Breaking Up Isn't Hard to Do: 7 Key-Elements to Guide Your Post-OPM Strategy
Preface: The OPM landscape is shifting, and it is not my intention to cast OPMs or the decision to partner with them as good or bad. The purpose of this article is to present neutral information senior-level leaders may want to consider when making decisions regarding their online strategy.
When our institution decided to “break up” with our Online Program Manager (OPM) in 2021, we knew the transition would be a significant lift. There are a hundred boxes to check and only 6-months to check them off. The online marketplace moves fast and ensuring your university stays in-market is critical.
If your university finds itself at a similar crossroads, here are 7 key elements to guide you through the transition:
Develop a Detailed Financial Proforma: Our priority was developing a robust financial model to analyze the costs, revenue projections, and profitability scenarios of insourcing versus continuing with the OPM. We gathered historical data on lead costs, conversion rates, and projected new student enrollment numbers to build out a multi-year proforma. This provided the data-driven foundation for our decision to insource.
Prioritize Continuity of Service: Ensuring a seamless student experience was paramount. We identified the most critical service areas like marketing, admissions, and instructional design and established a six-month timeline to insource each function systematically. Staggering this process allowed us to bring in new staff and vendors with minimal disruption to existing operations.
Embrace an Entrepreneurial, Start-up Mindset: From day one, we fostered an entrepreneurial, adaptable mindset across the team. A new team of employees proves a clean slate on which you can build a foundation. This small "start-up" culture bred creativity as we established new processes from scratch – everything from our admissions communication flows to integrating disparate technologies.
Align Marketing Strategies: Our marketing efforts were another priority from the outset. We secured a new marketing partner - Validated Insights - that could align our online student recruitment tactics with our institutional brand and identity. Their expertise in areas like pay-per-click advertising and content marketing allowed us to maintain a competitive position. The importance of owning our marketing costs and performance data cannot be understated.
Invest in Staffing and Resources: Insourcing required a substantial investment, both in personnel and enabling technologies. We rapidly hired an assistant director of admissions, academic advisor, and additional instructional designers. We integrated our marketing and CRM data, student success platforms, and learning management system to support evolving needs.
Establish Standardized Processes: With our new team in place, we developed evidence-based standard operating procedures (SOPs) across all service areas. Our advising SOPs aligned with EAB's Navigate platform. Course development followed Quality Matters and OLC best practices. These guidelines ensured consistent, high-quality services.
Foster Collaboration and Transparency: Perhaps most importantly, we fostered a collaborative, student-centered culture through transparency and shared goal setting. We held weekly team meetings to celebrate wins and problem-solve challenges collectively. We co-authored department goals to uphold our commitment to putting students first.
Three years later it feels like we can finally come up for air. To be sure, it hasn't been easy, but the results demonstrate the value of this undertaking. We successfully insourced all operations, grew online enrollments 400%, and have a portfolio of 16 online programs tailored to in-demand healthcare fields. We continue to focus on continuous improvement, cost optimization, and ensuring our students receive premium experience from a cohesive, passionate team.
For any institution weighing the OPM decision, my advice is this: look in the mirror, as an institution are you prepared to embrace a bit of turmoil? Are you willing to make investments in personnel and marketing? We are not talking about millions, but it is not zero either. If so, have your financial proforma structured, prioritize seamless services, and be willing to build something special from the ground up. It's immensely rewarding to hear your students say they are pursuing dreams and goals never thought possible.
So where are you on your OPM-journey? I would love to hear from similar institutions.
Let’s connect, I promise I’ll pick up the phone (or zoom call). jeremiah@fractionalcolo.com