In this new era of modern technology, Higher Education is in the midst of rapid change in response to environmental, social, economic, technological and political transformations occurring worldwide. As a result, institutions of Higher Education are facing ever more numerous operational challenges. In order to survive these challenges, Higher Education needs new institutional strategies and decision-making processes. For a Higher Education institution to prosper and perform efficiently, all levels of campus staff and administration must collaborate to create a wave of change by implementing Business Intelligence to manage and monitor campus performance. Going one step higher, a digital dashboard provides a view of campus performance that can be directly mapped to campus vision and mission.

So to all Higher Education institutions out there, please take this opportunity to re-strategize your campus performance management in order to gain or maintain a competitive edge!

Here are some of the major benefits a digital dashboard for Higher Education provides:
• Enables administrators and campus executives to better support the education process by accurately compiling, analyzing and reporting information across systems to both internal and external decision-makers
• Empowers faculty with the information they need to create the best learning environment for all students
• Provides the right information at the right time to the right user group
• Maximizes the availability of information to all levels of the organization: the Executive level receives performance data, the Management level receives trend and summary data, and the Staff level receives detailed data
• Facilitates seamless processes supporting the full life cycle of student administration
• Enables campus executives and administrators to track and monitor campus key performance indicators in order to establish, improve and align them with the mission

I have mentioned Key Performance Indicators in a couple of my blog entries. I will discuss these further in my next entry.

“Why do I need a dashboard? I’m a college department head, not a cab driver!” This is the common response that I receive every time I bring up the topic of the digital dashboard. However, I’m not talking about an automobile dashboard, of course, but a digital dashboard for Higher Education.

A digital dashboard is a Business Intelligence system designed along the lines of an automobile dashboard display system. However, digital dashboard is enhanced with sophisticated features that display real-time data in a more interactive and presentable way with color-coded visual effects – graphical representations of gauges and depictions that summarize institutional performance. While an automobile dashboard displays a speedometer, fuel gauge, temperature gauge, etc., the digital dashboard displays a Higher Education institution’s performance indicators with multiple gauges—in this case Key Performance Indicators, such as Retention Rate, Enrollment, Student Graduation Rate, Transfer Rate, etc. Much as a driver does with the automobile, college and university executives take appropriate actions based on alerts provided by the indicators.

In my next entry, I will share some thoughts on the digital dashboard as a Business Intelligence tool.

We celebrated our 10 year anniversary last week. That’s 10 action-packed orbits around the sun! In actual fact, we passed this milestone on February 28, 2008, but wanted to have the celebration in a month that offered better weather than is typical in late February in Chicago.

Over 300 people joined us on June 4 at the Adler Planetarium for an evening of networking, dancing and good cheer. The Galileo Room was filled to capacity with clients, partners, vendors – and our wonderful and talented employees and their spouses. The energy in the room was truly amazing.

A link to the video we developed for the event appears at the end of this entry. Whether you know Synch well or not, it provides a good way to gain a deepened sense of who we are as a company, and what we stand for.

Follow this link to our “Elevating Value” video. Follow this link to our 10th anniversary celebration picture gallery.