Ep. 20 - Cecilia Olivares, University of Missouri

In this episode of The Pickup Meeting, Brody and Kevin welcome Cecilia Olivares, Director of Academic Advising Initiatives at the University of Missouri and former NACADA President, for a conversation that zigzags delightfully from Easter candy to change management to the existential question of academic advising itself.

Fresh off the Administrators Institute, the trio dives into:

• Tech implementation without losing the human touch
• Decentralization dilemmas and the art of staying curious
• Why “What’s the worst that could happen?” might be leadership’s most underrated question
• Exploratory students, major changes, and decision-making on the daily
• Dissertation marathons, dust-covered books, and the power of just finishing
• And yes…Criminal Minds vs. NCIS

There are road trip playlists. There is Garth Brooks. There is a brief and unexpected detour into Breaking Bad territory. The rails are left. The rails are found again.

*The Pickup Meeting is a spinoff of the Adventures in Advising podcast!

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Transcript

Kevin Thomas  
And away we go. Welcome to The Pickup Meeting. It's Kevin Thomas and Brody Broshears. We're gracing us with your presence. Wait, that's not it. How you doing? 

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
I'm awesome. I got to see you all week.

Kevin Thomas  
I know this is four days in a row that we've connected in some way, shape or form. Three days seeing you now. We're doing the pickup meeting. It can't get much better.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
It can't get much better. We're even dressed alike today. I don't think we coordinated, but our color scheme is pretty similar.

Kevin Thomas  
I know, for our audio audience, Brody's also got the I look super smart glasses on today, and I didn't bring my I look super smart glasses today, so I'm gonna look less intelligent.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Apparently, I don't think you're any less intelligent.

Kevin Thomas  
Hey, so we were at the Administrators Institute. 

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
We were, yeah, it was, it was a look. It does fill a lot of buckets, that's for sure. And things went well on my end, right? I was a little nervous about presenting the AI session with John Vasquez to the entire group. It was kind of the second planet plenary. And I think that went swimmingly. I feel good about it.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, I think that I was amazed by the wide variance of use of AI at the institute, people who said that they were pretty anti it, and on the flip side, people that were really, truly embracing it, and that is an interesting place to be. And so that part of the conversation was definitely a theme of the the event. Were there other themes that stood out to you?

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Definitely managing up and across, I think, handling and working with difficult people both seemed to rise to the top. I will say that this year, we saw a lot less of creating a new center or new models, at least I did in years past. And that's a little surprising to me, because I think a lot of folks that I talked to across the country are in model, structure, change kinds of situations, yeah.

Kevin Thomas  
And I think the other one for me that stood out was change management, yeah, that was a big one. And then the onboarding of various technology, when we asked that question to the larger group, how many are doing a technology implementation? It was a pretty large number of folks that were a part of that, and none of them seemed to be real happy in life about it.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
No, I know that was a distressing piece. There was a lot of discussion about change fatigue. I hadn't thought about that, and it definitely is a thing. I don't think there's any question about that. And so change management, change fatigue, certainly a theme. Kevin, you're the chair or the outgoing chair. So you chaired this event for two years in a row. How do you feel about your contribution to the administrators institute here over the last couple years.

Kevin Thomas  
You know, it's always the the best part of professional development for me, and, you know, we sign on to do this faculty, and it's like it's teaching for two and a half days and and there's a lot of work in advance that really goes into that. I think that some of the things that I'm the proudest of is that we've made the curriculum a little more nimble in the last few years and brought some things that weren't being talked about to the table, including the fact that advising, I think, for a very long period of time, had a narrow view of itself, and that view has had to widen to where you're talking more similar to this podcast, right, where we talk to a lot of folks about advising, but we also talk about student success, we talk about enrollment management, we talk about transition and change. And so that view has widened quite a bit. And so that's been a it's been a highlight of the last couple of years. And the way that this works right is it doesn't go well without the faculty that are just tremendous. And so we get to go and work with on any given year, eight to 10 wonderful individuals, and really, then then learn, learn through them, and then also learn through the participants. And it can't get much better than that.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
And I always joke with you, but it's really serious. I get to that table Sunday afternoon, kind of for our table reading of the week, and you're like, wow, I don't know that I really belong here. What do I have to add? You know, I'm going to be super tired by the time this thing is over. It's such a it's such an impressive group. Well. The cod is in debt to you for your service and really organization of this great event, and we haven't talked about really the most important thing, and that's the ability to be able to help the 130 or so participants that come in that are putting together an action plan, trying to solve big problems. You know, I always love those individual consultations that we do in the evening of the second day, that it's kind of that speed dating version of problem solving that's just really invigorating to me.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, you met with my team so you solved all of my problems because I came at the Institute I did. You're You're lucky that I'm nice. That's right. You solved everything. I don't need to do anything in my job anymore.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
I gave them good advice, Kevin, I could have given them really bad advice. I could have steered them in the wrong direction, but I didn't do it.

Kevin Thomas  
That's good. I like you. Speaking of things that are the right direction, look at that transition. That's great. Yeah, we both drove to the Institute and drove back, and both of our drives were roughly five and a half to six hours. And I have to say, I feel like absolute do do today, because I'm exhausted. And it's like driving just getting to be this thing when, as you get older and listen, 45 right, and a little younger than you like, but like, I still am, like, I used to drive all the time. This is terrible. I feel so awful today, and I'm not a big fan of driving right now.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Well, maybe it's because you're, you're a little bit under the weather. I tend to really enjoy driving, and I usually am driving with my wife and a dog, but you know, when you have the car to yourself, you can kind of set everything into the passenger seat, you pop your headphones in. 

Kevin Thomas  
I still don't think you're supposed to do that.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
I just it is really invigorating to be able to listen to podcasts and to listen to your music. Sometimes I'll just put one headphone in so I can hear the horns honk when I'm cutting them off, things which is very rarely happening.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, I'm sure that that's not the case. But, okay.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
At five and a half hours you have to do at least. I gotta stop once my car is not big enough to make it and but I do really like to only stop minimally. So I've I used to always carry a big soda with me, and that never went very well.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, you told me last night that you stopped. I did. I said, What did you get for dinner? And you listed the healthiest thing I've ever heard anybody get from dinner. Can we go through that again? 

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
I had chips, yeah, uh huh, and almonds, yeah, and a Milky Way bar, yeah?

Kevin Thomas  
Dinner. All right. Well, let's What did you have for dinner? I didn't stop at all. I mean, I stopped to go to the restroom and get gas, but I ended up not getting food because the Google Maps took me back in some way that just didn't have a lot of options. So I was like, I'm not stopping at that McDonald's or that one, or that one, yeah, you know, it just felt like there was nothing else.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
The only other thing that I'd say is getting older. I really do not enjoy driving in the dark. It's not as fun as it used to be, right? There's no doubt that I'm just terrified of hitting a deer. You know, I'm in the Midwest, and deer are things.

Kevin Thomas  
And, yeah, they're actually animals.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Yes, they're animals that do massive damage to cars. That's great, well, and remember, I want to drive the same car all the time for the rest of my life, so I need that car not to hit deer.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, we need to have, like, a throwback button anytime we refer to something that occurred on a previous episode.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Yes, we do throwback.

Kevin Thomas  
So you're eating your Milky Way bar, yeah, and, and that's one of your candies. But I learned that you're a big fan of lemon something this week. 

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
I love all Tootsie Pops, but you are a real friend. If you can find lemon Tootsie Pops and get them to me, because they make lemon Tootsie Pops, and that might be the best candy of all time.

Kevin Thomas  
I didn't even know this was a thing I know, utterly disgusting.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Well, I mean, you can't eat Tootsie Pops in meetings or with your friends, because you got to talk to people. But, I mean, when I drive Tootsie Pops are always in the car. I have three or four of them, and they're only 60 calories a pop, right? So you can, you can have three or four of them.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, yeah, definitely to go with your super delicious dinner you

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
had last night. I don't normally eat like that. You know that.

Kevin Thomas  
That's true. You're the model of fitness.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
But you have a candy too, but it's a candy that I really like.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, the Starburst. Jelly Beans. Oh, man, they are the best. And we're coming up on that time frame that that Easter season, when you're going to see those everywhere, and I am addicted to them, and to the point where last year, I think I probably didn't have very many because I knew I couldn't stop myself if I did. Yeah, I'm in the process of being healthier and eating better, and I think those could have sent me down a dark path to gaining a lot of weight.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Well, Starburst jelly beans are amazing. Even regular fruited jelly beans are amazing. But I'm telling you what you want. You put spice jelly beans in a bowl and put them anywhere close to me. We're going to have we're going to have words. Those are the worst things in the world.

Kevin Thomas  
So as long as they're just not spice ones, you're good. Yeah, absolutely, yeah. I also don't understand the Jelly Bean game in which you eat things that could be nasty. Do you know that game? Oh, yes, I don't get it.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Why would you eat a jelly bean that tastes like dirt, right?

Kevin Thomas  
Grass, yeah. And those are the kind ones like, there are other awful ones like burp and just so bad. I don't know why you would do that.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Well, maybe we should bring on our guests and find out what's the most disgusting she's eating, or maybe she's got a candy that she really likes that might be a better approach.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, I am super excited to welcome Cecilia Olivares from the University of Missouri to the episode today. Cecilia is the Director of Academic Advising initiatives at Mizzou. She's also a former Nakata president, currently serving as the co chair for the Nakada region seven and 10 Conference that's held in Albuquerque, New Mexico. That's fun. Yeah? Welcome to the show.

Cecilia Olivares  
Thanks, guys. It's good to see you again. I also got to see you this week every day.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah? Sometimes there's not enough of us.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
No, so too quick. Like, do you have a candy Cecilia?

Cecilia Olivares  
I do. Also the Easter theme, the Cadbury mini eggs.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Oh yeah, great. Oh yeah. Well, we've ruined our Easter candy discussion.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, yeah, we have and so when we get to those episodes, we're going to talk about Christmas.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
That sounds great to me. Yeah,

Kevin Thomas  
Cecilia, how was the institute? We talked about it a little bit. And, you know, it's your first time to attend, and it was great to have you with us in our track that Brody and I were co faculty with.

Cecilia Olivares  
Yeah, no, it was fantastic. It was my first NACADA Administrators Institute, it went better than I expected, I think, for a lot of reasons, mostly because I didn't really have expectations of what to you. Also talked about changing some things up, and I wouldn't have known what the previous version looked like. And so, yeah, it was it was really helpful. It was helpful to be in a room with folks that are wrestling with similar conversations, very different, obviously, than the annual conference, when you've got all sorts of people talking about all sorts of things like this was so very specific. I mentioned to someone this was a very personal professional development type of activity, and I think I was needing that.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
That dedicated, that dedicated time to kind of tackle an issue or concern or problem is really, it's really useful. What are you working on? What What? What was your kind of action plan like? What is, what are you trying to accomplish?

Cecilia Olivares  
Yeah, so we were definitely on the tech implementation side. So that is one thing that we are in the midst of. I'm an implementation team for a new degree, audit, scheduler, registration, planner, analytics, all of the fun things and so yeah, bringing that to scale on our campus, not just from a technical perspective, but also, how is that transforming our advising approach on a very decentralized, large campus that has many ways of doing advising. So really, kind of the parallel of we've been doing the technical things, let's talk about the relational you know, how, how we are doing advising with a tool that helps us do that, right? So what drives? What's what's got to be the first driver, I guess, right, it's the technology is not driving our advising. The Advising needs to be driving with the technology helping us in that. So really kind of wrestling through that. So we didn't share out our action plan, because we're still kind of working on that, because it's a pretty big deal. But interestingly, this little tidbit, there are two things, actually, I think that are important. We did the individual consultation with Kevin, and Kevin, I have to say, your question to me and my colleague, Cody, that really kind of resonated was, I think you asked something about it was like, What's the worst that can happen? Or like, what are the consequences if you do this and and that? Really, we walked away from that, and we sat for probably another good 20 to 30 minutes, and we talked through, like, what are we scared of? Like, what's really going to happen? And so I just that was such a good takeaway and something to think about, like, what's the worst that could happen if you if you do this right, can you handle what the fallout could be? Is it really as bad as you think it's going to be. So I appreciate that. That was, you know, seemingly simple question, right? But it really made us think it. When you weren't giving us answers, you were just asking us a question to ask ourselves. So thank you. Thank you for that.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, that's also the approach we've taken to this podcast. I just could happen so far so good. Well, you talk about the things that you have going on Cece, and one of the things that I would say is you're juggling a lot, right? Like you've got the work that you just talked about you're juggling your dissertation work, your professional responsibilities. I mentioned co chairing a major regional conference, and I guess, like, how do you manage it all and what's keeping you energized as you're doing this journey?

Cecilia Olivares  
Um, I wouldn't say that I'm doing it all well. I think that's always important for people to know. If you could see my desk right now, I literally have post it notes all over the place to kind of help me keep track of like, what am I supposed to be doing? What are the big things, the the little things within those big things. So I will say I feel like most days I I feel like I'm dropping the ball, and that's just what it is. I mean, I'm getting planning done, don't get me wrong, but I definitely think that I am not always doing what I should be doing to the best or the fullest extent. 

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Cecilia, we always like to get to a an origin story. So what drew you to academic advising as a career. Was there a moment or experience that made you think, this is what I want to do?

Cecilia Olivares  
Yeah, I kind of fell into it honestly. So wasn't on my radar. I graduated from college, went right into my master's program at Iowa State. Wanted to work with Multicultural Student Organizations. That was what I've been doing, you know, as a student, really involved in the kind of student affairs, student org side of things. And, yeah, went into my master's program, was working with multicultural student programming. Went into that as a first full time job, and then ended up actually at Illinois State as a residence hall coordinator. And that, yeah, that I have so many stories from the Res Life days, and Illinois State in particular, I was a hall coordinator in Waterson towers, which is the tallest residence hall in the world. I think Illinois, yeah, and Illinois, but I think even beyond that, and yeah, and that wasn't my thing. Honestly, I had one child going into that, and I had a baby part way through, actually broke my water outside the Waterson tower dumpsters. Um, yeah, exactly 20 years ago, this past Tuesday. So, yeah. So yeah, that's my, my great connection to Illinois, Illinois State and Waterson towers. But yeah, I was that was not going to continue to be the path that I wanted to do was I learned a lot from housing, from the housing days that I still carry through, certainly, and lots of stories, but it was not going to work for for us as a family. It just wasn't the right balance. And so ended up applying for we were also geographically bound, I should say that. So we were going to be staying at in Bloomington Normal. And so applied for an academic advisor position at Heartland Community College, and really had to talk about transferable skills from my previous time as a multicultural, you know, program advisor and as a hall coordinator, and, yeah, fell into it quite honestly, and really haven't looked back since. I've been doing that since, Gosh, 2008 I think so it's been, yeah, it's been good. It's been kind to me.

Kevin Thomas  
Brody's never going to look at the dumpster of Waterson Hall in the same way he's gonna be like life began here for South South Tower, south tower. Here we are.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Waterson is so it's such a unique building. I mean, I yeah, if you're, I mean, you can't. The elevators only go every three floors, but the building's 31 floors.

Cecilia Olivares  
Five floors, yeah, yeah. So it's like, it's like five residence halls stacked on each other, yes, right? And so you've got five floors per Hall, and on each end there's, it's actually like two residence halls, right? One in each tower, but yeah, the third floor is where the elevator of those is, where the elevator stops. And then the other part is that there's criss crossing staircases in each tower. So there's a red staircase and a green staircase. I'm assuming it's still the same. And so it is a maze of a building, absolute maze of a building.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
I help students move in, and every time I do that, I've done that three every summer I've been here now, and Waterson is always the building I decide to help out in. And I'm always like, this place is really unique. It sure is, sure is that's the best word for it.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, we're gonna go with that. Yeah, and also, who designed that but not listening to the show? CC, for people who might not fully understand what your role is, what is, what does academic involve? Advising initiatives really mean, and how do you explain your role and what its impacts are on student success?

Cecilia Olivares  
Yeah, it's a great question. I think I'm still learning how to figure this out every single day of what this role is. So I'm the first person at Mizzou in this particular role. This was a position that our academic, academic advising Leadership Council proposed upwards to our provost at the time that we needed a person that could help, a position that could help us across our very decentralized campus, nine schools and colleges. You know, we have exploratory advising and a transfer center as well. So lots of ways that we're doing things and lots of projects, and not always a seat at the table when leadership or when decisions are being made, because we can't all be at the table at the same time. And so having this position helps us move a lot of those projects and initiatives forward. So a lot of it has been policy, process enhancements towards student success. So we had a big project around academic standing. We essentially kind of blew up the academic standing policy that had been long standing here at Mizzou. Worked with faculty council to get that to move forward, because we had some process improvements that we needed, but we needed to change the policy before we could do that. Technology implementation, advisor, training and development is in my purview on, you know, to really figure out how to standardize and centralize certain pieces, but what still lives in the schools and colleges, for example, and really just working with the advising Leadership Council and our advising community at large in terms of what we need to support students and student success.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Yeah, I'm we're kind of in a similar boat here at Illinois State University. What's been the hardest, what's been the hardest, or the biggest challenge of that decentralization, now that we, you've, you've been identified as a person to kind of bring all that together.

Cecilia Olivares  
Yeah, I think really, just trying to figure out what kind of what does get standardized, right? And what can get centralized, and what needs to stay where it's at. And you've got so many different kind of cultures within each school and college, and different ways of doing things. And that is definitely the hardest is, how do you coordinate all these moving parts and pieces? And really, kind of sometimes, do you need to coordinate all of the moving parts and pieces. So it's always, it's a, I'm gonna go back to the Bolman and Deal, okay, you talked about this. I'm going to tie this together for us. I will say, in my my doctoral program, Bowman and deal is like the one thing that has stuck with me, if I didn't learn anything else, those four frames, I think, have helped with so many, so many aspects of the work that we do in advising, administration and leadership and really considering all four of those. So if you think about the structure, we have a really decentralized structure, right? Cool, okay, there are some things that we can work to kind of reorganize within that. How do people feel about that? That's a human resources, right? We hold true to some of these. The symbolic part. You know, there are certain things that we are just always going to hold on to. We can't let go of this. This is just the way we do things, or certain traditions and whatnot. And then there's always the politics, right, the political side of it. And so, how do you build alliances? How do you build consensus and whatnot, and so, yeah, I think that if we look through that, you know, we've got to always find that balance between all four, and we always default to one or two. But how do we consider all four of those types of things? So there you go. There's a nugget Bowman and deal. Thank you for bringing that back this week. The.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
I was going to give credit to your doctoral program, but I did talk about Bolman and Deal and cage management, how I've used that in my career. So it's great to hear you talk about that. What do you think about that? Dr, Kevin

Kevin Thomas  
Thomas, listen for our audio audience today. Like Cecilia brings this up, and all of a sudden, Brody's just like, beaming like a proud papa, right? Like he just, he came up with this idea, and it was just magically going to show back up. He talked about it on Tuesday, and all of a sudden on Thursday, here we are again, and it's like, wow. Like, Man, I didn't think his head could get bigger and CeCe might have made his head bigger here.

Cecilia Olivares  
Sorry, sorry about that.

Kevin Thomas  
Come on, these things happen. You, you, you, you know, we worked in advising for quite some time, and you've had various roles, various places. You know, you've been in the wonderful opportunity to serve as the Nakata president. And so I'm curious, if it's you some of your last answer hit on some of these things. But you know, what do you think institutions get wrong about advising, and are there ways that they should be considering it differently than they might be right now? 

Cecilia Olivares  
That's a great question. I think we're still we had a conversation earlier today. And I think this still plays into conversation earlier today, in a we have an advisor development program in our system, so our four campuses within the University of Missouri System, so, you know, group of advisors who are kind of, kind of midway through, I don't say midway like, you know, three to five years of experience, hoping to move into leadership. You know, that type of stuff. We were talking about an article, and actually, Matt Markin is one of the co authors of recent article. I'm completely blanking right now on the title of it, but we did an article, read conversation, but we're talking, we were wrestling or having the conversation around the definition of academic advising, like, what does that mean on our own campuses to ourselves? And the fact that we don't have a common definition of academic advising, and for so many reasons, right? There's campus reasons, the role is so different, how we do it, all of that type of stuff. And so I would say, I don't know if that we're getting it wrong. I think it's just that we don't, we don't really have that common definition that really shapes who we are, or maybe not, shapes that really defines who we are, right as a as a profession, and how we do that work on our individual campuses. Because I have said, Kevin, I've been on multiple different campuses, and it looks different and even those roles have looked wildly different there. I worked at the University of Memphis in our Center for Academic retention and enrichment services, working with students that were on probation and returning from dismissal and wouldn't call that academic advising work in the kind of this sense that most people think of it, and we worked in coordination with our academic advisors, right? But it still falls in that realm of academic advising and supportive students. And so, yeah, I think, I think the definition of academic advising the role definition and role clarity. I know Brody, you shared an article with us this week as well around role clarity, because that was another part. That was another thing we talked about quite a bit in track B at the administrators Institute. And so, yeah, I think it's just a very complicated, big question, right, that we're all trying to figure out. And because we do it all different ways, it's it looks different on every campus. So it's just, again, just perfectly imperfect.

Kevin Thomas  
So some of your answer there gets into something we did talk about this week, right? Like, which is storytelling, and in those answers, of like, what is advising on our campus? What is good advising look like? What does excellent advising look like? And and I think that my takeaway from your answer, and then some of the conversation this week has been not enough campuses know the answer to that question, or how to have that conversation, or even provide that information in a way that's effective for their story to be told in a relatable way, right, like and so then it comes down to people don't hear the story, and then They just say, well, advising is course registration, and it's just not.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
I was, I was just going to say that. Kevin, right. I think the challenge we run into is people only think of advising as course registration, and it makes it difficult. And we should use history and Nakata as a resource, because the historical, some of the earliest historical definitions of advising, clearly articulate that it's more than course registration, clearly articulate there's there's a connection to the course goals, or to life goals and and career interests and. Uh, personal goals, right? So I just think we've got to do a better job of making certain that the staff that we bring on understand that it's more than course registration. Certainly we have to be good at that piece. But you know, the article that was in the academic advising quarterly that I wrote about the power of the 30 minute meeting, even granularly, the 30 minutes that we spend with students needs to kind of take into account that it's not just about course registration. It has to be about more than that.

Kevin Thomas  
Like he was like, well, if I'm referring to an article that I wrote.

Cecilia Olivares  
I opened the door to the ego inflation. I apologize.

Kevin Thomas  
This is what's happening. That's where we're at today. Look at this article Smart Glass guy,

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Cecilia, I want to talk about exploratory students. I love the exploratory student advising community, and you and I are both members of that group. There's no doubt about that, but I've noticed clearly there's trends across the country. We're seeing fewer and fewer exploratory students. I think when we think about return on investment, how do you think we should balance between helping students explore different paths and making sure they're still on the right track to graduate.

Cecilia Olivares  
Yeah, I I actually think every student's an exploring student, even if they don't kind of declare that coming in, right? I think all of our students are and so we have to meet them where they're at. So even if there's a cleared major, we all know this right, like they still change majors behind the scenes and all you know, at multiple different points. And so yeah, I agree with you. I mean, we are definitely seeing the downward trend and the students that are starting with us as exploring on our campus here at MU, but the major changing doesn't stop that. Mean that's Yeah, so we have to talk about students in transition in multiple different ways. And so yeah, it goes beyond the exploratory conversations about majors and careers, but also, you know, the transitions that happen because of academic, you know, warning, or academic probation, whatever you call it on your particular campus, and how that impacts student decision making. Our transfer students, all of you know that are coming in from different types of institutions and looking to complete their degree. So, I mean, we're having a lot of different types of conversations and exploring. Isn't again just it's not just the major, you know, the academic program conversations,

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Yeah, I'd feel a lot better if we weren't making it harder, right? If our barriers were fewer and our access to programs were greater, especially with students who are performing well, right? But even students who are in academic difficulty, I think, you know, making certain that we're providing the kind of career guidance that I think is really necessary, that clarity of vocational goals to help students move forward, there's, there's no doubt about that.

Cecilia Olivares  
And even our high achieving students, right? We have students that want to have multiple majors and minors and certificates. And how do you balance all that when you're still trying to get done in a four to five year time frame, you know they're truly they're still exploring in the decision it's not even just the exploring part. Sometimes it's the decision making part, sure, right? And there's a continuum of decision making as well that we're guiding students through. 

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Helping students understand purpose, right? Yeah, absolutely.

Kevin Thomas  
Yep. Cece, I think you know you're one of the nicest humans I know. And I say that and that truly, you are one of the nicest people. And so you know your ability to be thoughtful and strategic and at the same time super nice is something that I admire and aspire to. And so this next question is already making you nervous, but you work with faculty in other offices, registrar, financial aid, enrollment, Student Affairs, how do you navigate the relationships that you work at with and build partnerships so effectively when I feel like, oftentimes in higher ed, like people are trying to do work arounds and trying to figure out a way to make sure that their team wins. And, you know, like, we're not always looking at it as if we're one institution. Sometimes offices are like, well, I'd like to win this one, and in the end, like we're trying to win for students. So like, how do you balance those things in your world?

Cecilia Olivares  
Yeah, I try to stay really curious, right? So we talked about difficult people, right? And managing different or difficult people upwards across, you know, those that report to us and everyone else, all the different stakeholders, right? So I try to stay curious and try to stay calm, you know, really trying to understand. Where people are coming from, and sort of unpack that. And so sometimes it's asking more questions, rather than giving answers to really get to what the core is, right? And a lot of it's just observing, you know, mannerisms and just the nonverbal type things, and picking up on a few things. And really it's a lot about relationship building, and we all have work to do in terms of how we do that successfully and maintain those relationships. But I definitely, I do think that's one of the strengths that I have. I feel like I can connect pretty well and understand and really try to help whoever, whatever group it is, let's reach some goals, but we have to understand what we're working towards and understand what our own hesitations are in that that's part of it. But I feel like I've been able to successfully navigate in a lot of spaces, coming into the board of directors, coming into new roles as a leader, and understanding where people are coming from, to be able to work towards whatever it is, what we're working towards in listening, listening, listening, observing, observing, observing, and restating. Did I understand this correctly? Okay, let's bring it back. That's, you know, let's put that to the side for a second. I hear you, but let's, let's keep working here. We'll still address whatever it is that you have a concern with. Or can we at least negotiate on some part of it. I'm not invalidating how you feel. You know, it's imperfect. There are a lot of thoughts that are going through my head, you know, at the same time of trying to be calm and nice, and they're not always the nicest and calmest thoughts under the surface. But I also know that doesn't that doesn't help the progress, if, if we just, you know, say all the things that we're actually thinking sometimes, and so, yeah, so

Kevin Thomas  
down you're thinking the things that Brody typically says. That's what I hear you. Yeah, yeah, I would agree. Might be that's fair.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
I am excitable, so sometimes that means, yeah, when things are disagreeable, maybe I get a little excited. I guess that's true. I mean, I hold it together, mostly with you, Kevin, and I'm thinking really bad things right now.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, how excitable of you.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
So you mentioned Kevin. You briefly mentioned that CeCe was the president of NACADA We don't have to talk about your presidency. It happened kind of in the worst possible timeframe of all times, which was covid. But you're chairing the NACADA Region 7/10 Conference this spring. Just, you know, thinking about being President four or five years ago, what and now, kind of chairing this conference? What are some of the big conversations that that you see happening in the advising world right now?

Cecilia Olivares  
I don't know that. I don't know that there's any one thing that I'm hearing. I feel like there's so many different things right now. I don't know I have a good answer the types of sessions, proposals that we're getting that you know that the conversations we're having here on our campus, even in the administrators Institute, I feel like there's just so many different things. I don't know if I have a I don't know if I have a good answer for that. Brody, honestly, it is a laugh just getting that one.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
No. I mean, I think you're right. I maybe that's the change. Maybe that's the change fatigue and the change kinds of maybe topic that we've been talking about is so much is changing. Maybe that's the answer. Is that there's just so much change in the intersection of advising and student success,

Cecilia Olivares  
That might be it, yeah.

Kevin Thomas  
And let's be honest, you're doing the region 710, conference in Albuquerque. You're, you're reading themed proposals at this moment. And the first thing that in my mind goes to this, having read so many proposals in my career, is like, all the gateway to the west and gateway to the Midwest that became gateway to advising. And so I'm like, What is like Albuquerque famous for, like, the only thing my mind went to is, like, Breaking Bad advising. You know, only thing that's occurring in this entire scenario. I'm sure there's tons of things to happen in Albuquerque. I don't know what they are, so I'm just going to Breaking Bad the entire time.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Kevin was an academic advisor, but then he turned to selling meth.

Cecilia Olivares  
Can I throw in a little New Mexico? I feel like I got to throw in a little New Mexican culture here, because I grew up 90 miles north of Albuquerque, actually, in a little town called Los Alamos. But you know, the big question when you're in New Mexico, when you go out to eat, is red or green and it's red or green chili, but you can also get Christmas, which is the combination. So, I mean, I kind of think that there are, there might be some relevance in there, right? Like we're talking about exploring and the choices that you have to make in. You merge those things together, you can choose not to have any at the same time, right? So, I don't know, throw that in there too, Kevin for you.

Kevin Thomas  
The real rails when Brody started talking about meth.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
I mean, if we're gonna, I mean, we can't talk about breaking bad without talking about meth, can we?

Kevin Thomas  
Apparently not here we are. I did not have this conversation on my bingo card for this episode.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
We made it well we can pivot back to working with new academic advisors. What advice would you give? CC to someone just starting in academic advising? Oh, see how I pivoted their Kevin.

Cecilia Olivares  
What advice would I give? Um, I think stay curious. Um, I think, you know, continue to put things in your advising toolbox. I think that's how all of us have kind of gotten to where we are, right. You know, you have opportunities ahead of you. You've got what's on your in your job description and what you're doing on a day to day, but I think things like Nakata give us the opportunity to add a little bit more to our advising toolbox. And so we've got this little, you know, toolkit, or toolbox of things that we're continuously adding to, and as long as you're continuing to add to and use those things when you need to and when you know you find the opportunities to I would say, keep doing that. Don't stop learning and growing. Because one of my favorite things about being an advisor and starting at a community college as an academic advisor was Britain. Go back to, you know, the 30 minute conversation, no meeting is the same, right? And what I loved is that, you know, every 1530 minutes, I was having a completely different conversation with students, you know, and some of those really stand out. And so I loved it. I loved hearing the different stories. I loved hearing the challenges that and the goals that students have. And it was like a puzzle, and how do we put these pieces together? And like, that conversation, or helping a student with a decision was just like one more piece in their puzzle, you know, to make this picture, or, you know, kind of framing, what it is that they want to do, and then putting some more pieces on the inside, and that type of stuff. So I would say, you know, for new advisors, yeah, just keep learning and growing. Keep asking questions. Enjoy it because, and after a while you've met with 1000s, hundreds and hundreds and 1000s of students, there's lots of stories, and the impact that you have on them is one thing that, man, some of these students, they've impacted me and how I do my work on a daily basis. Because, you know, because of those conversations.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
That's such great advice, Cece, and it makes me want to just go out and be an academic advisor right now, maybe I'll give it a go.

Kevin Thomas  
There you go. He's switching careers.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
I mean, I do really. I mean, I mean it 100% it's such a fantastic response. And I think the idea that every individual interaction matters is is really an important one. As we start to chat with new advisors about this work.

Kevin Thomas  
I would, I would say we're in transition here a little bit, but it's going to be a little mix of the professional and personal here you are trying to get to the end of the dissertation journey, trying to finish this process for the audio audience. There was just a deep sigh. You could see that it was there, right? And so you mentioned several things. One is that you you have books that you want to read when you finished your dissertation. I'm curious, what are some of those books, and are they a little dusty? And make the flip side of that, if you want to talk about this is up to you. You know what? What are the things that you would say to somebody that's fighting through at this moment to try to get done that helps motivate you to get done and keep going in this process, because it is a marathon of a process.

Cecilia Olivares  
Yeah, great question. I'll be honest, I have a lot of books at home that are collecting dust, that I haven't read, that have been gifted to me. The one that is sitting on, well, there's three, and I honestly can't even remember what two of them are right now, but the one that's sitting on the top is the let them book by Mel Robbins, who I enjoy listening to her podcast. But Jenny bloom actually is the one that told me about the book and kind of gave me some a couple snippets. She actually gave me, kind of her notes from the book. So I did buy the book, and that is one that I absolutely want to read when I get a moment to actually completely immerse in that. But some of the others are more of the fiction of the fiction genre that I just want to kind of escape, like I used to back in the day when I would consume many, many books, even sometimes multiple and. A day when I was younger. So yeah, getting back to that. But I would say, I mean, that's the one that comes to mind right now, is the let them, let them theory.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
That I got to get to that too. I've had multiple people tell me about that book and how it's kind of changed their mindset, for sure.

Cecilia Olivares  
So yeah, there was another question in there, Kevin, about the dissertation process.

Kevin Thomas  
Guidance to those folks that are just plugging along here and just pushing toward towards the finish line of this marathon.

Cecilia Olivares  
Yeah, I think so let's preface this. I finished my coursework in 2021 so it's been five years of kind of slogging through, and I needed to take some time because let's be real. 21 we already mentioned this. I was coming off my Nakata presidency. I was finishing up graduate, you know, graduate coursework, my doctoral coursework. I had a child that went to college and one that was starting high school. My partner lost his job. I mean, there were just so many things. And I said, I need to take I need to pause. So one year pause turned into multiple year pause, and really kind of jumped back into it last year. And so this past year have been pretty good progress and but at the beginning of this year, I don't really do resolutions. I'm not really good at all of that type of stuff, but I finally just sat down and journaled a lot of things, and I really came to the approach that I just need to finish like it doesn't have to be perfect right now. I just need to get something to my dissertation advisor, which I already have been obviously through chapters. I am essentially done with content. I have edits to do that I've just not been able to get to it's just days are long, and I get tired of staring at a computer and, you know, need my brain to work. And I work well when I have multiple hours ahead of me, I don't work well in like, 15 minute increments, like some people can kind of chip away at things I don't. My brain doesn't operate that way. But yeah, now I think I'm hyper focused on, just get it done. Stop overthinking it. Just do it. So I am, I'm almost right there. I just have some more edits to finish.

Kevin Thomas  
So I really like the program you went with there, right? Like, get it done, just do it. No one has coined that phrase in the history of this world, and so I think that if you just you broadcast that everywhere. I don't think anybody's gonna give you any grief about it at all. I really that that one's top notch. I like it.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Are we ready to move to the lightning round, Kevin?

Kevin Thomas  
Let's just do it round. 

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
I mean, now you're really stressed out. I mean, we've asked all the hard questions now, stressed out.

Kevin Thomas  
All right? I know that these are two that you enjoy, so NCIS or Criminal Minds. If you have to pick one, which one are you picking?

Cecilia Olivares  
I'm probably gonna have to go with Criminal Minds.

Kevin Thomas  
I have not watched a lot of the show. I think I've seen, like one episode ever, and I hear there are, like 1000 episodes. Yeah, there are, yeah.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
how about early bird or night owl?

Cecilia Olivares  
Ooh, night owl, definitely.

Kevin Thomas  
Oh, what is, what defines night owl? Like, how late we talking here, Cece?

Cecilia Olivares  
Oh, I mean, I'm getting old, but like, not late anymore, but like, I actually night times where I actually find most of my energy, like, because everything gets quiet and still, and I can actually crank through a lot of stuff if I stay up late, but then I pay for it in the morning, so I can't do it like I used to.

Kevin Thomas  
Brody calls himself a night out too, and that's right At 930 for him. So you never know what definition is going to be there.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
for that morning. Come on now, right now.

Kevin Thomas  
If, if you could master any skill instantly, what would you choose to master? Oh, gosh, I know. I don't know what my answer is to this one, Brody, you can be think of an answer like coding. I don't know.

Cecilia Olivares  
I mean, the first thing that came to my mind was singing, because I am a terrible singer, but I don't we're gonna leave it at that. We're gonna leave it at singing. Yeah, I'm not gonna overthink this. 

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Love it. How about a guilty pleasure food that you'll defend to the death?

Cecilia Olivares  
Oh, I mean, I'm gonna stay with the cat and the Cadbury theme, a good Cadbury cream egg, like I will, you know, the you break it open, you get the yolk, like I will do, like one or two of those around this time when they really start to come out, and some people are absolutely disgusted by that. My mom is probably horrified. If she hears this podcast, she's gonna be horrified that I gave that as an answer, but I'm just gonna stick with it.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, at this moment, if my wife is listening to this episode, she just turned it off, and she was like, nope, nope. Do it. I'm done. That's what's happening. Something still on your bucket list?

Cecilia Olivares  
Ooh, there's a lot. There are a lot of things on my bucket list. Okay, I'm gonna, I'm gonna go back to this Albuquerque place through this too. And actually, Bloomington Normal does too. I really would love to do the whole route 66 I think it'd be fun to do a road trip and do the entire thing.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, Brody, won't drive with you at night, but he'd go with the rest of the trip with you.

Cecilia Olivares  
Brody, I don't like driving at night either, so we can be during the day. It's fine.

Kevin Thomas  
I still drive at night. Kevin.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
You're fun. I like you. What's the best advice you've ever received or ignored?

Cecilia Olivares  
Oh, man.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Oh, general recommendation.

Cecilia Olivares  
Um, advice. I'm I don't know if this is advice more, so maybe it's just sort of a kind of a phrase or motto, but my my current boss, Dr. Jim Spain, here at Mizzou. When I first met him, he has a very family first approach. And so, and some of you may have seen this, I posted on on on social media as well, because I had written it out, but it's family first always guilt free, non negotiable. And so as as an as an employee, as a supervisor, whatever family always comes first. And so if you have to step away because of whatever like I want my people and myself to not feel guilty about stepping away from work to tend to what's most important. And family is most important always, and there should be no guilt associated with that ever.

Kevin Thomas  
I don't know that there's a better answer to a question to end this episode. In your time, you're off the hook. You can breathe easy now. 

Cecilia Olivares  
Good thing I have deodorant wipes in my desk.

Kevin Thomas  
Cecilia, you've been fantastic. Thank you so much for being on the show. Appreciate you both.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Now, I mean, Kevin, don't I have to say it. I mean, because Braden would expect me to say it. Go on. That was fantastic.

Kevin Thomas  
It was fantastic. Cecilia. Was fantastic having CeCe on the show. We've been talking about having her on for quite some time. It was great to finally get that scheduled and get her on. And yes, she was fantastic. I you know, I just think time we've spent with her, including today, she's such a thoughtful and strategic leader, but she's such a kind soul as well, and every time we have the chance to interact, I'm always learning so much from her. I need to embrace more of her patience approach and her curiosity of learning and my own approach to higher education and being a leader.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Yeah, those that the collaboration moments where you have to work with other entities on your campus, and those campus partners can be hard, and an ask questions. First approach is a good one. I don't think there's any question about that. Yeah, she kind of nailed that. I'm pretty certain that that's the way she gets it done?

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, there's, there's a lot to be learned and gained from how she leads and University of Missouri and the folks that she works with and I got to interact this this week. We both did with Cody, her colleague, it was pretty clear that, you know, like she brings on people, has good partners, good has good people she works with, and is able to accomplish some things that are really moving that university forward. So it's, it was, it was a joy to have her on today.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Yeah, and her service to Nakata too. We can't, we can't forget about that.

Kevin Thomas  
That's right. So we're two of the top three for this week. And in the road tripping theme of being on the road for, you know, five and a half, six hours, 12 hours, over two or three day period. There, we decided to go with top three songs from our recent road tripping to and from Kansas City. And so do you want to start this off? You want me to start this off? You go, you go first all. Right, so I will give some preface and some context to some of these. I'm a big Spotify person. I listen to Spotify a lot. One of my favorite artists is not on Spotify, Garth Brooks, not on Spotify. Wow, right? And so I was like, Well, how do I listen to Garth Brooks? I would like to listen to Garth Brooks on Sunday as I'm driving there. And it turns out it's Amazon music. So I downloaded Amazon music and was just listening. Mean the songs from the Garth album, so I can listen to, I could list the ton here, right? Like I'm a big Garth fan. You karaoke. It's usually Garth Brooks. I love some Garth and the song that hit me, and I probably sang far too loud in the car, was the change by Garth Brooks. I just love that song.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
That is a great I'm not a big Garth Brooks fan, but I do enjoy that song for sure.

Kevin Thomas  
Yeah, the second one, which will make our listeners think what a geek is lost in the woods, which is from the Frozen soundtrack and but that's not the version that I was listening to. I was listening to the Weezer version of that song, and I love it. That's fun. Yeah, in the movie, it's, it's where the deer are, the moose, I don't know what they are. In the movie, the deer. Yeah, he's a deer expert. I'm sorry, right? I would say, neither am I. I think I've seen it, like once, maybe the reindeer are singing as well. And so, like, the fact that Weezer is doing that song is, is tremendous. And then my third and final from the road trip, that is fantastic in every way. And it brought me back to my freshman year in college, when I lived in Hester college 221, and the guys that lived in 222, were named Big, meek, I honestly don't know what his first name was, and Byron, and all I heard for most of that year was juveniles back that ass up. It was the song, and I found it this week as I was driving and I could not have been happier to just be enjoying the music, enjoying the bass and throwing down some rap lyrics in the car by myself. That's hilarious. You weren't ready for that one. I'm fairly certain.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
Well, I mean, I wasn't all I'm thinking that is a surprise. All I'm thinking about is, you're like, how would I listen to Garth Brooks, I'm like, Kevin. I mean, you could just have a car that has a CD player in it, and just bring your CDs and do that.

Kevin Thomas  
I thought about that because I have all the CDs.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
My 2016 Honda CRV has served me well, because I still have a CD player in my car.

Kevin Thomas  
Then I thought about how inconvenient would be to go find my book of CDs and bring them along. And then have you all judge me as you got in my car when we were going to dinner one night. Why do you have CDs in your car? Do you know it's 2026 I could hear your sarcasm, and I couldn't take it.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
I love physical media so much, so I usually bring CDs with me. Sometimes I'll even bring the cases. And so my list starts with a CD that I bought just used in a thrift store the other day. I've been really into a heavy Rubber Soul Beatles album, and I love Norwegian Wood. It's such a great track, and that song kind of got me I've been reading a book about Miles Davis, and I was in an elevator somewhere or a record store somewhere, and heard do bop sound or do Bob song, which is kind of the last, I think it's the last album that Miles Davis made. It's a it's kind of a mix of hip hop and jazz. So there's some rap in there with Miles Davis's trumpet. It's fantastic.

Kevin Thomas  
Your list is already so much more eloquent than my list.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
And then I kind of am really into the instrumentation of the late 70s and early 80s, prior to some of the electronic stuff, but really poppy. So I'm going to say two songs, and I put them together on the list that I send weekly to my kids, but I had Diana Ross's, I'm coming out, and Michael Jackson's, don't stop till you get enough. And those two songs are baller, man. Just rockin. Late 70s, early 80s pop. Just great stuff.

Kevin Thomas  
We had some good road tripping going on. We did. Yeah, all right, that's a good playlist.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
It is. So put those seven songs together, except for that last one that you were talking about.

Kevin Thomas  
Oh, such hatred for juvenile there.

Michael "Brody" Broshears  
I don't hate I'm gonna even put it on. I've got, I gotta listen to that now. There you go. I don't know that I've willfully listened to that song ever. So I'm gonna definitely have to do it for sure. I can't wait to hear about it. All right, folks, that's it for this edition of the pickup meeting. We hope your own meetings, formal or pickup style, are as meaningful and as fun as this one. Until next time, do good and be nice gang.