To learn more about how you can start sharing your volunteer opportunities through the Alumni Volunteer program, please contact alumni.volunteer@umich.edu.

To view a full recording of the event, click here. You can access both presentations that were used during today’s event in the additional resources section.

Keynote Speaker Information:

Tina Gourley, Director of Volunteer Onboarding and Training at Cornell University

Tina Gourley is the Director of Volunteer Onboarding and Training in alumni affairs at Cornell University and has more than 25 years of experience working with volunteers. In her current role, she primarily focuses on creating and implementing an onboarding and training program for all volunteers at Cornell University. Tina is an active leader in the content and implementation of the Cornell Alumni Leadership Conference.

Prior to her current role, she was the Senior Associate Director in Class Programs at Cornell. Tina is a graduate of the State University of New York, Cortland. She began her career at Cornell in the development office in 1990 and has served in various roles since.

Additional Resources

• Volunteer Onboarding and Training: The Beginning of Lifelong Engagement (PowerPoint File)
• Alumni Relations Council June 2021 Slide Deck (PowerPoint File)

Featuring Ravi Pendse, Ph.D.

Vice President for Information Technology and Chief Information Officer, University of Michigan

Ravi Pendse, Ph.D. is the vice president for information technology and chief information officer at the University of Michigan, where he is responsible for providing university-wide leadership and strategic direction for information technology. He is also a clinical professor of electrical engineering and computer science at the College of Engineering. Dr. Pendse began his service on Aug. 1, 2018.

Dr. Pendse has extensive experience as a successful and collaborative university leader. He joined the university from Brown University, where he served as vice president for computing and information services and chief information officer. He has also been a professor, researcher, teacher, and advisor to students.

Dr. Pendse’s successes include securing more than $21 million in external research grants, developing university courses, earning several teaching awards, and publishing numerous scholarly articles and papers co-authored by students.

Dr. Pendse holds a B.S. in electronics and communication engineering from Osmania University in Hyderabad, India. He received his M.S. and Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Wichita State University.

On Dec. 5, we hosted thought leaders from across campus to explore The Changing Nature of the Workforce. Thought leaders from across campus came together to discuss the changing nature of the workforce and how it’s impacting Michigan alumni, their careers, and overall educational programming efforts. This session provided an overview of how the traditional career development trajectory has and is continuing to change across the nation.

Topics covered included:

• Increase in flexible, freelance, and contract work arrangements
• Skill or competency versus degree-based recruiting
• Less time spent in positions with the average at 2-3 years
• Millennials and young alumni pivoting earlier and more often in their careers

Watch the livestream replay.

On June 20, we hosted thought leaders from across campus to explore multiple aspects of lifelong learning. This ARC session provided a modern look at lifelong learning as well as suggestions on how you can easily incorporate aspects of online education into your alumni engagement work (e.g., Alumni Education Gateway). We learned things from faculty who are newly entering the digital space as well as veterans who have internationally popular MOOCs. The panel also included faculty and staff discussing their strategies for sharing educational content with U-M alumni.

Resources from Academic Innovation and the Alumni Association’s Alumni Education Gateway (AEG) were reviewed. ARC members were encouraged to use campus resources, including the AEG Toolkit and sending content for the AEG.

Panelists

Katie Doyle, MSW’97, MBA’13, School of Social Work

Katie Doyle shared her reasons for recently embracing digital learning and how the School of Social Work is intentionally creating in-person experiences, online courses, and blending the two.

Connie Lareau, MBA‘93, Executive Education

Connie Lareau reviewed some of the thinking behind Executive Education’s strategy for online learners. She also shared a potential flipped classroom approach to Executive Education, where students learn the concepts first and work together to solve real-world problems.

Chuck Severance, Ph.D., School of Information

Dr. Chuck Severance discussed Michigan’s involvement in creating the first digital course platform as well as online courses today. He emphasized the importance of the user experience and relationship building within the digital space. Future opportunities in lifelong learning include creating assessments that require learners to master the content, instead of gaming multiple choice tests; creating digital patients to help train students and keep real patients safe; and finding effective ways to bring learning opportunities across interdisciplinary spaces.

See the ARC June 2019 session slide deck.

Through a series of interactive exercises and discussions, attendees uncovered ideas and definitions of diversity that impact how we relate to each other and alumni we serve. Participants also gained insight on the changing landscape of philanthropy, the business case for diversity, and the evolution of DEI in alumni engagement and philanthropy.

Rob Henry, keynote presenter, is vice president of education at CASE, where he is responsible for creating an overall global strategy for achieving CASE’s vision and mission related to talent management and for guiding conference programming, diversity/inclusion initiatives, research, and the CASE Library.

See the ARC February 2019 session slide deck.

In today’s world, there’s no reason to limit our engagement with alumni based on where they live. We will expand our outreach to connect with them in deeper ways that are based on things like interests and shared experiences. From communities centered around everything from sports and culture to travel and tech, we can cultivate more meaningful engagement with our alumni.

Bottom line, we want alumni to feel that we are with them all the time, in whatever way possible, by expanding organic and structured points of connection.

Visit community.alumni.umich.edu for more information about Online Communities.

See the ARC November 2018 session slide deck.

Patrick Doyle has served as president and CEO of Domino’s since March 2010, an appointment that came after nearly 13 years with the company. He announced his plans to depart Domino’s in July 2018 after eight years of guiding Domino’s to industry-elite levels of sales performances, earnings growth, shareholder return, and franchisee profitability. Patrick earned his undergraduate degree in economics at the University of Michigan, and went on to earn his MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

Patrick shared lessons learned from Domino’s and applications for higher education.

See the ARC September 2018 session slide deck.

Heather McNair, VP of Engagement Technology for Higher Logic, shared industry trends on leveraging technology to maximize engagement and informed attendees on how online platforms can be a catalyst for creating and sustaining alumni connections. Steve Burns, Director for Global Engagement, walked through an online demo of the new Online Communities & Online Directory platform. The session concluded with a panel discussion on lessons from the Online Communities Pilot launch, which took place winter semester with the U of M Club of Washington, D.C., MLaw Entrepreneurs, U of M Club of Chicago, and Alumni Association Club Leaders. We’re excited to share that Online Communities will launch for all Michigan alumni in late summer 2018.

Visit community.alumni.umich.edu for more information about Online Communities.

See the ARC May 2018 session slide deck.

On March 9, Jennifer Cunningham, a nationally recognized expert in alumni engagement metrics (and an Assistant Vice President for Alumni Relations at Lehigh University), delivered an Alumni Relations Council talk titled, “Is Alumni Engagement an Art? Or a science?”

“What we do is an art, but we also need to apply some science to it,” Cunningham told the crowd gathered at the Alumni Center on Friday morning. “… Alumni engagement metrics don’t tell us what to do. Metrics guide our decisions and actions so we can be more effective.”

***

Cunningham emphasized quality interactions with alumni over planning more and more events, noting that while it’s easy to get caught up in the latter, alumni attendees are more likely to engage in a sustained way when they feel they’ve been heard.

One way to achieve this is by using short, simple net promoter surveys that consist of just two questions: “Based on your experience, how likely are you to recommend this to another alumna/us?” using a 0-10 scale from very unlikely to extremely likely, and “Why did you answer that way?”

Cunningham explained that the open-ended question allows alumni to cut to the chase and tell you precisely what they thought could be better, or what they loved about a program. “What you can learn from these two questions is fascinating, and it provides a great opportunity to follow up and call people and say, ‘Hey, I’m wondering what you thought about this.’ … Instead of someone becoming more and more unhappy, this allows us to ask ourselves, how can we turn it around and get them to come back? And if they’re happy, how do we get them to be an ambassador?”

Interestingly, Cunningham said that attendees who give an event a high score, and those who give it a low score, often offer nearly identical feedback on logistics or food. So what makes the difference? It’s the sense of being united with others. “People who got the group hug overlooked that stuff, because what was important is that they got to talk to each other,” said Cunningham. “… It’s not about the chicken. It’s about the connections.”

Cunningham also talked about alumni relations methods that don’t work – relying too much on science, or too much on art; whining about colleagues who don’t get it; complaining about bad technology; complexity; and doing nothing – and the many benefits of upselling or cross-selling. By way of example, Cunningham showed a brief grocery list, followed by a photo of a full-to-bursting shopping cart.

“In one store, they put the bananas right by the cereal, making it really easy for you to buy something else,” said Cunningham. “And what do they do at McDonald’s? For forty cents, you can supersize your meal. … For us, when we get people to come to homecoming, we need to not only make them feel good when they’re here, … but we also need to actively go out there and supersize them. … While they’re here, why don’t we do everything we can to get them to come back for something else?”

Cristina Frendo, Director of Alumni Engagement at University of Michigan-Dearborn, thought Cunningham’s thoughts on cross-selling were among the talk’s most valuable takeaways.

“Because we’re so decentralized, cross-selling is what we do, and it’s not going away,” said Frendo. “We need to embrace that. … And the creation of the Alumni Relations Council helps us with cross-selling, giving us the opportunity to hear what Flint’s doing, and share what’s going on in Dearborn.”

Meanwhile, Beanie Zollweg, Manager for Student Engagement at the Alumni Association, was interested in Cunningham’s comments about how to transition students to be engaged alumni, and experienced an “ah-ha moment” while listening to Cunningham’s thoughts on short net promoter surveys. “If we don’t ask what they’re thinking about, we won’t know,” said Zollweg. “I really like the idea that if you keep it simple, they’ll tell us what we want to know.”

Finally, Brent Nickola, Alumni Relations Manager at University of Michigan-Flint, felt reassured by Cunningham’s talk. “We’re headed in the right direction, and we’re ahead of the game on some things,” he said. “It was heartening to see that some of the work we’re doing on our campus, in collaboration with everyone else, is in line with what a national expert came here to tell us.”

The Alumni Relations Council kicked off with a very provocative session, Alumni Engagement in the Third Century, in which three Michigan deans and the President of the Alumni Association challenged the 100+ U-M staff in attendance to reimagine the definitions of “alumni” and “engagement.”

Additional takeaways from the panel included:

• Use an alumni-centric approach to learn how they define the University and the types of opportunities that are meaningful to them.
• Give alumni entryways into the world of alumni engagement so that they can connect where they feel comfortable, and can access the many engagement opportunities in a coherent way.
• Strengthen ties to future alumni (i.e. students) while they are on campus.

It was encouraging to hear the panelists express the value of alumni relations professionals and the role we have in transformative alumni engagement. We also welcomed many new faces to the ARC community and look forward to being a valuable network for you at Michigan.

Read about the distinguished panelists:

Scott DeRue, Dean, Ross School of Business

With a background in private equity, management consulting, and academia, Scott DeRue, the Edward J. Frey Dean of the Stephen M. Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan, is a widely published thought leader in business education and action-based learning, as well as an award-winning researcher and instructor. He believes that business is the most powerful force for economic and social impact — and it is the responsibility of Michigan Ross to develop the next generation of business leaders.

DeRue joined Michigan Ross in 2007, taking on multiple leadership roles over time. Prior to his deanship, DeRue served as the associate dean for Executive Education, professor of management, director of the Sanger Leadership Center, and faculty director of the Emerging Leaders Program. He also led the creation and launch of Alumni Advantage, a new initiative connecting Ross alumni to the school and university. Offerings include free tuition for executive education programming, access to livestreamed school events, and the opportunity to attend #ROSSTALKS, a series of global events where faculty present TED-style talks on hot-button business topics.

Prior to joining Ross, DeRue worked at the Monitor Group (now Monitor Deloitte). He received his PhD in management from Michigan State University and his Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Andrew Martin, Dean, College of Literature, Science, and the Arts

Andrew D. Martin is the dean of the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts at the University of Michigan. He is also a professor of political science and statistics, and he is proud to be both an educator and a student advocate.

As dean, he leads the largest academic unit at U-M. In addition to overseeing its daily work, he has led significant new initiatives for diversity, equity, and inclusion, and for scholarships and internships. He has also driven the creation of the new LSA Opportunity Hub.

As a researcher, Andrew’s expertise lies in the study of judicial decision-making, particularly with regard to the U.S. Supreme Court. He is the co-creator of the Martin-Quinn Scores, which measure the ideology of Supreme Court justices and are routinely cited by academics and leading news outlets alike. His research has been supported by the National Science Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation, and the National Institutes of Health.

In addition to serving as dean, Andrew teaches courses in judicial decision-making and political methodology at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. He earned his B.A. in mathematics and government from the College of William & Mary and his Ph.D. in political science from Washington University in St. Louis.

Steve Grafton, President & CEO, Alumni Association

Steve Grafton is in his 23rd year as President and CEO of the Alumni Association of the University of Michigan. In this role, he ensures that the Association continually provides greater opportunities for engagement to Michigan alumni to involve them in greater levels of support for their University.

Beyond his responsibilities at the Alumni Association, Grafton has been actively involved throughout the University community, serving as a longstanding member of the Dean’s Council Development Subcommittee and for 10 years was chair of the Advisory Council for the University’s Museum of Natural History. He also served as a member of the board of the Ginsberg Center for Community Service Learning and in 2015 was a member of the Provost’s Committee on Diversity, Equity & Inclusion. In 2016, he served on the University Bicentennial Alumni Awards Committee.

Grafton is a charter member and past President of the Council of Alumni Association Executives (CAAE). He also served on the board of trustees of the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) and chaired CASE’s Commission on Alumni Relations. He has been a district director and faculty member for numerous CASE conferences, an author of articles on alumni relations, and an editor of the “Handbook of Institutional Advancement.”

Before coming to Michigan, Grafton was executive director of the Mississippi State University Alumni Association. He also served as legislative director for U.S. Sen. John Stennis, D-MS. He has a bachelor’s degree in political science and a master’s in public policy and administration, both from Mississippi State University. He and his wife Carol have two sons, who are both graduates of the University of Michigan.

The event was moderated by Ralph Johnson, MBA’92, Chair of the Alumni Association Board of Directors and Ombud for the Americas region, McKinsey & Company.

Ralph Johnson, MBA’92

Ombud for the Americas region at the consulting firm of McKinsey & Company. Ralph is the former chair of the University’s annual fund campaign, and also a former chair of the Ross School of Business’ Alumni Board of Governors.

Participants reviewed The New Rules of Engagement and brainstormed how to turn new alumni engagement ideas into strategic action.

• Agenda & Roundtable Notes
• ARC Slide Deck
• The New Rules presentation slide deck is located in the Alumni Relations Council folder on Box at U-M
• Additional EAB resources are available to U-M staff who create a profile via U-M’s membership

• Agenda
• ARC Slide Deck
• The New Rules presentation slide deck is located in the Alumni Relations Council folder on Box at U-M
• Additional EAB resources are available to U-M staff who create a profile via U-M’s membership

Professor Melville led participants in activities designed to provide a “deeper dive” into learning how data and metrics can support and amplify alumni relations. Attendees received a complimentary copy of Data Driven Nonprofits.

• Agenda

Ross alum Peter Faricy, ’95, shared his Amazon insight at the September meeting to help attendees understand how data can optimize customer (or alumni) engagement. Professor Nigel Melville shed light on how AR teams can become more data-informed organizations. The School of Information previewed a Bicentennial App that will launch in January 2017.

• Agenda

• Agenda
• Slide Deck
• U-M Unit Bicentennial Plans
• Bicentennial Events

• Agenda
• ARC Vision Book