BU Virtual Connects

BU Virtual Connects - Inspiring and Empowering Change: What It Takes to Cultivate Leadership and Resiliency in Uncertain Times

• Boston University Virtual • Season 1

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In this episode, Meredith Rosenberg, Co-Founder and Partner at NU Advisory Partners, spends a lot of time working with senior academic and industry leaders – whether that is relative to recruitment, strategic consultation and advisory services, or launching education technology startups. She has a really unique lens when it comes to empowering leaders and assessing talent, and helping organizations and institutions thrive and pivot in times of change. Her own approach to leadership is to manage the predictable and leave space to rise to the unpredictable, and most importantly to live your authentic self and be clear about what matters. In her own words:  “The leaders that I love in the university setting are the ones who think about what is possible, who are aspirational, who think about what is the future, and how do we build that. Those leaders are really the most exciting. They are entrepreneurial. They are innovative. They are creative. They think about what should be done.”

Wendy Colby:

This is Wendy Colby, vice President and Associate Provost at Boston University and the host of BU Virtual Connects. I am so excited to welcome Meredith Rosenberg, co-founder and partner at New Advisory Partners, an executive search and advisory firm, where she leverages over 25 years of experience in education and ed tech. In this role, she guides public and private companies, investors, universities and nonprofits in navigating the evolving education landscape. I met Meredith years ago and was immediately impressed by her ability to size up talent, think strategically and help leaders navigate toward success and anticipate the unexpected. Over the years, she has also created opportunities for education salons of a sort, bringing people together from different backgrounds and with different perspectives to foster dialogue and exchange. I had the pleasure of recently attending one of those events in Boston and I have to say it was the highlight of my dark, cold Boston winter.

Wendy Colby:

For those in higher education who may be listening, this is a conversation you won't want to miss. During these times of change and isn't everything always changing? Meredith encourages all of us to rise to the occasion, read the moment and move with precision where it counts. So why don't we get started? Really great to see you, meredith. Thanks so much for coming into our studio today. Thanks so much for having me, wendy. So, as I was sharing there just moments ago, you have quite an incredible career working across ed tech, consulting higher ed and now advising many of the leading institutions and organizations that service our industry in dramatically changing times. I wonder if you can talk a little bit about your journey and what you have learned along the way that has guided your work forward.

Meredith Rosenberg:

Yeah, thank you, and thanks again for having me. It's just really delighted to be here and I love that you're doing this podcast with so many different voices, so thank you for doing that Pleasure. So I have had a very circuitous journey to where I am today. I think if you had told me when I graduated university in 1992 that I would be leading an executive search firm, I would say I don't even know what that is, but I appreciate you saying before about these salons.

Meredith Rosenberg:

I really think of myself as a connector of people, and so one of the things that I have learned across this journey so far is that to really understand what people can contribute to a particular situation, pay less attention to titles and to roles, but more about what are people really exceptional at doing, what problems are they great at solving, and how do you match people together to help change situations. And so I think that I've become almost a collector of people along the way. I've worked both in the US and outside of the US in many different industries, and so sitting where I am today, it just gives me a really good view of who would I want to introduce to someone else to really just move a conversation forward.

Wendy Colby:

That's really wonderful. You know we're going to talk a lot today about leadership and I love that notion you just shared of collecting people. So we'll come back to that. And you know, as I reflect on my own career, I think about the many elements that are really critical to living leadership, and you just touched on many of these. You know it doesn't matter so much about title, but how are you sort of bringing your vision and strategic thinking? You know, thinking about proactive management, market customer focus, risk-taking, collaboration, communication. We could go on and on right. And so, as you look at this, in these times where we do need sort of that focus on adaptability, resiliency, change management, growth, mindset, right especially inside of education today, what's important to you and how would you define your own approach to leadership? I think?

Meredith Rosenberg:

every day is filled with the predictable elements and unpredictable elements every single day, and if you can manage for the predictable and leave space to rise to the unpredictable, then I would consider that a win. It's so important to understand who you are, what you're really good at, live your authentic self, be really clear about what matters and then, as a leader, just let your people run with what they're good at, so enabling people, empowering people. It's not about control and charisma. Being a great leader, I think it's really letting your team go do what they're really good at and enabling them to move forward.

Meredith Rosenberg:

I, as you know, have a vision disability, and so I don't think I thought much about this growing up, but now, when I reflect back, I think that has made me much more comfortable with uncertainty. It's made me a much better listener. It's made me much more agile, because I really had to navigate the world in systems that really weren't designed for me, which, again, as a kid I never thought about it that way, but now, as an adult, I think about it, and so that makes me better as a founder in a startup. I think it makes me better as a leader to really think about including people very authentically and just letting people run and go do what they're good at.

Wendy Colby:

And to be yourself, and I like what you're saying there. You know how do you navigate into places you may not have been before right, and I appreciate kind of growing up with that, like the things you can see and you can't see, and then how to move through that literally speaking, right, literally speaking.

Wendy Colby:

You know it's so interesting as I think about higher education. I think this is the moment where we need leadership more than ever in higher education. You know we're witnessing great change. You know rapid acceleration of technology, and it's really requiring us to think differently. And you know, again, I'm interested in your perspective because you've straddled business and university right, and so have I, and so it's really interesting to look at. Perhaps sometimes you know what you can also learn from the other. And as you think about this time, we're in right again. So many pressures on higher education. You've touched on so many themes in terms of leadership, but what do you try to advise your collectors those you collect right or what do you try to learn from them? How do we help others in this time who might not be so used to how to navigate change? What do you recommend for those who are maybe new to this journey?

Meredith Rosenberg:

So it's very important to understand how much change an organization can absorb, because not every organization can be so creative at the same level that others can. So for leaders, you really have to adapt to again what can an organization absorb? What is the right level of change for that organization and what is the right level of change for that organization, and what is the definition of innovation within that environment? As you had said, higher education is fundamentally changing and the pace of change and new initiatives or initiatives that are going away every day is evolving, as we know. Having a leader that can really again think about the predictable and the unpredictable and lead with both of those things in mind is so important. And so with universities, and particularly those that I have to think about the best way to say this particularly those that might be more conservative, might have a longer history more conservative, might have a longer history traditional that historically have been afraid of embracing too much change.

Meredith Rosenberg:

You really have to let go of that.

Wendy Colby:

Yeah, you know, I will say hey, we're having a lot of these conversations inside of our own community today, right, thinking differently about the way in which and I love the way you're sort of focusing on what's your strategy, what's your raison d'etre? Right, as an organization or as a university, you know it's forcing us to think differently about. And what do our students want, right? What should our courses and programs look like? Right? How are they performing for us today? Are they attracting the students we want? Do we need to rethink that, right?

Wendy Colby:

So, all sorts of discussion on this now, right, that is really what is going to make universities, you know, not only viable but thrive into the future. And so I think we are at that moment where, again, I kind of go back to fundamentals around. It's that strategic leadership, it is understanding markets and customer segments. It is, you know, and how you sort of get that expertise or help those who, again, might have had very traditional models historically evolve from that system, and then you think beyond the physical confines of the campus and your reach, and that can extend globally.

Meredith Rosenberg:

And where do you have people located? But yes, it is thinking about do we have the right courses? Are we teaching our students to thrive once they leave the university, which is really what the goal is to be thinkers and global thinkers and to solve the future problems of the world. But also universities have that responsibility for the care and keeping of their people, and so what does that mean? That thinks about what is my lived experience on campus, in the classroom. When I leave the classroom, there is a little bit of chaos, as we know, surrounding that, but that's a whole other important layer that speaks to again, living systems, mental health career.

Meredith Rosenberg:

What you need to surround the experience with right, exactly, yeah, it's just beyond the classroom, I think, and we learned some of those rules during the pandemic, when students suddenly were not gathering physically together. And how do you continue the product delivery, teaching and learning, and what is the core product of a university? But also, again, layering in this, how are we embracing our people? Super important.

Wendy Colby:

Super important. You know one of the conversations we have on this podcast series. I was speaking to one of our other guests yesterday and he likes to talk about learning in the flow of work and learning in the flow of life. And you know, you think about, I love that too. You know education and what that means, and even beyond the classroom, like as we extend to the boundaries, right.

Wendy Colby:

As you know, one of my key areas of focus here at BU is around how we extend our reach and our mission through online and other programs that will open up education to others who may not physically be able to come to Boston, right, and so we're starting to think about education not starting, it's been going on a long time, but thinking about education. And so when you think about the people we serve, right, whether they're right in front of us in a classroom or they're around the world, it's interesting to think about how you navigate that, how you manage that, what leadership skills are required to do that and not everybody learns in the same way, and that is also important to think about.

Meredith Rosenberg:

So when you think about bringing even BU beyond the physical borders of the campus and globally, as you had just said, you're also thinking about those students and learners who can't physically be here for other reasons and don't learn in the traditional. Having someone talk to me and at me, it's the. Do I learn by seeing things differently? Do I learn by doing? And so I think universities really have to think differently about that model how they're delivering the core product in a time of significant economic constraint, where priorities might be different as well too, and many universities we know are saddled by fiscal plant and deferred maintenance, which causes them to make choices about where they're investing in other spaces and other programs, them to make choices about where they're investing in other spaces and other programs, and I think many universities traditionally were afraid of online learning and non-traditional delivery of learning. That certainly changed a little bit in the pandemic, but I don't think we're ever going to go back to where we were before.

Wendy Colby:

I think you're so right If you look at most universities today and certainly the pandemic was a catalyst, as you said right, but so many universities today already have pretty vast portfolios of online offerings, right, providing choice. And, again, usually it's also and generally it's also extending that reach, as I said earlier, right in that these are segments of learners outside of those who would come into our campuses. So it's a great way for universities again, especially in these times, to think about diversification and to think about growth and think about impact to a broader segment of learners globally.

Meredith Rosenberg:

And there's also much more focus, I think, on cross-collaboration. So many universities that have colleges sub-colleges, I would say under university umbrella, historically were run separately. Faculty was separate, courses were separate, students were separate, and that is just not the way we think about things. And so being able to think about healthcare or health innovation but take a class in business to help me think about how am I going to launch something as a student once I graduate, it's so important, and I've seen more universities really think much more about cross-collaboration.

Wendy Colby:

I'm so glad you're talking about this. This is a theme we're talking about at BU today cross collaboration. We call it convergence here or interdisciplinary here. I was just sharing an article the other day about the humanities which are very much getting redefined, and this is, of course, a very important topic here for BU. But you start to think about humanities in general, as majors have been in decline and so how do we make those more meaningful? Well, back to your point. If you connect some of the arts and so on in the humanities with business, with health care, and so now students actually are looking at different pathways to their careers, that's, I think, what gets really exciting and we have to be intentional about that. Like, what is that experiential learning experience? What is the career outcome, what is the internship opportunity? And so we create that. We help our students then become these individuals that can have societal impact on the world.

Meredith Rosenberg:

Particularly when you think about education, because education isn't just what it used to be. There's law, there's policy, there's business. There's so many different ways to think about the education sector as you know as someone who worked in private sector and now is in the university and so being able to teach the future leaders to approach a situation from many different angles is so important, and so these traditional silos that many universities had, I think they just have to crumble. That, of course, has economic implications and budget implications and hiring implications, et cetera, but it's just it has to be approached that way, et cetera, but it's just, it has to be approached that way, yeah.

Wendy Colby:

I think it's a moment of opportunity and reimagination and reinvention, right in many respects. And you know, as I reflect and I'm interested in your perspective on this, meredith too, you know, kind of bringing you know my portfolio of experiences, if I were to call it that while I've been working in higher ed most of my career life, I have to say I've also appreciated having the business side right and I think at this moment higher ed really needs to blend business acumen with the academic as well. You need both. But looking at how to reimagine our programs and what we do for students today and taking a close look at, are these sustainable and scalable models and, you know, will they withstand right? The unpredictable, as you talked about earlier.

Wendy Colby:

And you know, often when you're sort of you know in business there I always say, or an entrepreneur, there are more unknowns than knowns, right, and so, as a good leader, you've got to prepare for that right. And so this may get to the question I wanted to ask you as well because you've done a lot to assess talent over the years. You talked about this, advising on strategic direction, and I'm just wondering just being inside a business as well, where you've spent a lot of time you run a business today, what experiences like? I'm always trying to figure out that intersection between business and academia and how the two can help each other. Right, and you know, certainly academia and higher ed is a place where we're growing and nurturing the future leaders right. At the same time, business has sort of moved at a different pace, right, and you work with many presidents of companies and CEOs of companies today, and so are there things you see in business that you think could be applied in these moments in higher education to help us with that reimagination, reinvention.

Meredith Rosenberg:

Well, certainly, because all universities have revenues and they have expenses, and so we say that nonprofits are certainly mission-driven, but it's really just a tax status that changes a nonprofit from a private company as well. So you still have to run them like a business. But very mission-oriented might mean the pace of change or level of innovation is different, but there are many similarities. I know that is not often a popular perspective. We do work with in addition to my company, in addition to working with companies across the education sector and the private sector, whether it's PE or public companies, growth stage venture.

Meredith Rosenberg:

We do work with universities, president searches, academic searches, but also searches. I would say bringing in leadership is a better way to say it than searches, Bringing in leadership and talent related to innovation and growth, and so we will often bring in people from the private sector to put them into chief transformation officer, chief innovation officer, partnership officers that are helping work with boards and presidents to think about what are ways that we can either partner university with other organizations, what would be additive, whether it's software or tech or other kinds of relationships that a traditional university maybe did not think of. So bringing in someone that is very mission-driven, really understands the goal of the university, loves working in that environment but has a perspective well beyond those walls, whether physical or otherwise, is super important and we've seen that very successfully happen and even with president searches that we've completed. Having someone that has a broader perspective beyond the university because of other relationships, partnerships, integration into the business community, other things, we find that those presidents are very, very successful because they can think of things beyond the academic lens.

Wendy Colby:

You know, you've hit on something that I think is really important here, meredith, and that's around this whole notion. I've seen more universities doing this right Chief innovation officer, chief transformation officer, even roles like mine, driving kind of new innovations in online et cetera across the university. But you're right, right, it can't just be kind of coming in as business only. Right, it's. There's there's an importance to culture and collaboration and relationship building and understanding the nuance of values, understanding the nuances of a university. To succeed in those, in those roles, have you generally found, as you've brought folks in like a chief innovation officer, chief technology officer or a chief transformation officer at a university, have they been pretty well accepted inside of universities today in your view?

Meredith Rosenberg:

They have. I think a lot of it has to do with how they're positioned in the university and who they're working with and that individual Do they build relationships across the community versus staying at the top level. The partnership is so important and coming in to listen and to learn and to be agile and adapt. The executives that do that best are the ones that are most successful.

Wendy Colby:

Yeah, it gets back to all the themes we were talking about. Right, you know that collaboration, the communication, the listening, the adaptability, reading your culture and then knowing how to steer the change and being thoughtful about how that will be accepted inside the culture. And often I found myself when I came inside of the university environment here that I had to calibrate a little bit. You know many of my colleagues will tell you they know I have a real bias for action and I like to move fast. My own teams will probably share that too. And while I want to keep a sense of urgency and I want to keep a sense of accountability, I'm also very sensitive to what it takes to bring teams along. And again, I think that's another example or an attribute of leadership.

Meredith Rosenberg:

So it's what I call the tenacious, yet patient gene. So if you come from private sector into the university, understanding what I said before about the pace of change, but being tenacious and know how to continue to get things done in a collaborative, bringing people along with you kind of way, and having the patience to see things through, because the pace is often slower and particularly if you are the first one, it is harder because you have to socialize these ideas and bring people along with you versus just saying, hey, this is the way we're going to do it, because I said so, which does not work, as we know, in a university, and particularly environments with shared governance.

Wendy Colby:

Yeah, I say a lot here. We can't have a.

Meredith Rosenberg:

Thou shalt Exactly, you've got to bring everyone along, but the leaders that I love in the university setting are ones that think of what is possible and that are very aspirational to think about what is the future. And let's think about what's possible and then how do we build that. And that might take several years to get there, but those leaders are really the most exciting. They're entrepreneurial, they're innovative, they're creative. They think innovative. They're creative. They think beyond what has always been done to what should be done. And how do we think about that? That art of the possible right, yeah no, I love that.

Wendy Colby:

That's exciting. It's super exciting collaboration of how we bring the best of sort of industry and academic together to really reinvent and reinvigorate. As you said earlier, you know where our space is going, so I want to switch a little bit to. You know the ed tech side of your world. You know where I also spent a fair amount of time, and it's an exciting space. Every year I'm seeing more and more ed techs popping up in the space, and you know that's a lot of where innovation is fueled today, right, and so I wonder if you can talk about any of the trends you're seeing in higher education today, for instance? You know we talked a little bit about online learning, creation of pathways. You know the skills and micro-credentials all seem to be hot topics today. Ai, of course, is on everyone's mind. What do you see?

Meredith Rosenberg:

I mean, how much time do we have?

Wendy Colby:

That's such a broad question. Well, pick one.

Meredith Rosenberg:

Pick one or two.

Meredith Rosenberg:

I think in this time where universities are budget constrained, they want to continue the level of delivery of product.

Meredith Rosenberg:

They have to think more creatively about what are solutions that help us run things a little more effectively, and that could be in anything from software technology, delivery, career services, mental health, and so I think universities are, and should be, relying at external companies.

Meredith Rosenberg:

To get your question about what ed tech trends are we seeing there are ways to run systems better and more efficiently so you can focus more on your people. Frankly, that's what we did when we founded our company to think about how can we use AI and tech to really be much more efficient and effective, to free up our time, to spend it on what really matters, which is people, and it gets back to what I was saying before about the care and keeping of people and content and delivery. That is super important to think about. So when I think about ed tech and I think about what are those industries that are growing again, what is going to help a university run itself better, deliver things more efficiently, so you can rely on again? What is going to help a university run itself better, deliver things more efficiently, so you can rely on again what really matters.

Wendy Colby:

I think that's wonderful. We here too at BU are in the process of standing up a new AI development accelerator and that is focused on Sorry, I had to take a drink of water there, sorry about that that is focused on really surfacing all the good work that is going on across the university relative to AI, and we ourselves are taking a look at the administrative side and the academic side and how that might feed and grow, you know, increased value inside the classroom, because there's some amazing things we're doing now in teaching and learning and at the same time but I appreciate that human element right. What can we be doing better to inform and work with our students but perhaps save time? On efficiencies? That's right. You know reviewing applications or submitting contracts right, there are some things that we can do with AI that should increase those efficiencies. So I'm really excited to see where that goes and I think we're all studying that today.

Meredith Rosenberg:

So we just a personal example. So when we built our company and now we've just last year was our first full year of operations, ending in December 24. Congratulations, thank you. We asked our team to think about how they're using these different tools and we measured that, and again this is about a year ago, so it's probably time we did this again that people on average were saving between 10 and 12 hours a week based on these tools that we were implementing into the daily workflow, which means that you have 10 to 12 extra hours per person to spend on being more creative, talking more with your clients, with your candidates, and so AI and tech shouldn't replace people, but it should maybe change the way we're thinking about things and delivering things.

Meredith Rosenberg:

So it frees me up to do the more people centric things that I have to do, and so I think in a university, are there ways to incorporate tech in different ways. Yes, it could be a little scary for someone who's been in a university for so long, because your job might fundamentally shift and you have to really reimagine what your job could be and how you add value, but that is really the way universities are moving. I think and you can see to your original question about what aspects of ed tech or software tech are really growing or software tech are really growing I think it's more about what's going to be additive to help universities be more efficient so they can focus again on what really matters with the people Sure, efficient and innovative, maybe as well, exactly, and innovative, yeah, and another area maybe to circle back on, because I know it's near and dear to your heart when you were talking about the sense of belonging and mental health.

Wendy Colby:

We see this a lot inside the university today. In fact, even in our online programs. We've incorporated tools inside the online programs to allow students to have places of outreach right, especially if they're feeling isolated and want to have a greater sense of belonging. And I wonder what you're seeing in this space too. Are there any areas that you're sort of taking a close look at here, just given your work in this space?

Meredith Rosenberg:

So we have seen more companies focused on mental health that are adapted by universities and brought in at the very beginning. So, whether that's in student affairs, student services, it's more now a way of doing things versus a nice to have Right now, a way of doing things versus a nice to have. So offering those kinds of solutions really, on whether it's an orientation or making students aware of the ability, to reach out and what's available.

Meredith Rosenberg:

It's so important because, you're right, tech can be very isolating, and so being able to balance increased use of technology with bringing communities more together and other online solutions that are additive to the in-person contact is important, right, but that is a real huge area of growth, certainly in the market.

Wendy Colby:

Yeah, you think about, like telehealth and where that's gone today, right as well. A question I have around where we're headed in education. We've talked a little bit about this today. The education sector is evolving so much technological change, students' expectations changing. If you could wave a magic wand, what do we look like five years or 10 years from now?

Meredith Rosenberg:

Well, if I could predict where we would be five years from now, maybe I would have a different job.

Meredith Rosenberg:

I don't know, maybe I would play the lottery. I would hope that we are in a much more collaborative, open-sourced environment, which is unusual sometimes for universities that focus on ownership of IP of themselves, and certainly with faculty. But I would love to see much more collaboration across universities. That could be regional, it could be by topic, by expertise, but, particularly as we move into a world where there are going to be and we are already seeing this budget and economic constraints, being able to share resources more effectively, I think will help break down more of the fiscal silos and also the silos that have been created. So I would love to see that in five years from now.

Meredith Rosenberg:

Now how we get from here to there. We would have to be very thoughtful about that, because that is really a very different approach to education. We have seen certain marketplaces that have brought in content in air quotes from different universities to put them together. I'm not sure that is the only way to approach things, but thinking about what are other models outside of education where we've had shared resources to move the ball forward. I would love to look more at that and embrace that and have that be the level of innovation and change.

Wendy Colby:

Because I think ultimately it's better for students as well, too, and the more we bring more of that collaboration, that community. One of the things I have loved about higher ed is it's conversations like this right. It's so collegial. I think we're all trying to figure out how to lift our industry up, and when we do that together is there more power to learn from each other or create these kinds of partnerships, as you're talking, for things like co-creation.

Wendy Colby:

I was with a colleague the other day and we were talking about, you know, some of the global opportunities we're seeing, and this comes off of a recent trip I took to India, as you know, and one of the statistics shared was that in India they need to train over 5 million students in MBAs in the coming years, and there just is not the infrastructure to do that today. So you think about the power of partnership and where we could be driving impact and how might universities come together to do that. So I think that's a really important theme to come back to, and hopefully our podcast here will stimulate some of that discussion, meredith.

Meredith Rosenberg:

Well, particularly if you think about that, 2007 was the largest single birth year in the United States.

Meredith Rosenberg:

And I know this because I have a high school junior who is thinking about university and the world after high school. So you have this huge group of students that will be leaving high school. Not everybody goes to university. Not everybody goes to a four-year college. People go into the workforce as well too. But how can we better support these students Because, as you had said, there are not as many spots in some of the elite universities? Can we start thinking about different ways to educate our students? What are other opportunities? Are there global partnerships? Are there different ways that we can creatively support by sharing resources and thinking about that? And if you think about who sits on the boards of trustees, they are passionate about their alma mater or the institution they're on the board of, but they usually come from the private sector or other places outside the university. Can they bring in different resources or partnerships or connections and networks to help grow this shared I don't want to say pool of resources, but the shared approach to learning?

Wendy Colby:

Yeah, it's really interesting to think about. You're kind of getting to that topic too of alternative pathways, right, for some students they may not want that traditional four-year degree. You're seeing models now, right, the three-year degree, or spend two of the first, spend your first two years in another location and then transfer in to X school, bu, and so I think thinking about these models that start to open up opportunities for students is going to be really important and it sort of follows the student interests too, I think, which we're seeing growth mindset, global mindset, mobility, flexibility, experiences in different places right it comes to the question of do we still need a four-year residential experience for our students, like traditional universities have been offering, as you had said?

Meredith Rosenberg:

maybe it's three years and a year of work, or three years here and a year someone else. We're three years here and a year someone else, but thinking differently about what education is and how we better equip our students to succeed once they leave the confines of a university or college and go into the workforce or whatever way they are doing. We must think differently about that and that's where ed tech or career pathways or other solutions or shared resources or partnerships. That's really where that comes into play. And again, in five years, in my ideal world, I would love to see that much more accepted. There are some universities that are doing that now, but having that be much more accepted, I think, would be really exciting.

Wendy Colby:

Right, I think it is Absolutely, and you know so many other industries, right, have gone through this kind of transformation. Right, education has been just kind of slow in that evolution. But I think now back to being an optimist. Now is that opportunity and that time. Okay, I'm going to try to bring us a bit to a close here and I wanted to just get your perspective. We've been talking a lot about how you work with constraints, how to expect the unexpected, what it takes in good leadership, the listening, and I was recently with another university leader on this podcast series and we were talking a lot about scarcity, right, that scarcity, while it can be scary to many who are losing or budget reductions or whatever the case might be, it can also really encourage innovation and resourcefulness. And so I wonder if you could expand a little bit of your view on that and any examples you might share in your own personal experience where scarcity actually was a catalyst.

Meredith Rosenberg:

I really agree with that. There are many different things that stimulate innovation and change, as we know, but scarcity certainly is one of those. And so really thinking about I think with education, about how do we train our students to be leaders of the future If they're not able to get what they need from a traditional university because either spots are scarce in entering classes or they don't have access that is scarcity that really stimulates others to think about again alternative pathways, other credentials, other ways of teaching, immersive learning, different kinds of experiences. So I think that is actually a really great example of what we're already seeing with scarcity. It's a different way to think about that, but I do certainly believe in that.

Wendy Colby:

Brave new world right. It's going to open up bold new opportunities for higher education.

Meredith Rosenberg:

I hope so, but it does also then come down to capital and where the capital come from. Is it coming from private industry? Is it coming from university? That's moving resources, maybe from one area to another, to build up these different areas, and that is always the constraint. But how can you be creative to continually move the ball forward? Super important to think about it that way.

Wendy Colby:

Well, you just kind of a great way maybe to close here. Right is you've brought the pragmatist back. You've put the business acumen back in. Let's make sure we're doing things smart and in the right ways that are going to drive the kind of growth and evolution and promote creativity. But for a reason.

Meredith Rosenberg:

I think, to come back to your first question about leadership, it's being aspirational and thinking about what is possible within your current constraints. And that is not new or revolutionary, but it really guides things about. Here's the situation. What can we do better, how do we get there and how are we going to drive the ball forward, and what are the resources you need to do that?

Wendy Colby:

And maybe, in closing, what is exciting to you in your current business today. What are you working on?

Meredith Rosenberg:

So many different things that I'm working on, so I focus on the education sector. As you know, I've been in this industry as a search consultant, as an advisor, now for maybe 15 years or so. My colleagues focus on all other industries, and so what I find really interesting is how we can bring in people from outside of education into the education sector by thinking about what does this industry really need and who has the right skills and competencies from outside to bring them in and get them excited about this.

Wendy Colby:

Well, we're going to need to talk further, for sure, as we advance our mission.

Meredith Rosenberg:

I would love to Love it Well.

Wendy Colby:

Thank you so much, Meredith. It has been a pleasure. Thank you so much, Wendy, been a pleasure. Thank you so much, Wendy. Thank you for joining us for this BU Virtual Connects podcast. Special thanks to my colleagues at BU Virtual and to our media team who produces this podcast under the leadership of our studio director, George Vago. To keep up with our BU Virtual Connects series, be sure to subscribe wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts. You can also learn more about our portfolio of online programs at BU Virtual by visiting bu. edu/ virtual.