Join Dr. Barnhart as he interviews Dr. Mickey Fitch-Collins about her experiences as an online doctoral student and career in higher education. Dr. Fitch-Collins is the Interim Executive Director of Student Success at the University of Wisconsin Superior. Her research looks at how higher education institutions can impact and support the self-efficacy of nonacademic middle managers through supervision and professional development.
Join Dr. Barnhart as he interviews Dr. Mickey Fitch-Collins about her experiences as an online doctoral student and career in higher education. Dr. Fitch-Collins is the Interim Executive Director of Student Success at the University of Wisconsin Superior. Her research looks at how higher education institutions can impact and support the self-efficacy of nonacademic middle managers through supervision and professional development.
Dr. Amy Lyn 0:02
VESC brings you exciting and practical tips for improving your virtual teaching and virtual learning experience.
Dr. Ryan Barnhart 0:09
And welcome back to another episode of VESC voices from NCU students and alumni driving research and practice. I'm your host, Dr. Ryan Barnhart, an adjunct professor in the School of Education, and admitted higher ed nerd. With us today is a very special guest. We have Dr. Mickey Fitch Collins NCU, class of 2019. She's the Interim Executive Director of Student Success at the University of Wisconsin superior. Welcome to the podcast.
Dr. Mickey Fitch-Collin
Awesome. Thanks for having me here. And I appreciate it.
Dr. Ryan Barnhart
My pleasure. We always like to start off and kind of get right to write down the things we'd love to learn about our guests. So we'd love for you to tell us a little bit about yourself kind of your background, how you were affiliated with ncu. And kind of what you're doing now?
Dr. Mickey Fitch-Collins 0:55
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Perfect. Perfect. First question. So as you mentioned, I graduated with my PhD from North Central University in November of 2019. In the leadership in higher education, PhD program, and I am a career higher education person, not the path that I thought I was going to be on way back when but kind of the path that I found myself on, and I've always worked in kind of a non academic side of the house, so Student Affairs, Student Services, academic support, diversity, inclusion, equity work, and have worked myself, kind of up the ladder, so to speak at a variety of different colleges and universities, mostly in the upper Midwest, you can probably tell from my dialect that I live in northern Wisconsin.
And yeah, now, for the last about year and a half had been serving took on a new leadership role at my university in charge of a Division of Student Success. And in one of the rare opportunities of folks that finish their PhD and got a new job all within about the same six week time period. So, so it's been a heck of a journey. And, and obviously, COVID has been a big part of that for last year.
Unknown Speaker 2:08
Yeah, I was gonna say, navigating all of that plus a worldwide pandemic, that totally disrupted higher education is no small feat. So that's pretty cool to be admit of all that change. This is kind of the nature of our podcast, you know, we talk about here, in terms of like driving research and practice, and a lot of those things, and I really relate to your career path, you know, same kind of thing. I've worked in that student support services, and so to be it, you know, end up in higher ed, and not really starting there, I think, you know, culminating it with a terminal degree is pretty important. When you when you absolutely,
Dr. Mickey Fitch-Collins 2:46
absolutely, yeah, yeah, I think, um, you know, on on the AI side of the house, and I don't mean to be so siloed in my language there, but you know, right. I mean, definitely take down silos in higher ed. You know, in the, in the academic affairs realm, it's, you know, obviously very typical and very known for folks, okay, if this is the path, you want to go full tenured professor, you know, or even Associate Professor, like, you definitely need to have that terminal degree. I think, on the non academic or the student service side of things, it's a little bit more murky, you know, and I think the expectations in the field have also shifted a lot over the last, you know, five to 10, maybe even 15 years, where a master's degree was very suitable, and for all levels of leadership, and in a lot of institutions, it still is, but you're seeing a lot of folks that are going into that terminal degree to either step into that, you know, executive level leadership role, like I am right now, you know, Vice President, Student Affairs, student success, Vice Chancellor, whatever that might be seeing that terminal degree as that way to kind of find the open windows and the open door, so to speak, for sure. So it definitely is a differentiator.
Dr. Ryan Barnhart 3:59
Absolutely. I can't agree more there. And let's talk a little bit about a your terminal degree. Now, we'll switch the focus back to you a little bit if you're okay. With that. Let's talk a little bit more about your research. How important was it in terms of, you know, what you've been doing in relation to virtual education?
Dr. Mickey Fitch-Collins 4:16
Yeah, so my, my research and what I did my dissertation research on, was about looking at how institutions of higher education can support or influence or impact the self efficacy of non academic middle managers through supervision and professional development. That obviously is a very long statements. And you know, it wouldn't be a good dissertation without a big old colon in the middle of that, right. That's right. to the to the to level name, but in essence, what I was looking at and what I continue to look at, is, you know, there's this group of folks, middle managers that are kind of stuck in the hierarchy of every higher education organization that have this push, pull, release. ship, you know, they're supervising the entry level, frontlines, you know, boots on the ground sort of folks. But they're also caught in between those folks that they supervise and the folks that supervise them, which are either at the senior level, or perhaps even kind of that executive level of the university. And I kind of consider it, you know, again, that murky middle, you know, a group of folks that is oftentimes overlooked in terms of what are their wants and needs, what type of support do they need.
And I looked in particular at how the type of supervision they're given impacts them, as well as how the type of professional development that they're given. And in the virtualized world, which, you know, 99% of higher education has been operating in for the last year and a half in particular, this is very timely, of course, that has, yeah, there's been a lot of game changing that has happened there, because obviously, we've needed to change the way in which we do our work period. But I think it's also helped the supervisors of those folks and those middle managers themselves, to really rethink. Okay, how does supervision happen in a virtualized setting? How can it happen? Well, how can it happen? Not so well? What does professional development look like? I think we've really pushed the boundaries and barriers of what professional development can and should look like or could look like, and how does all of that impact my ability to feel like I can do my job and do my job?
Well, so there's been a lot of stuff, obviously, you know, when I was working on my research, there was no Coronavirus, there was no you know, a pandemic that was coming. So that context and that lens is very pre pandemic. But the way in which, you know, I, I feel very lucky, because not only have I been somebody who got a job where I directly was responsible for supervising middle managers. So I felt this calling or I feel this calling in this responsibility to live out my research everyday, which some people don't get to do that some people, it becomes a book on the shelf. And hopefully, that's not a lot of folks out there, but but also a way in which to look at this entirely differently as how do we look at Virtual Education, and a lot of higher education institutions that are looking at, you know, telecommuting changes, and and the way in which we do our work, even at brick and mortar institutions looking differently in the future.
Dr. Ryan Barnhart 7:19
Absolutely. So So let's talk a little bit maybe, and then in your findings there, how do you see, you know, the systems or structures or best practices in terms of research, you know, the maybe there, there may be communities here at NC u, we have a very diverse listenership current students alumni, how might this be important for them? Whether it's, you know, in a more sense, a research focus. Now we'll talk a little bit about the practice focus here after that.
Dr. Mickey Fitch-Collins 7:47
Yeah, absolutely. So I mean, I think a big thing is I should probably share. So this is a qualitative qualitative case study design. And so I looked at folks across the entire United States that were in those kind of middle management sort of positions. And what was what was helpful for me in the research side of things was, being able to identify with the participant I think, was a very important part of my research. At the time that I was doing it, I was myself, a middle manager. There's complicated pieces with that, right?
Because, you know, if you get too close to the research, you can't separate yourself away from it. But it also, I think, in a lot of ways, endeared me to a population that might have had pretty low trust, especially when it came to the questions that I was asking about. Things that inherently ended up being kind of negative conversations, bad experiences, people have had poor support structures, they've been a part of all that sort of stuff. And so you know, so so one piece was about kind of my experience, is being part of that target population.
The other piece is, you know, being being a online learner as part of ncu, I was already used to and had at hand, the skills to connect with people virtually, because that is the name of the game of being a virtual learner at NC U is, you know, connecting through video calls and phone calls and stuff with your faculty in your chair, and all these sorts of things, using social media to connect with other students. And so I was able to very easily identify folks to be part of my research, because I had that skill set that was afforded to me through my experiences as a student at NCU.
Dr. Ryan Barnhart 9:30
Absolutely, and I can't stress enough for current students to tap into those resources in the comments through your chair through your previous instructors. You know, those are all great, great strategies. And again, a good example of how current students, you know, can kind of apply that research researcher bias a little bit and navigate that because definitely, I know being in that situation.
As a former middle manager in higher education myself, it's hard to separate yourself sometimes from the research and and universities. So that's a great, great practice there. I'm sure, you know, that folks can draw from your experience there, too. Let's talk more a little bit about the that side of practice. So, you know, from your research and kind of the findings, how have you seen, then, you know, this kind of outsource? I don't say, outsource but outlet for middle managers are these ones and needs in the virtual world how best can maybe those? And I agree, I like how you phrase that the murky waters there?
Because it definitely is. I would say, oftentimes, there is a disconnect between maybe sometimes executive or campus leadership, and then middle management. So how does that you know, in a virtual environment, in probably a continued virtual education environment? How is that important in practice in terms of practice?
Dr. Mickey Fitch-Collins 10:46
Yeah, yeah. I mean, there were there were definite findings, obviously, like any good research setting, I had, you know, very concrete sets of findings that came from there. The one that has really held with me, especially through the COVID experience, is not making assumptions about knowing what your supervisors need or don't need. And I know that sounds like a really basic sort of thing to come away with. But I think that, you know, given this murky middle group of folks, there's an expectation that, well, you're not frontline, this is not your first job, it may not even be your second job.
So there's an understanding that you have a base level skill set and, and ways of operating and conducting yourself. But I think what comes with that sometimes is an assumption that you also know how to engage in ongoing continued learning, and continuous improvement, you know, how to seek out professional development, you know, what you need in a supervisor. And I think all of those when when we start getting into a place like anything, when we start getting into a place of making assumptions, we oftentimes find ourselves at the wrong end of the stick more than we can do at the right, you know, and so especially in the virtualized setting, you know, as we moved into COVID, but thinking about folks that are going to going to continue in virtual education settings, you know, we need to make sure that folks have resources at their hand, and that we're actually having real conversations about, okay, what does supervision look like to you?
Like, what would it be, you know, if I can wave a magic fairy wand, and I am the very best supervisor to you that you would need in a virtualized setting, what does that look like knowing those things for me, and that way, be stuff around, you know, regular one on one checkins on a weekly basis, that might be stuff around making sure that I can reach you on a chat function. That may be, you know, having, you know, block time on calendar for us to work on projects together in a synchronous sort of fashion, because so much of the virtualized world happens in asynchronous sort of ways, you know, so it could be things that are really concrete like that, or it could be things. One of the things that I've loved seeing over the last year and a half that I really hope continues, you know, kind of before, during and after, with the pandemic is access to professional development that really takes the fee barrier. And the travel barrier reduces that significantly.
So like asking those questions of like, what are the skills that you need to learn supervise? Like, what are the things that you know, that you're not super sharp on, or things that you want to develop even further, that I as your supervisor can help pave that pathway or open that door? Because again, I think if we if we put ourselves in a situation of assuming, okay, well, I have a seasoned middle manager, who's in charge of this department, they probably know how to do budgets, they probably know how to be an effective supervisor themselves, they probably know how to conduct evaluations, they probably know how to do crisis management, when we start getting in that probably space and that assumption space, that's putting a lot of pressure on that individual.
And that's taking a lot of pressure off you as a supervisor, when in fact, you have significant responsibility as a supervisor. So that would be, you know, my greatest takeaway is having those very transparent conversations of what are your wants and needs? What do you need out of this relationship? And most importantly, like, what can I do as your supervisor to help you believe in and get your job done? So both believe in your capacity to get your job done, but also actually get the job done?
Dr. Ryan Barnhart 14:15
Those are great points. Have you? You know, considering your you know, we talked a little bit earlier on about how you've kind of navigated this new role and this new position at UW superior. So there have been any anything from major findings or research or best practices that you've implemented? You know, in your new role?
Dr. Mickey Fitch-Collins 14:34
Yeah, yeah, a couple of things. And you know, and it's interesting, because the timing, I started this new role about two months before the pandemic started. And so my staff and I, these are all folks that I knew before and had pre existing relationships with, but we have very limited experience of doing face to face supervision with one another, it's all been primarily virtual. And because of that, for me as a supervisor, making sure That I maintained an appropriate level of contact with each one of my direct reports was really important. And one of the things that that came from my research, but I but also I lived out in my practice was this idea of, you know, intentional frequent contact and clear expectations.
And so for for my direct reports, I have seven direct reports on they're in charge of seven different departments. We have regular every other week one on ones pre scheduled recurrence on the calendar for an entire academic year, one hour of dedicated time together, and I always tell them, this is your time, you know, you're in the driver's seat, I'm in the passenger seat like this is this is what you need of this time, I certainly will bring agenda items to that meeting. But I always try to reinforce that as your time we use Microsoft OneNote. Some folks maybe might use like a shared google doc or something like that. And we use that as a shared document so that we have kind of a keep running agenda items, so that we know exactly like what's on each other's agenda for that meeting.
So it's really purposeful and intentional time together. Certainly, there's times where there's, you know, just chit chat and catching up and, you know, telling stories of things that have happened or whatnot. But we have that agenda to kind of make sure that we're keeping each other on track. One of the other things that actually came from my research to that, that I was like, I want to see how this works, is you know, and I found that through lived experience that that one on one was really kind of a business items sort of meeting, and I wasn't feeling like I was getting the full perspective of like, how are you doing as an employee? What are questions that you have that are lingering out there?
What are big picture of things that you need to know? What are things that you want me to be sharing with my peers on Chancellor staff or external to the university? What are things that you're really struggling with? And so I implemented you know, I call it tidbits, but just kind of, you know, ever, in during the times that we don't have those one on one. So that kind of off week, they fill this out. And this is a passive form that they fill out and just kind of answer those questions. And what that does is, it's really about synergistic supervision. At that point, then, because it's giving me you know, our one on ones give us the opportunity to have business items to talk about and kind of resolve problems and issues there. But those tidbits really allow me to kind of understand how the whole person is doing.
And certainly individual health and wellness, mental health, personal, you know, balance boundaries, whatever, you know, term you want to assign to that has a really big influence over people's self efficacy and their ability to do their job well. And so, you know, implementing those two pieces has been really helpful to me in this kind of virtualized supervision modality we're in.
Dr. Ryan Barnhart 17:46
That's great, I can't having being a health and wellness person like background myself, that that kind of attention to the multi dimensional aspects of wellness and how they write self efficacy. That's still important, especially now, I think, maybe more than ever. So that's great to see that kind of come out in your research and practice. I guess, I guess, you know, this is kind of related not only to the topic, but also a lot of our students, and alumni. May be it, you know, those middle managers in higher education, or, you know, in other fields, so what are some of the things maybe that they can take away from this from your research to maybe bring to their employers to for better supervision, or to have that better and clearer lines of communication?
Dr. Mickey Fitch-Collins 18:36
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. That's a great question. And, you know, again, my research focused on, you know, the practices of supervision kind of done unto them, and the professional development that they experienced from the institution. So I think the way that I would respond to that is to kind of turn that back around. And to tell folks, regardless of what type of organization you're in, unless you're an entrepreneur, or something of that sort, everybody has a supervisor, right, like everybody's got a boss. And that we, as, as supervisors, and also as supervisees have some ownership or in what the authorship of that relationship should look like, right? There's predisposed, obviously, like, these are the things you need to get done, because this is your job.
But what is oftentimes missed in that is having a conversation about what the supervisory relationship should look like, and what we want it to look like. Right? And so you know, I think about throughout my career, I've had a variety of different types of supervisors, some of which I have been very developing and awesome for me, and some of which, it's been a very transactional, like, do these five things. Okay, I got these five things done. Here's these other five things for you to do. And and that's the end of it. So my pieces of advice would be is to have that conversation with your supervisor regardless of what organization And you're in to make sure that you have a clear understanding not only of what your job is, but also of what that supervisory relationship should be like. Because, you know, some folks will want something that is very interpersonal, some folks will want something that's very transactional in nature.
Some folks will be like, I want to talk to my supervisor every day, other folks will be like, I just want to talk to my supervisor once a month so that they know that I'm doing my job. That's one piece of it. The other piece of it is around professional development. And, you know, I think professional development is oftentimes a thing that people put on the backburner of like, Oh, yeah, once a year, I go to this conference, or, you know, I do these webinars or whatever it might be. And it's very much this kind of like after the fact sort of thing, when in fact, professional development should very much be like a 12 months a year, ongoing, continuous improvement sort of thing. That should be directly linked to not only your job, but the job you're hoping to have in the future, too.
And that's a conversation also to have with your supervisor is like, here's the things I'm hoping to learn, like, here's the skills I want to build. Here's the competencies I want to build, what sort of things do you supervisor know that I could do, whether that's, you know, read these journals, read these books, go to this webinar, go to this conference, talk to this person, engage in this mentoring, relationship, whatever it is, but also, what are the things that I individually should do, whether that's, you know, engaging in a community on LinkedIn, or Facebook groups, or whatever that might be to be able to achieve some of those competencies and skill sets. So, so moral of the story is talk with your supervisor, find out where they're at, find out what they expect of you, and have a clear idea of what you expected them to, because this isn't just a one directional sort of thing. Good supervision, you know, I use that term before synergistic. supervision is a constantly cycling loop, right? Like it's, it's something that mutually benefits both people and is constantly cycling through that. And, and that's hard work. Good supervision is really hard work. But when you can get to that place, you know, there's the whole entire organization can elevate from that experience.
Dr. Ryan Barnhart 22:07
That's great insight. Thank you for sharing. I think that's something that a lot of us can take away all of our listeners, no matter what, what constituent ship, they constituency, they the box they check, you know, whether they're alumni, current students, or even some of the, you know, the faculty and staff here at NC u, that great takeaways there from your research. Alright, this brings us to my favorite part of the podcast, it's my favorite question. We ask everyone this. We're all about making life easier for everyone. So is there one hack a tool, you know, something that makes your life easier in terms of you know, Virtual Education, or your workflow or processes that we should be using?
Dr. Mickey Fitch-Collins 22:45
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I wouldn't name one in specific I would name a concept related to virtual life hacking. And that is to to leverage technology for mobility. And so you know, as a online students, and in online, you know, learner educator, all of those sort of things. For me, being able to move around with my technology, and still access all of my materials to either do schooling or do work is super important. So every piece of technology that I used, I wanted to make sure that it's something I can access on my phone, on my tablet, on my laptop on one of my family members laptop. So you know, Wherever I am, I'm able to plug in and do my education, I'm able to plug in and do my work. And so, especially these days, I'm in the pandemic environment.
But certainly before that, when I was working on my schooling, it just was so critical to me that if I had a thought occurred to me, or, you know, an idea or a resource that I wanted to check, it wasn't like, Oh, I have to be on my laptop at my house at this place. It was like just pull out a device, login, drop the note in there, you know, whatever it is. So whether that's using the Google suite, the Microsoft suite, you know, whatever project management tool you might use, I think the mobility between our mobile devices and our laptops and computers is super essential. That certainly, absolutely what helped me make it through the finish line in terms of my dissertation was being able to do my work from wherever, whenever, and, and not be limited by being in a particular time or space, for sure.
Dr. Ryan Barnhart 24:17
That's absolutely valid points. You have to be mobile fluid, and 10 technologically fluent, I think, with all all pieces now, in this day and age, and that's a good strategy to adopt. Well, so great insight here, I want to thank you again for taking some time out of your busy schedule to, you know, to meet with us and talk on our vesicle voices from ncu students and alumni podcast. Before we go, we always like to kind of give our guests that opportunity to allow like our MC su community members do connect with you, essentially an opportunity for you to plug your plug doubles, if you will. So without without further ado, go ahead and plug your plug doubles.
Dr. Mickey Fitch-Collins 24:58
Yeah, yeah, I would just say If anybody wants to connect, I'd be super open to it. You can find me on LinkedIn. Just it's Ford slash Mickey Fitch fit ch. or on Twitter. I'm the handle there is just Mickey Fitch and Mickey like the mouse Nic ky fit ch. And we'll connect from there. I'd love to connect with anybody. Awesome.
Dr. Ryan Barnhart 25:18
Well again, thank you so much, Dr. Fitch Collins. And this is again, the best voices from ncu students and alumni driving research and practice podcast. Thanks for joining us. We'll catch you next time.
Dr. Amy Lyn 25:32
Thanks for joining us on desk. This is Dr. Amy Lyn. Remember, learning is right at your fingertips.
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