Note: This interview in the Weekly Wisdom Series originally aired on March 21, 2022 as part of the University Innovation Alliance’s Innovating Together Podcast, appearing live on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. The transcript of this podcast episode is intended to serve as a guide to the entire conversation, and we encourage you to listen to this podcast episode. You can also access our summary, along with helpful links and audio from this episode.
James Kvaal:
When I was at the White House, a lot of my job was trying to give substance to the President’s vision and his values for the country. And so, how do we set policy priorities? How do we lift up work or ideas that the teams are generating that are consistent with the direction the President is trying to take the country? I did a lot of translating, so it was a lot of helping the lawyers understand the economists’ perspective, or helping the comm shop understand the policy weeds. That was a big part of connecting the dots and helping people speak each other’s language.
As an outside advocate, it’s a little different. You sort of need to have a couple of things that you believe very strongly, and plant a flag, and find new and creative ways to keep banging away at those points, and stay relevant, and try and keep your issue at the forefront. Now that I’m here at the Department, I’m really trying to support the Secretary, support the President. I’m trying to make space for my team so that they have the guidance and the autonomy that they need to really drive their projects forward and try and produce results. So there are really three different roles.
You know, I think it’s helpful for me in my current role to have had those different perspectives, because I have some idea of how the White House will think about a problem or the very different questions that a Congressional staffer might ask, for example.
Bridget Burns:
Welcome to Innovating Together, a podcast produced by the University Innovation Alliance. This is a podcast for busy people in higher education who are looking for the best ideas, inspiration and leaders that will help you improve student success. I’m your host, Bridget Burns. Each week, I partner with a journalist to have a conversation with a sitting college president, chancellor, system leader, or someone in the broader ecosystem who’s really an inspiring leader. And the goal is to have a conversation to distill their perspective and their insights gathered from their leadership journey. Our hope is that this is inspiring and gives you something to look forward to each week. This episode, my cohost is Inside Higher Ed co-founder and CEO, Doug Lederman.
Doug Lederman:
This is not a college or university leader, but it’s somebody who influences their work a great deal. I’m joined by James Kvaal, who is the U.S. Under Secretary of Education, and previously spent a bunch of time in the Obama Administration in the White House, and then in between worked for the Institute for College Access and Success, which works on higher education policy. James, welcome. Thanks for being here.
James Kvaal:
Thanks so much for having me.
Bridget Burns:
Well, we are super delighted to have you, and thanks for – you said that this was your podcast debut. So we feel very honored to have you join us.
James Kvaal:
I’m honored to be here. Thank you.
Bridget Burns:
So I wanted to just start out by asking you a little bit about your style of leadership and how it’s been influenced by others. You have worked with, when you were Domestic Policy Deputy Director, obviously you worked with President Obama but also Vice-President Biden and many others, Arne Duncan. And then also in TICAS, out in the broader ecosystem, you’ve learned from a lot of folks and worked as a peer. You’ve had an opportunity to work with some of these great leaders. Can you share any lessons or stories that have influenced your leadership style from them?
James Kvaal:
Yeah, well, thanks for the question. I do feel very fortunate over the course of my career, I’ve worked with President Clinton, President Obama, President Biden, a number of Cabinet secretaries, senators, presidential candidates. And it’s really been a privilege for me to see their leadership style and think about what works for them. I think it’s really important that everyone have a personal style that’s authentic to them. There’s as many different styles as there are leaders. But a couple of things that I admire and I try to emulate, one is humility, and that was something that Secretary Riley, who was the Secretary of Education when I was 23 and started here for the first time, really emulated. He made everyone in the room feel like they were on the team, and someone he respected, and someone he counted on for contributions.
A second thing that I really try to work on is clarity, and I think really great leaders, whether in politics or business or government, really just know how to get their point across in very few words. You know, John Edwards, who I worked for, obviously was a very successful trial attorney, had this incredible gift to see one corner and he could sketch the whole picture. Or he knew just sort of the key fact that the whole issue revolved around. Arne Duncan also just has a great ability to use one fact or one story that inspires people to feel like they have to take action.
And then a third thing I guess I would say is a sense of responsibility toward the people that I work with. I really want to make sure that when my team takes the time to write a memo, or finds an issue that they think is important or they need help on, that they feel like I’m doing my job in giving them that guidance or that support or clearing the way for them. That’s something that President Obama was very, very good at. Could tell just how seriously he took his job. Every night he would read his book, even though sometimes he didn’t get it. Right after dinner, sometimes it came late at night, and he’d come to the meeting the next day having read and put a lot of thought into it. And I think that’s really an important part of the bargain that leaders have with their team is to make sure you’re supporting them and respecting the contributions that they’re trying to make.
Bridget Burns:
I really saw that with you, and I mentioned that the other day when we were prepping, that I remember one time in D.C. that we were having – it was after some long day of conference. And you’re like, "I’ve got to go home. I’ve got to go check my email. My team’s been working all day, and I need to not be a bottleneck." And I was kind of like, "I get that, but the rest of us are so tired." And yet here you were going to go do a second shift. So I thought that was an important insight into your style of leadership.
James Kvaal:
Thank you. Yeah, I try.
Doug Lederman:
The Education Department is one of those entities that is easy to characterize sometimes and not all that well understood. I guess I wondered what you think is most misunderstood about the Department and the role you play.
James Kvaal:
Good question. I mean, I think there’s this idea that the Department, the Executive Branch, has a lot of discretion, and therefore it’s easy. It’s easier to get change through the Executive Branch than maybe through Congress, and then that leads to frustration when people don’t see change happening at the pace that they would like. It is true the Department has a lot of discretion, but there’s also a lot of people internal to the Administration not just across the Department, but also across the government that need to agree for us to take action. A lot of those requirements are prescribed by Congress. All the comments, and you know, all of that I think is really for good reason. The stuff we do is important, and we have to get it right. It benefits from people having a lot of different perspectives.
It is sometimes not easier necessarily than going to Congress. It can take 18 months to write a regulation. That’s moving pretty fast, actually. Our computer systems were really designed for accuracy and on a low budget, they’re not necessarily very nimble. In fact, one of our biggest systems is 47 years old. I’m 47, so I know 47 isn’t old, but we are trying to replace the computer system, hopefully not the Undersecretary.
Bridget Burns:
That’s great. Well, I hope that’s helpful, because I do think it is widely misunderstood, and therefore people don’t always know how to engage and support and what kind of information you actually need from them. And what kinds of stories are especially useful when you’re trying to advance change. But I wanted to talk about you have this trajectory of working in the divested policy council with TICAS and ed, and obviously in the sense of career, politics, and policy. And each one of these roles was very different from what I would assume took some different leadership styles from you. And I’m curious if you can tell us how those roles had an influence on how you function as a leader right now.
James Kvaal:
Yeah, it has had an influence. When I was at the White House, a lot of my job was trying to give substance to the President’s vision and his values for the country. And so, how do we set policy priorities? How do we lift up work or ideas that the teams are generating that are consistent with the direction the President is trying to take the country? I did a lot of translating, so it was a lot of helping the lawyers understand the economists’ perspective, or helping the comm shop understand the policy weeds. That was a big part of connecting the dots and helping people speak each other’s language.
As an outside advocate, it’s a little different. You sort of need to have a couple of things that you believe very strongly, and plant a flag, and find new and creative ways to keep banging away at those points, and stay relevant, and try and keep your issue at the forefront. Now that I’m here at the Department, I’m really trying to support the Secretary, support the President. I’m trying to make space for my team so that they have the guidance and the autonomy that they need to really drive their projects forward and try and produce results. So there are really three different roles.
You know, I think it’s helpful for me in my current role to have had those different perspectives, because I have some idea of how the White House will think about a problem or the very different questions that a Congressional staffer might ask, for example.
Doug Lederman:
So that’s really a helpful sort of lead-up to this question, which is pretend you’re speaking to some undersecretary wannabes out there who could see – although maybe you’ll tell them they shouldn’t want the job – but assuming they do, what are the key traits and characteristics that in the role you have are most important for you day-to-day and over the long haul?
James Kvaal:
You know, I think there are a lot of different ways to do this job, and there are a lot of different ways to do the job well. And different people are going to bring different things to the job. I guess my advice would be to think about how do you have a team that together can do more than any individual can do. And for many under secretaries who come from outside of Washington, how do you get people who understand the programs and the policy-making process and the personalities? For me, that’s my background. Maybe I know too much about the details there. So while trying not to get in the weeds, I’m also trying to find people who can complement me especially with experience working on college campuses. People who know what it’s like trying to do this work on the ground. Also, people who have operational experience, data skills, communication skills that can complement some of my policy work. So for example, I’m really excited that President Biden chose Nasser Paydar to nominate for Assistant Secretary for Post-Secondary Education. And I just think his experience leading a university, doing the equity work on the ground, is just a perspective that will be so important for us.
Bridget Burns:
I want to just ground us in this moment a bit more in terms of it’s been a really challenging couple of years to be a leader. And it’s sometimes challenging to just wake up and be a human and do a job right now. And so, I’m just curious about you as a leader. How are you framing work when you communicate with your team and broader audiences, but in particular your team? How do you help them keep their eye on the ball rather than being distracted by the various things going on in the world that, while important, they can’t actually influence? Are there any words of inspiration or perspective that you offer the folks who work with you at the Department?
James Kvaal:
Yeah. It’s hard. I mean especially for us, the challenge is that we are building a brand new team, basically. There’s a heavy reliance on Zoom. We are in the office, but some of our colleagues are not. And so, we do a lot of meetings over video. It doesn’t allow you to build the same sorts of personal relationships that meeting in person can do. You don’t get the hallway time after to get a little work done. You don’t get the social experiences. So it’s made it a little bit harder for us to build this sort of informal capital that is so important to getting things done.
I think what we try to do, we do try to take a little bit of extra time to connect on a personal level and not jump right into business at every meeting. We try very hard to celebrate the successes that we’ve having. So for example, we discharged the debts of 700,000 borrowers, people who were cheated by their colleges, people in public services. And we see those stories, and we try to make sure that we call them to people’s attention so that they can see the tangible impact of our work. We’re also trying to make Education an intellectually vibrant place to work. I want it to be a place that young people will feel excited, they’ll be challenged, they’ll learn things, they can make a difference in a way that’s hard to achieve at some other places.
Bridget Burns:
Just to remind folks, because I promised that I would put this plug, the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Waiver that you all have issued is a really important piece. And I, in particular – I actually still need to file mine to be able to make it so that mine …
James Kvaal:
Mine, too.
Bridget Burns:
[Laughs] I know. We talk about this. So this is opportunity for folks in the audience, I will put myself up there. What is the date by which people can get their loans that were not previously qualified for Public Service Loan Forgiveness, and is there anything else you’d like to share about that?
James Kvaal:
Yeah, well this program’s been around for almost 15 years now, and the promise was if you worked for 10 years in public service, you’ll get your loan forgiven. And unfortunately, the fine print was pretty restrictive. You had to be in the right repayment plan. You had to have the right kind of loan. So it was a very complicated, confusing program, and in a lot of cases borrowers may not have gotten good advice from the contractors we hire to service student loans. So what we’ve been able to do is cut away a lot of that red tape. Say if you’re making payments, if you’re employed in public service, even if you didn’t file the paperwork on at the right time, we can go back and give you an opportunity to restart. So the waiver is in place until the end of next October. So I would encourage people to get started. In some cases, you may need to consolidate your loans to bring them into the Federal Direct Loan Program, and that can take a number of months to process. We also need to make sure we have your employer certified. And for us this is a first step. We want to make this program as seamless and as easy as possible. We don’t want this to be a program where only a small percentage of people who are eligible are actually benefitting. So we’re looking at ways to try and automate this more going forward.
Bridget Burns:
That’s great. And I love seeing folks on TikTok posting whenever they get their waiver and were surprised to do it. So I will do it. That was the official plug.
James Kvaal:
I’ll check in. I’m going to check in on you.
Bridget Burns:
OK.
Doug Lederman:
You said next October. October '22, not '23?
James Kvaal:
Yes.
Doug Lederman:
So a little twist on the question Bridget asked a minute ago about your team. How are you yourself staying grounded and staying focused and presumably as upbeat as you probably need to be in your role, and particularly on a day where you’re testifying in Congress or you’re doing something significant? What do you do to try to keep a good frame of mind?
James Kvaal:
I don’t have one special secret, I guess. I think the things that help for me – first of all, I have a toddler, and he does not care what’s going on at work. He has a problem he wants me to solve, or maybe he’s just in a …
Doug Lederman:
Now. Right now.
James Kvaal:
[Laughs] Anything that I have to concentrate on really helps. So I really enjoy cooking. Cocktails are a hobby of mine. And the other thing that really helps is meeting students or people who are doing really great work serving students. And that is just really, for me, very refreshing and rejuvenating and kind of reminds me why we’re doing the work and who we’re trying to support, who we’re trying to help. So those are I think some of the things that I find very refreshing. And I wish that it was possible for more of my team to get out in the field than it seems to be right now. But hopefully in the coming weeks, we’ll be able to do more of that.
Bridget Burns:
I’m going to shift to you’ve had a very impressive career and you’ve been able to create a lot of impact in the world. But I don’t know what that’s like for you having grown up as young James Kvaal. What is the most surprising thing for you when you look at your career?
James Kvaal:
[Laughs] I don’t know. That it works. [Laughs] I didn’t really have a plan, but I guess, looking back, it’s incredible that I’ve had the opportunities that I’ve had. And it’s just been a series of really, really rewarding and exciting opportunities. It’s been a lot of work, but I wouldn’t have expected necessarily to have gotten the breaks and the support from people along the way that I’ve found.
Doug Lederman:
We’ve got just a few minutes left, so I want to focus on some of the questions that we tend to ask everybody. It helps to give people that continuity. What advice do you most consistently give to others who are thinking about leadership?
James Kvaal:
Well when I was starting out, my dad, who’s very reluctant to give me advice in general, but his advice was to try and make your boss look good. I think it was good advice, and it helped me remember what my job was and what my role was in the team, especially as a junior person. I think something that I try to emphasize now to my team is, you know, I think all of us can work on our communication styles. And it’s not what you say, it’s what they hear that’s really important. So how do you simplify and shorten what you’re trying to say and try and make this main point stick?
Bridget Burns:
That’s a solid – I could get a t-shirt made based on that. That’s really good advice, especially for folks early in their career. I am curious about what has been – what are you proudest of as a leader thus far? I think of it as two sides of a coin. What you’re proudest of and what has been the hardest thing you’ve had to do in your career?
James Kvaal:
I would say the hardest thing would be culture change. And I’ve been in situations where I stepped into organizations that were high-performing but, for whatever reason, just didn’t feel comfortable for me in terms of my leadership style. And I think teaching a new culture and trying to evolve a culture is really challenging and takes a very long time and can be taxing personally. I think the thing that I am most proud of is when I have had a team that I think is really fantastic and firing on all cylinders. The group I have now, for example, I’m unbelievably blessed to have a group that is brilliant and entrepreneurial and humble and support each other. And it feels like the best I can do is just try and nurture that and tend that and get out of the way of it. I find that very rewarding. I have a real sense of satisfaction in helping people do good work and helping people grow.
Bridget Burns:
That’s great.
Doug Lederman:
Is there a particular book that you have read, presumably on leadership, that helps you, most influenced you in your career?
James Kvaal:
Well one book I recommend a lot is How to Have a Good Day by Caroline Webb. This book was actually recommended to me by John Schnur of America Achieves, and I have found myself buying it for people. She takes a lot of scientific literature around psychology and communication, breaks down for you sort of the psychological aspects of why people may not be ready to hear what you want to say or sort what of might be going on in their heads as you’re trying to communicate with them, and literally just gives you the precise words or the precise formula for how to break down your message in a way that they may be able to hear. She also has some good tips for leaders in managing their own emotions, which I think can be really helpful. Because if you’re not calm and patient, if you’re thinking about the last meeting or something else that didn’t go the way you wanted it to, then it’s very hard to be present and supportive for people.
Bridget Burns:
That’s a great – no one has recommended that book before. So we are going to definitely have to add that to the list. That’s solid. I did want to ask magic wand questions. Perhaps it might be magical thinking, but you do sit in a space of great importance, and you’ve also been in the nonprofit space. You’ve been around higher education for so long. If you could wave a magic wand and change one aspect of higher education, I’m curious what it would be and why.
James Kvaal:
This is almost a policy question, Bridget. Change of pace here. You know, I think our higher education system places far too much emphasis on a relatively small number of institutions that are very wealthy, very selective, very prestigious. We are very lucky to have those colleges and universities in the United States. They’re an important part of our fabric. But if what you are trying to do is expand the middle class, promote equitable opportunity, help large numbers of people understand each other, you’ve got to be looking at places like community colleges and public universities. You know, that work really should be more prestigious than it is because those are the kinds of places that are changing people’s lives. Large numbers of people’s lives. And are really driving prosperities of communities and regions. So that is kind of my fear, is places all seem to want to climb the U.S. News ladder even when doing so could sacrifice what it is that their community needs most.
Bridget Burns:
Well, we are certainly aligned about changing the value system of higher ed and what we prioritize and focus on. So I think that’s a great way to end this conversation. It’s been really delightful to have this conversation with you. I know that you get interviewed or you get to talk to a lot of different folks, but I wanted to make sure that folks got a chance to kind of peek behind the curtain in terms of your leadership style and how you think about the role. So I feel like we accomplished that today. So thank you for the time, and Doug, as always, thanks for being an excellent cohost. And for those of you at home, we will be here next week with President Freeman Hrabowski from University of Maryland, Baltimore County. So we will see you same time, same place. And otherwise, we hope you have a wonderful week.
Bios of Guest and Co-Hosts
Guest: James Kvaal, U.S. Under Secretary of Education
James Kvaal formerly served as the president of the Institute for College Access & Success (TICAS), a research and advocacy nonprofit dedicated to affordability and equity in higher education, nationally recognized for its policy recommendations on student debt. Mr. Kvaal served in the Obama Administration as the deputy domestic policy adviser at the White House and deputy undersecretary at the U.S. Department of Education. He led efforts to cut student loan monthly payments, hold career colleges accountable for excessive debts, and make community colleges tuition-free. He helped organize the White House Summit on College Opportunity, which featured more than 100 college presidents and other leaders committing to help more students graduate from college. He also has served in senior roles in the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate. Mr. Kvaal taught at the University of Michigan’s Ford School of Public Policy and graduated with honors from Stanford University and Harvard Law School.
Co-Host: Bridget Burns, CEO, University Innovation Alliance
Dr. Bridget Burns is the founder and CEO of the University Innovation Alliance (UIA). For the past decade, she has advised university presidents, system chancellors, and state and federal policy leaders on strategies to expand access to higher education, address costs, and promote completion for students of all backgrounds. The UIA was developed during Bridget’s tenure as an American Council on Education (ACE) Fellowship at Arizona State University. She held multiple roles within the Oregon University System, including serving as Chief of Staff and Senior Policy Advisor, where she won the national award for innovation in higher education government relations. She was a National Associate for the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, and has served on several statewide governing boards including ones governing higher education institutions, financial aid policy, and policy areas impacting children and families.
Co-Host: Doug Lederman, Editor and Co-Founder, Inside Higher Ed
Doug Lederman is editor and co-founder of Inside Higher Ed. With Scott Jaschik, he leads the site's editorial operations, overseeing news content, opinion pieces, career advice, blogs and other features. Doug speaks widely about higher education, including on C-Span and National Public Radio and at meetings and on campuses around the country. His work has appeared in The New York Times and USA Today, among other publications. Doug was managing editor of The Chronicle of Higher Education from 1999 to 2003, after working at The Chronicle since 1986 in a variety of roles. He has won three National Awards for Education Reporting from the Education Writers Association, including one for a 2009 series of Inside Higher Ed articles on college rankings. He began his career as a news clerk at The New York Times. He grew up in Shaker Heights, Ohio, and graduated in 1984 from Princeton University. Doug and his wife, Kate Scharff, live in Bethesda, MD.
About Weekly Wisdom
Weekly Wisdom is an event series that happens live on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. It also becomes a podcast episode. Every week, we join forces with Inside Higher Ed and talk with a sitting college president or chancellor about how they're specifically navigating the challenges of this moment. These conversations will be filled with practicable things you can do right now by unpacking how and why college leaders are making decisions within higher education. Hopefully, these episodes will also leave you with a sense of optimism and a bit of inspiration.
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