Note: This interview in the Weekly Wisdom Series originally aired on December 19, 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.
Taylor Randall:
You can't be too optimistic, right? You have to say, "Look, here's where we are, here's the facts." But fundamentally, our role has been to move people out of this. Move out of, in some sense, some darkness and into some optimism and light. That's fundamentally what leadership is about. And you can't be unrealistic in that optimism. But it is your role. It is your role to say, "Look, we can do this," and it has to be a little bit more than patting people on the back and say, "There you go, let's go do it." You've got to make sure that policies are moving, that resources are moving, and that you're leading the way.
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 co-host is Inside Higher Ed co-founder and CEO, Doug Lederman. We're so excited to be back filming shows, surfacing wisdom, which is what we do. We want to elevate the leaders and the values and the voices that we think are leading in the sector and we should be elevating. So really excited to finally be back having these conversations, and today is definitely going to be one of those really good ones.
Doug Lederman:
We are joined today by Taylor Randall, who's the relatively new president of the University of Utah, though he's been at Utah for a long time. He and Bridget have some news to share, or recent news. Welcome President Randall, thanks for being here.
Taylor Randall:
Hey, thanks for having me this morning, Doug. Bridget, it's great to see you again.
Bridget Burns:
Yeah, you too. So for those of you who are at home who don't know, last week I was on the University of Utah campus meeting President Randall IRL for the first time. We were finally being able to unveil the long-awaited news that the University of Utah is the next campus to join the University Innovation Alliance, which is a small group of institutions who are operating as a multi-university laboratory for student success innovation, accelerating the implementation of proven innovations on their campus to increase the number and diversity of college graduates in the country. So just very excited. University of Utah, at the U, I wore my red. We have lots of photos wearing red. It was perfect.
Taylor Randall:
You couldn't have been more on brand for us, anyway. We appreciate it and we're very excited to be part of this innovation alliance. It just meets everything that we're trying to do here at this university. So, very excited to participate.
Bridget Burns:
Well, we're super excited, and it also gave me a chance to get to know a little bit more about you, and that's the episode and the chance for us to learn about your leadership, about what really draws you to this position, and especially because you have unique circumstances, I think, having been a longstanding dean that was beloved at the University of Utah, to now become the president, that has to have some benefits that people know you, but again, challenges and that everybody knows you. So we're really excited to learn how you navigate that unique circumstance of coming in as a president in this moment. So we'll just start right there in terms of -- I would love to hear your thoughts about that experience of loving this place, knowing this place, but the decision to step up and become the president, that's a big one.
Taylor Randall:
Yeah, thanks for that question. My history at this university goes back probably too many years. We're probably a family stuck in a serious rut. I come from a line of three generations of faculty members here at the University of Utah. So you might say we are nuts about this place. We're irrationally passionate about this place. And so, for me, this is absolutely my dream job. This institution has meant so much to me over my career, but also my family's career. We've seen changes, we've seen almost a hundred years of history here collectively with our family. But it's also been, I think for us, not only part of our identity, but also part of our mission in life is to make this university great for the State of Utah. And that's, I think, really the reason I took it. I will say, obviously, as you step from being a dean into a much larger role, there's a lot to learn still.
I knew a lot about the business school where I came from. I certainly knew a lot about the university through the interactions I had. But one of the first things you've got to do is just sit down and assume you don't know as much as you think you do, and listen to individuals. And I spent six months, and it was probably the most invigorating six months I've really ever had in a career. I wish I could have taken you with me. It was like I was like a kid in a candy shop. Just listening to the remarkable things that happen on this campus, the individuals that have a passion for higher education, or the research they're doing, it was an absolutely spectacular experience.
And what I did learn is that there was a lot to still understand about the dynamics of this university and how it worked and where it wanted to be. It's a university that has incredible ambition, but also has a heart that is larger than anything I've ever been able to even comprehend. These are people that want to have societal impact on an unparalleled level. They want to address the needs of society both educationally and on the research side. And to me, that is just invigorating every day I walk into the office.
Doug Lederman:
What you said about seeing things and the learning experience during ascendancy to the presidency that you hadn't understood before, can you share a little bit about what kinds of things those were? Because listen, the vast majority of our listeners are not in that role at their institutions. Presumably there are a lot of people at your in institution who it would probably help you if they understood it better. So what are some of those things that became clearer, that weren't clear as dean and faculty member, et cetera?
Taylor Randall:
Well, this is kind of part of my leadership style. I think you've got to understand the personalities, the heart, the soul, the values of an institution. And I certainly knew my part of campus really well, but when you sit down and begin to listen to other leaders across campus and what they're trying to do, you begin to see a much bigger picture and, quite honestly, a bigger set of values that you've got to bring into the equation and into the leadership process.
You begin to understand what makes people tick, what motivates them intrinsically. And I think what's amazing about higher education is you really have a set of people that are just completely mission-based. It's very different than off in the private sector where it's about money. And to understand those passions around campus. So for example, we've got a massive health science this side of campus, and they were, at the time I came in, just kind of at the tail end of COVID, to understand what they had been through from the nursing programs, and we all saw that on the news, but to just sit down and talk to them, try to understand how they were trying to make themselves more resilient was quite inspiring, and they were lessons that you could take to other parts of campus.
Bridget Burns:
I love that. It just makes me think about one of the things that we should ask in the future, Doug, is what do deans need to understand about the presidency that they don't understand, right? So I think there's definitely some illumination in the leadership journey there that's super important, and about motivation as well. That's really great. I want to just tease out a little bit more in terms of if there's anything that's been particularly challenging about transitioning in this moment when we're coming out of COVID, people are in-person. It's been weird. There's also been this burnout epidemic, and higher ed's going through a variety of really, at times, existential conversations layered upon each other, and there's just a lot. Being a human in the United States right now is a lot. And I would say ascending to a president in that moment in time as well. So I'm just wondering what, for you, was the most challenging about this moment to transition?
Taylor Randall:
There's no question that COVID just had an outsized effect on what we've been doing in higher education. And I would say the positive of it, for me as a leader, is it taught me to communicate and empathize in very, very different ways. You begin to realize in this COVID environment that any policy you lay down had such an individual impact. And I almost felt like anytime I said, "Here's where we're going to go, and here's what we're going to do," I had to have an individual conversation with every person on campus to make sure that they were okay and that they were going to be able to make it through this. And so, I think the expanded empathy through this whole situation has been a big positive. I think very differently now about implementing anything, because COVID gave me the opportunity to see the various viewpoints in our faculty, in our students, in our staff.
I mean, I think the second big learning for me is the role of a leader in painting an optimistic future. You can't be too optimistic, right? You have to say, "Look, here's where we are, here's the facts." But fundamentally, our role has been to move people out of this. Move out of, in some sense, some darkness and into some optimism and light. And that's fundamentally what leadership is about. And you can't be unrealistic in that optimism. But it is your role. It is your role to say, "Look, we can do this," and it has to be a little bit more than patting people on the back and say, "There you go, let's go do it." You've got to make sure that policies are moving, that resources are moving, and that you're leading the way.
Bridget Burns:
I think that's really great, and I agree. I hadn't thought about that, that if people were too optimistic, people wouldn't trust you. Especially if you're in the midst of crisis, it's not credible to act like everything's perfect. But you got to be upbeat even when things are hard. So, I think that's an important nuance.
Doug Lederman:
Yeah, I'm curious how you think about the elements of doing that, because some of it obviously has to be picking people up and giving them hope. It also seems like you need to be able to be transparent about the challenges and provide exhortation about the need and the potential ways to attack them. So what do you think are the key elements of that blending of the optimism with the acknowledgement of the potential problems and how to solve them?
Taylor Randall:
I think one of the things that frequently worked for us is very open dialogue and gathering data from everyone. And quite honestly, I think this is something that's going to generalize in the future, just the way we all now deal with information. And so, we had many, many large-scale meetings, whether it was on Zoom -- most of the time it was on Zoom. And you just had to spend at least 20 to 30 minutes just saying, "Let's talk about the situation in the way you're seeing it." And that was really a data gathering exercise. We would share our data, they would share theirs, we would try to reconcile the differences. And once you did that and you got people on a common framework for understanding where they were, then you could actually have really sensible dialogues. And I will say the following: As a leader, you'd go in and you'd say, "I think maybe this is where we ought to go."
But I began to amend my process. I would maybe say, going in, "I need to be prepared to know what options we have available." And then I've got to listen to people. I've got to say, "Look, here are the three options that come out of this situation. Where are we on this? Where should we be? Where should we go?" And often that flexibility in joint problem solving built the trust because people saw the decision as it was coming. And so, to me, that was a shift in my leadership style. I couldn't walk in and say, "This is where I want to go." I had to walk in and say, "Here are three options, let's make this decision together."
Bridget Burns:
I think that's super interesting, especially it makes me think about how you make decisions as a leader and how it's not just about balancing optimism with transparency. I think that's super important, but I also am just curious. It makes me think about, as a result of COVID, as a result of working with your team so closely and being on Zoom calls and doing in-crisis mode for the last few years, has it changed how you like to make decisions as a leader?
Taylor Randall:
Oh, absolutely. I mean, I think I had this philosophy before that you've really got to bring people along, but I would say I learned how to do it in that crucible of COVID. You realize, particularly with the limited forms of communication, that you had to have some patience. And while decisions had to be quick, you had to spend a lot more time just making sure that everyone involved in this decision had understood the logic behind it, and had a voice. We knew this, COVID was the greatest example, you never please everybody, but at least you can give voice to those decisions. And I think it does help ultimately in the implementation, because people understand why you're doing things.
Doug Lederman:
We've talked a good bit so far about the how. Maybe let's shift a little bit to the what, at Utah, but also maybe more broadly in higher education. What do you consider to be the most significant kinds of change, transformation, that institutions like yours need to be -- And there may be a little bit of how in there as well, because I think there's a lot about change management that institutions need to change, but what is your sense of the key lines of attack for --?
Taylor Randall:
Sure. I'm sure on this show, you've discussed all of the different changes coming through higher ed, and we certainly are experiencing those in spades as well in our own shape or form. We're a public institution, and I fundamentally think we're at a point where we have to redefine what it means to be a public institution and redefine what our obligation is to our stakeholders, the state, in our case, State of Utah, the public at large through our research enterprise, and in particular our students. And so, where we're focusing on is, top-to-bottom, redefining a set of experiences for stakeholders and really trying to take their view in mind. So I like to say we're going to redefine the student experience at the University of Utah. We're going to start from admission standards and try to say what are different ways we should be welcoming people to our institution rather than shutting them out? How do we make sure that they get through our institution in time and they have great outcomes?
And then one of my pet passions is that I think institutions of higher education should actually create extreme passion and confidence in individuals. And I was fortunate enough here at the University of Utah that I had some faculty members that did that. They took me aside. They taught me how to learn. They taught me to know when I didn't know things. But instead of running away from problems, run to them. They taught me how to identify what made me tick in life and what gave me energy. And that, to me, that's the fun challenge on the student side of higher education, is trying to design a set of programs that make people just completely thrilled with where they're headed in life.
Our other constituents are clearly our state and our state stakeholders. What are we doing? If we're a research university, how do we demonstrate the power of a research university within a state? I'll give you a very specific problem that we're working on right now here in the State of Utah, the Great Salt Lake. If you look on the map, this great body of water is shrinking dramatically. It has incredible ecological consequences if this doesn't go away. If you're a skier, the powder goes away. The wildlife that surrounds that lake goes away. It's literally maybe a hemispheric event if we can't protect this lake. Well, one of the things we've done with the research universities in the state is, for the first time ever, we convened all the researchers and we said, "What do policy makers need to know about the dynamics of the lake to protect it and make it thrive in a serious way?" And we have met multiple times now with the researchers, and for the first time ever, there's consensus around inflows and what levels the lake should be to be at healthy levels. That's a very practical way that a research university can affect a state in a positive way.
Bridget Burns:
And absolutely critical, especially at this moment in time. So that's super timely. I want to just go a little bit -- Just a slight shift. I mean, I completely agree with the idea of actually redefining what it means to be a university, especially your mention about creating confidence in students, because they were stuck behind screens for two years. And the thing I've described to folks that's most necessary is institutions building a curriculum that gives them courage pills, because that's what our students need. They need experiences.
Taylor Randall:
I agree, yeah.
Bridget Burns:
And that's not a natural thing if you look at the lecture style. We have to evolve pedagogy to actually give students the confidence. And I think that you learned that from courage-building, team-based activities, like the chance to try stuff, because otherwise they were captured behind a screen. The anxiety piece that we're hearing, one element of it is that they've been basically just stuck somewhere for a while. So I love that idea. But I want to shift to talking about what has surprised you about your career? Did you think that you were going to end up being a college president, especially in your alma mater?
Taylor Randall:
Yeah, not in a million years. That's been the fun part about my career. I mean, if you look back for just a little story, I'm an undergraduate business major. I take a job that I don't like. Interestingly, why did I not appreciate the job? Because I never did an internship. The career services at the time at the university probably didn't deliver for me what they should have. So I go to graduate school, and I go just to get an MBA. And I'm thinking, "Oh, I'll go become a consultant, or I don't know, a financial analyst on Wall Street." And as I'm in the middle of this, I remember those lessons from undergraduate: "What makes you tick? What is your passion?" And those things were not my passion. And I realized my passion was in the development of people and the development of ideas. And so, my internship in an MBA was very non-traditional. I decided I wanted to go work with some faculty members to see what they were doing and how they were affecting both students and what they were doing in research.
Turned out it was the best summer I've ever had in my life. And at that point I said, "Well, I may have just spent too much money on an MBA. I'll finish it, but I think I'm going to head into a Ph.D. program, and I want to get into higher ed." And that was probably the big turning point, was that summer internship where I realized this is what is fun for me.
Bridget Burns:
That's a perfect testament to the value of higher ed. And also, that makes me want to ask a bunch of questions about internships and --
Taylor Randall:
Go for it. I'm a big fan of internships.
Bridget Burns:
I mean, I sometimes wonder if an internship, is it more important that it teaches you what you don't want to do, or what you do want? Because for me, it was what I didn't want to do. And that was so helpful to not have to waste a career learning that lesson.
Taylor Randall:
So, interestingly, I think the first ones, my opinion is the same as yours, Bridget. I think it actually teaches you what you don't want to do. I told my kids they couldn't make the same mistake as I did, they need to do internships after their sophomore, junior years. And if I look at the evolution of those kids and those internships, it was always, "Yeah, that wasn't what I like, but I did see something over in the next room that I thought was my passion." And so then they moved over into the next room. And that was extremely valuable.
Doug Lederman:
Yeah. What we need to do with that is if all we're doing is two summer internships, that's not a lot of opportunities. So that's figuring out how to build shorter-term work experiences in that give you more chances to both learn what you like and what you don't like, is clearly one of the directions we need to move in.
Taylor Randall:
No, Doug, I absolutely love that idea. So you think about how do you reconfigure curriculum to be able to provide those learning experiences? Interesting thing, when I became dean at the business school, is I realized that the curriculum was exactly the same as it had been 25 years earlier. So we did something really basic, and I'm sure you all have done it. We bought 10 pizzas and we put 20 students on a couch, and we said, "We'd like you to just tell us what you would like to see if you were a freshman coming in to this university and you're interested in business." And they laid out a pretty simple plan. One, your curriculum doesn't allow us to explore possibilities. So we want to do fast case studies where we actually get to go to companies and we get to talk to people and understand their careers.
Okay. Two, we want to be with each other while we're doing that. To your point, Bridget, this is not a group of students that wants to be on screens. They wanted group projects. They wanted to do case analyses. They wanted to get as involved as possible in these companies that they were going to go visit. Three, they actually wanted it to be fun. Now, I know that may sound like an odd concept, but that is one of our design principles that education should actually be fun. And so we could accommodate that. And so really, out of 10 pizzas and an hour, the entire first-year experience at the business school was recreated.
And we're now taking that simple way of doing things around our entire campus. We're redesigning our science curriculum based on that. We now have freshman lab experiences where you can go in and work on industrial-size problems that are actually given to you by industry in your freshman year. You get to visit those companies where you'll potentially work if you're coming out of a STEM degree. And again, it connects people to their passions really early on, and suddenly they guide themselves through higher education with a very, very different viewpoint.
Bridget Burns:
I love that.
Doug Lederman:
That's a pretty good return on investment for that 100 or 120 bucks for the 10 pizzas, right? I haven't been in Salt Lake for a while, but --
Taylor Randall:
Yeah, we use coupons, Doug.
Doug Lederman:
There we go, perfect. 60. Perfect. That's awesome.
Bridget Burns:
Well, this has been really wonderful, President Randall. I just want to land the plane with our questions that our viewers always love. And so it's kind of rapid fire. The first one is, if you think back on the best advice and most valuable advice that you received, what advice was it especially about helping you with your career?
Taylor Randall:
Never make a decision solely on money. Make it on your passion.
Bridget Burns:
And that was about deciding what to do?
Taylor Randall:
Yeah, coming out of that MBA program.
Bridget Burns:
Okay. Love it. And then when you're talking to people who are, say, baby deans or assistant deans or whatever, thinking about the moving up in leadership, what advice do you find yourself giving to others about leadership?
Taylor Randall:
I say just the following: You have to be optimistic about people if you want to be a leader. If you are optimistic, you will succeed. If you find yourself too much on the pessimistic side, may not be right for you. You may be leading yourself into some pain that you do not want. But if you love working with people and you're optimistic about what they can be, keep going.
Bridget Burns:
I love it. Yeah, generosity. People's assumptions about what their motivations are. Love it. Lastly, is there a book that has helped you in terms of your leadership journey that you most frequently recommend to other people?
Taylor Randall:
There's not a single book. There's kind of a top general genre, I would say. I find history to be the most instructive leadership manual I've ever seen. I love Doris Kearns Goodwin, anything that she has written. One of my favorites is No Ordinary Time. It is the history of the United States when Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt occupied the White House. And it gives a remarkable perspective of just the internal workings of the United States during these World Wars. And particularly, it gives you a lot of insight into what Eleanor was doing during those times and the tension between the two. And I just love the way that they use the creative tension to solve big, hairy problems.
Bridget Burns:
I really appreciate you spending this time with us. I think that's very helpful for us in terms of the nuggets of wisdom to give folks in the rest of the week. So thank you, President Randall. Thank you, Doug, for being back on the show, and for our audience back at home, we will see you on Monday, actually, with Javier Reyes, who's the interim chancellor at the University of Illinois Chicago, and we're very excited to have you there.
But thank you again, President Randall, and we will see you all soon.
Taylor Randall:
Thanks, Bridget. Thanks, Doug.
Bios of Guest and Co-Hosts
Guest: Taylor Randall, President, University of Utah
Dr. Taylor R. Randall is the 17th president of the University of Utah. He joined the institution in 1998 as a professor of accounting and led the nationally ranked David Eccles School of Business for 12 years prior to his 2021 appointment as president. The first alum in 50 years to hold this position, President Randall has an infectious energy and passion for his alma mater. He has set a bold goal for the University of Utah to become a top ten public university with unsurpassed societal impact. He believes the U can revolutionize the student experience, change lives through research, and have an impact on all 3.4 million Utahns. Highlights of his tenure include re-pledging the U’s commitment to serve the state of Utah, opening centers for climate policy and fintech investment, announcing several new living-learning housing projects, hiring the U’s first chief experience officer, and launching plans for a new campus and hospital in West Valley. President Randall is proud to lead a top-tier research institution, the state’s largest employer, a member of the Association of American Universities, and home to University of Utah Health, the only academic medical center in the state of Utah. President Randall graduated from the University of Utah with honors in accounting and then earned an MBA and Ph.D. in operations and information management from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. He and his wife, Janet, have four children, one daughter-in-law, and one son-in-law. He loves spending family time playing games, relaxing in the backyard, mountain biking, road biking, golfing, and all things sports-related.
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 (A.C.E.) 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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