Leaders on Leadership featuring Dr. Charles L. Welch, President of Arkansas State University System

Episode Transcript

Jay Lemons:

Hello, and thank you for listening. I’m Jay Lemons. Welcome to Leaders on Leadership, brought to you by Academic Search and the American Academic Leadership Institute. The purpose of our podcast is to share the stories of the people and the forces that have shaped today’s leaders in higher education and to learn more about their thoughts on leadership in the academy. I’m truly delighted to be joined by a dear friend, Dr. Chuck Welch. Chuck serves as the president of the Arkansas State University System and is one of his state’s most important and leading advocates for higher education, which he has been for a number of years. He’s also got the distinction of being the youngest person to ever serve as a community college or university president in the State of Arkansas. During his tenure, Chuck has hired numerous chancellors for each and every one of the seven institutions in the Arkansas State University system.

He’s a past chair of the AASCU Board of Directors and serves on the board of directors of the American Council on Education, as well as our parent organization, the American Academic Leadership Institute. Chuck serves as the co-chair of the Executive Council of the Arkansas Department of Higher Education. He previously has served as the president of Henderson State University, chancellor of the University of Arkansas Community College at Hope, Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs at Arkansas State University-Beebe and Dean of University studies at Pulaski Technical College. He’s a native of Jonesboro, Arkansas. Chuck’s a first-generation college student and the first member of either side of his extended family to receive a graduate degree. He got his B.A. in Political Science from the University of Arkansas, a Master of Arts in political management from the George Washington University, and a Doctorate of Education in higher ed administration at the University of Arkansas, Little Rock. Chuck, it’s a great pleasure to welcome you, and thank you for sharing your time and your story.

Chuck Welch:

Thank you, Jay. It’s great to be with you and appreciate all you do for higher education.

Jay Lemons:

Well, it’s a joy and it’s a pleasure. And as we were both once upon a time the youngest people in the room. How old were you when you first were appointed a campus leader?

Chuck Welch:

31. And we were just talking the other day that one of the chancellors in our system is retiring this summer and that will make me, I think I’m still the youngest in the state, but it will actually make me the senior president in Arkansas. I’ll be starting my 19th year here in a couple of weeks as a president or chancellor. And it has certainly flown by, but wouldn’t trade it for anything.

Jay Lemons:

Well, you beat me to the punch. I was 32, and boy, it is a blink of the eye and 25 years in the presidency and now completing year six at Academic Search, and boom. But we are truly blessed people to have had important opportunities for impacting others. And Chuck, one of the things I want to say out of the gate is, thank you for the commitment you make to leadership development, your work in leading so many of AASCU’s leadership development programs is something that I know President Millie Garcia is enormously grateful for, and I’m just so deeply grateful for what you do. I was on the AASCU Professional Development committee when we said, “We think we should do something for new presidents.” And wow, the New Presidents Academy we gave birth to, and to see what you’re doing with it all these many years later and the importance of that work in helping leaders to transit or to be identified in emergent ways, and to support the work that the Millennium Leadership program is doing, and the work of AALI.

I just want to say thank you for investing in the future leaders who are going to shape the academy, and also thank you for your commitment knowing that the gifts of leadership come in packages that don’t necessarily look and act like you and I, come from many different corners under God’s sky, so bless you for all that.

Chuck Welch:              

Well, thank you, Jay. I mean, I’m a firm believer and have a passion for leadership development. I often joked that I’ve never met anyone who went to college thinking, “I want to be a college or university administrator.” They may think, “I want to do that at the K12 level or I want to be an accountant or a banker.” But it’s one of those things that more often than not just happens organically. And I think it’s really critically important that we help those aspiring leaders or those that maybe don’t think they have the skills that we think that they do, and to help them work their way up to those ladders we know that we are having and we’ll continue to have mass retirements throughout the academy. And I think it’s important that we develop those people to come in and step into those roles. And then as you say, New Presidents Academy is one of those things that those of us who made those early mistakes can not only give advice on what to do but what not to do.

And I was blessed. I had it on a more disorganized basis with mentors and such. But I think anytime you can do that, it is just a wonderful opportunity. And so, I’m proud of the different, from AALI to all the AASCU, programs that we have at every level. As you say, those that will have leadership challenges just by virtue of where they come from or what they look like, or what their backgrounds are that perhaps you and I didn’t experience. It’s important to have that breadth and depth of experiences and training. And I love to watch those that participate in our cohorts go on to be immensely successful, and it makes our jobs easy.

Jay Lemons:

Yeah. I’m just home from the most recent addition of Mastering the Presidential Search Process. And I do the opening, and one of the questions that I ask people, I tell them it’s the calisthenics or the yoga before they get into the real work. But when did people first start thinking about working in higher ed? And you know what? I would almost guess that the plurality of our participants in this last program, it was because somebody, usually a faculty member, sometimes an administrator too, said, “Have you ever thought about doing this work?” It was my own experience. I bet it was yours. And the profound impact that sometimes the simplest question can have. And if we have listeners out there who are faculty members or administrative leaders at any rank, you have that capacity to really profoundly change lives. And I’ll be forever grateful for actually a woman who had came to my institution from Jonesboro, Arkansas…said to me one day, “Have you ever thought about working in higher ed?” Bam. And my life was changed forever.

Chuck Welch:

Oh, wow. I didn’t know that story. Of course, Jonesboro being my hometown. Yeah, what a great story. I did have the same thing. The late Diane Blair was my academic advisor. Her husband was the general counsel for Tyson Foods. She had been Hillary Clinton’s matron of honor at her wedding, just a very wise woman. And I met with her, I think about maybe my senior year, the beginning of my senior year of undergraduate studies. And she asked, “What do you want to do next? What is your next step?” And I said, “I was going to go to law school.” And I’ll never forget the look on her face. And she said, “Why?” And at that time I thought I wanted to get into politics in the governmental arena. And so I answered in that way. And she said, “Do you want to be a lawyer?”

And Jay, nobody had ever asked me that question. Nobody had ever really put it that way. And so as we sat there and talked and she said, “I don’t think you want to be a lawyer. I think that’s what you feel like you need to do to go do something else.” And she said, “Chuck, I think you need to find what it is you enjoy.” And she said, “Here’s what I want you to do. I want you to think about an experience that you’ve had as an undergraduate that you’ve enjoyed, that you’ve watched someone else and maybe drawn.” And I was the president of the student body at the University of Arkansas. And I mentioned to her, having worked very closely with the chancellor and getting those opportunities, how much I enjoyed that and how much I enjoyed being able to help other students. I was a first-generation college student. And so being able to pass that on and she said, “Well then why don’t you go work in higher education?”

And I had never even remotely considered it. And really from that day forward, that’s where it led me. And so you’re exactly right. And it obviously had a profound impact on my life and I’m forever grateful for that question and then that advice afterwards.

Jay Lemons:

Well, we should all be determined to try and pay it forward, so thank you. Chuck, when you think about what makes a good leader, and by good I do not mean grade B, I mean someone who is effective, virtuous, and successful?

Chuck Welch:              

Well, I think the first thing, and there’s a lot of things that I’m going to look for when I’m hiring a Chancellor, for example, for one of our campuses.

Jay Lemons:

Yeah.

Chuck Welch:              

The very first thing that I’m going to look for to be a good leader is that you always understand it comes back to people. It comes back to the people that you serve. It comes back to the people that you surround yourself with. It comes back to the people that actually make the work happen. And really understanding that you have to value those individuals. You have to listen to those individuals and you have to serve them. And so, I spend an inordinate amount of time in those processes really trying to make sure folks get it. That they want to take care of them. Secondly, I think you have to be an effective communicator. I have said many times you can be a 4.0 from Harvard, a Rhodes Scholar, you can have every certification in the book, but if you’re not able to effectively communicate in an interpersonal setting, be able to communicate to large groups, you’re going to struggle in these jobs.

And I think that’s increasingly becoming important. Because it’s important that you not only make tough decisions, but you explain those decisions. And that when you explain those, you’re able to communicate those to very diverse audiences and understanding the impact that it could have on those individuals. And then I think the last thing that I’m always looking for is someone that is innovative. And I may talk about this some more later as we talk, but I think the way that the world is changing with technology, the way that our governmental and business structures are changing in higher education, no longer can we just always do things the way that they were previously done. And we have to innovate. We have to think differently. And so I think a good leader is someone that has that innovative mind and then can communicate those things. But again, everything else being equal, it has to come back to people. Because we have to realize that’s who we’re serving, that’s who we’re here for, and that’s who makes it work or not work as the case may be. And we have to really get a firm grasp.

Jay Lemons:

Thank you. I’m a huge believer that leaders don’t do much alone. And we all have an opportunity, whether we’re at a departmental level or at a divisional level, certainly at the institutional level. But the same holds I am certain at the system level. When you’re creating a team, what do you look for in your team members, the other leaders that you call to be a part of your presidencies?

Chuck Welch:

I want people first and foremost that are team members. I mean, you use the word team, and that’s what I want. And that can be really difficult in a system sometimes. I mean, obviously, there’s that friction sometimes between an individual campus and the system office. There’s friction sometimes between one campus institution and another campus or another system institution and another system institution. And at the end of the day we have to all realize we’re all in this together. We’re trying to reach some common goal. And I’m a firm believer that people that are open to collaboration, that are willing to really treat leadership as a team and almost family type atmosphere can get more things done. Now, that’s not to suggest that I want people to just roll over or to do things that are in the best interest of someone else, but to really understand that we have to try to be on the same page to find efficiencies, to find the greatest impact, to try to accomplish the best work that we can.

And so, I’m looking for those team members. Again, I’m looking for those people that are strong communicators, those people that are able to make a decision, but then also communicate that decision. And then I’m looking for people, Jay, that are ambitious and people that really want to push the envelope. I’m not interested in hiring someone to … It never fails in a search that someone on one of the search committees may say, “Well, he or she might only stay five years.” And the answer I always give is, “The only way they’re leaving us is if they’re doing a good job for us. And if they leave, we’re better because of that.” And I don’t want to hire someone just on the mindset of, “Hey, I want them here 20 years.” I want them to push as hard as they can to improve our institution. And then if that affords them opportunities, then great.

And I tell those that I hire, “I’ll be the first one to help if that opportunity arises. Because I will know that you have made us a better place.” And so, got to be a collaborator, got to be a teamwork member, got to be able to communicate and got to be somebody that doesn’t just want to go retire somewhere, but wants to make the current place better so that they can go make somewhere else better. And to me, that makes a very well-rounded leap.

Jay Lemons:

Yeah. The days of Mr. Chips and just caretaking are gone, aren’t they?

Chuck Welch:

Absolutely.

Jay Lemons:

And thank goodness in many ways. One of the things that I want to pull on really distinguished professionals like you and leaders like you, Chuck, is you have some advice that you give to folks who aspire to leadership.

Chuck Welch:

Absolutely. The first piece of advice I always give is, identify, cultivate and maintain relationships with mentors. I’m not sitting here right now if not for strong mentors, individuals who came before me and understood what we were going through. And what I often tell aspiring leaders is, it never fails as someone say, “I really hate to call you. I know you’re busy. I don’t want to bother you.” And my response to that is always, “Bother me.” I would love nothing more than to give back, because people did that for me. That’s the highlight of my day is when an aspiring leader calls me and asks for a piece of advise, wants to talk through a situation. And mentors, and don’t get me wrong, Jay, I tried to argue with mine at every turn. Because I thought I knew more than they did now. They always won. I did always ultimately listen to them.

And now looking back, I realized they were right every single time. And so I think that development of mentors is so critically important. And another thing when I say to maintain that, is because I see far too many aspiring leaders that just jump at an opportunity because it pays a few thousand dollars more or it has a title that they really want, without having a firm grasp or understanding of the position, of the institution, of the culture, of the fit. And mentors can help with that and say, “Be patient. This isn’t the right opportunity for you. There will be another.” And I think that is so helpful. Another thing that I tell aspiring leaders is, make sure you do your research to understand the truths and to eliminate the myths.

I hear far too many aspiring leaders say, “I would never want to do your job. There’s too much stress, there’s too much pressure, there’s too much X, Y, or Z.” And in many cases, it’s just simply not accurate. It’s a misunderstanding of the role or what the position is. And so, do I have stresses and pressure? Sure. But I say all the time that the job I have today overseeing an entire system and campus CEOs isn’t nearly as difficult as that first academic deanship that I had. That was one of the toughest jobs that I had. I learned a great deal, but every job has its different situations. I want to make sure that individuals understand those things. And then the third thing is, don’t sell yourself short.

When I ask someone, “What is it you ultimately aspire to?” And they say, “Provost.” Or they say, “Vice president for student affairs.” I’ll say, “Why not president? Why not? And why would you stop there?” Now, if that is ultimately where they get and decide, “That’s where I want to be,” that’s wonderful. I’m not saying everybody should go there. But don’t sell yourself short for no reason. Really make sure that you understand where it is that you can go and push that. Jay, I remember right after I got my first presidency, I got a call from the Chronicle and they wanted to interview me and talk about, “I’m sure you had similar experiences with being so young.” And they asked me, “What is the greatest challenge that you’re currently facing?” And I told them, I said, “Well, I think you’re probably going to think I’m going to say finances or enrollment or something of that nature.” But I said, “It’s really hiring.” I said, “Because the very thing that benefited me is now one of the biggest challenges that I have.”

And what I meant by that was, hiring committees or boards of trustees, they were looking for someone that was up and coming and energetic and new ideas, and there weren’t a lot of those folks around. And so it benefited me, they looked my way. But then when I was trying to do the same thing, there weren’t very many around. And that’s why I think to go back to our earlier conversation about leadership development programs, I think it’s so important to begin to develop that, what I would call, use a baseball term, a farm team that is ready to step into those roles and really understands what the roles entail, what it takes, and what the benefits and the challenges are going to be for those positions.

Jay Lemons:

Thank you. Such important and keen insights, and I know that will be helpful to folks. When you think about the challenges facing leaders today in higher ed, what are the big pieces? And I love to have you reflect over time how you’ve seen it, and are there new expectations or different skills that are more important today than ever?

Chuck Welch:

Absolutely. Well, I’ll start by saying, I think the ones that have been there forever are still there. Funding, enrollment, personnel, all of those things that you have to manage. And I mean, they’re every bit as difficult today as they were when I started this 19 years ago. They’re slightly different. Technology has impacted that obviously. The economy can impact that. Governmental mindsets and the way that politics is happening around the country. All of those things I think are still in place. Nothing has really gone away. Now, the thing though that I think, and this is going to be a very broad comment. But I think the greatest challenge facing not only me, but facing all of higher education today is the need to change our model. I’m a firm believer that we have got to do things differently moving forward, or we are going to … Those that don’t very well may face the closure of their institutions.

Because I like to joke that Thomas Jefferson were to come back to life, the only thing he’d recognize was a college campus. Because it looks just like it did when he was here and those things. But sometimes we are one of the worst. I often say too that enacting change in higher education is like turning around the cruise ship. It’s very difficult and it takes a long time. And I don’t think we have the benefit of a long time anymore. When you look at what’s happening in terms of defunding of higher education in many states around the country, when you look at the added pressures from the private sector that are coming, when you look at those changes in technology that are happening, when you look at the devaluation of the value of higher education from many of our prospective students and their families, when you look at the need to be everywhere all the time immediately, because that’s what our young people are accustomed to today, when you look at just rapid changes in other industries that we’re responsible for preparing individuals for, but we have to think different.

And so in our system, we talked a lot about you must be strategic, you must be analytical, and you must be accountable. We have got to, no longer can we just set up a program and say, “Boy, I hope it works.” We’ve got to constantly look at the analytics of it. Is it in demand? Is it relevant? Is it profitable? And I’m not to suggest that every program has to be profitable. We know that some won’t be, but that we have to have them for higher education. But I don’t think we can just blindly let programs run anymore either. We have to really look at efficiencies and shared services. And so I think that big challenge is, how do you change that model when you have hundreds of years of it being done a certain way and very strong opinions from faculty and staff and boards of trustees and policymakers that are rarely, if ever in alignment.

We have to navigate. And so I think that moving forward, the campuses and the systems that do change, that are innovated, that do things differently, will prosper. The ones that don’t, I really have a great fear, Jay, about what their future looks like. And I think unfortunately we’re going to see an increasing number of institutions that are forced to either close their doors, or merge with other institutions, or make decisions that are just unfathomable because of that unwillingness to change. And I think today, more than ever it’s moving faster and it’s more critical that that change occurs.

Jay Lemons:

Boy, it does feel as if we’re … And maybe this has always been the case. But that ability to be change management experts and leaders is at the core of moving an institution forward. Growing an institution. Building an institution. We’re going to move into a little bit of a lightning round now where I’m going to ask you shorter questions, you can answer in whatever length you wish. Who’s had the most influence on you?

Chuck Welch:              

Well, I’m going to answer this with two. The first would be my parents. Neither of my parents were college graduates. My father didn’t graduate from high school. None of my grandparents got past the eighth grade. My paternal grandfather couldn’t read or write, literally signed his name with an X. But my parents from day one, there was no question that they wanted me to go to college. They wanted me to have opportunities they had never had, instilled in me at a very early age how important it was to do that. And so they had enormous influence. And then in terms of my-

Jay Lemons:

Where did that commitment come from in them?

Chuck Welch:

I think Jay, that it came from … I mean, I think they always, even when they were younger, understood that education was important. But no one had ever done it before them. They didn’t have the means, and so they didn’t really deemed it accessible at that time. And so I think that they made their life’s mission … I’m an only child, so they made their life’s mission to, “We’re going to provide him with that support.” My dad was a truck driver. My mom stayed home most of the time and then became an administrative assistant. But I think they wanted me to have things they didn’t have. They didn’t struggle the way that they had to struggle for so many years. And they wanted me to live a life that no one in our family had ever lived. And that’s happened for me.

Jay Lemons:

Yes.

Chuck Welch:              

And I’m just incredibly grateful for that. They’re among the most wise people I know. They just didn’t have those chances. And they set out from the beginning. In fact, I was born in St. Louis, Missouri. And then fairly shortly after that, they moved back to Arkansas to a smaller town because they wanted me raised in that community where I could have that village, if you will, to help raise me and give me those opportunities that maybe I wouldn’t have had in a metropolitan area. And so I’m deeply appreciative. And then from a professional standpoint, it would be Alan Sugg. Alan Sugg was the president of the University of Arkansas system for over 20 years. And someone who very early on took a liking to me, really took me under his wing and taught me and then gave me my first chance, probably at a time that I didn’t deserve it. Was too young, very green. But he believed in me and I watched him.

And he was one of those people that he understood the importance of people. And he understood the importance of communications. He understood the importance of kindness and what we do. And I think about him every day. And he is still someone that I reach out to and visit with on occasion. And if not for him, who knows where I would be? But certainly he’s been a great influence.

Jay Lemons:

Wonderful, wonderful. Is there a book that’s had the most significant influence on you?

Chuck Welch:

This is going to be a very bizarre answer, I think, Jay. It’s a series of books actually. But I’m a big reader of non-fiction. And I like to read non-fiction biographies. I like to read non-fiction accounts of historical events, I was a political science major. But a series that really just had stuck with me my entire life was Robert Caro’s series on Lyndon Johnson. And it’s really because Lyndon Johnson had his wars, obviously. And I certainly didn’t agree with everything that he did. But for a man from the South to be able to push through civil rights legislation in the 1960s is always fascinating. And he did it through a combination of political skill. He did it through a combination of relationship building, did it through a combination of being an expert on how to get things done and what the mechanisms were.

Now, he used intimidation and force and all that too. And I don’t suggest it was all good. But as I read through that book, or the series of books about his life, it just really struck with me that he gets a bad rap in some areas within, at the same time, was able to do some things and accomplish some things that I’m not sure could be accomplished today. And was done at a time that was obviously very, very challenging. And so it’s just fascinating and I would encourage people that haven’t read those, and there’s plenty of other biographies out there, but to read and really try to understand where some of our political giants or higher education giants came from and to really understand a book I’m getting ready to read. Our colleague, who is the current president of Coastal Carolina University, Michael Benson, has written a biography on a former president of Johns Hopkins University who was the father of the American Research University. And so I’m looking forward to reading that. And it’s for those same reasons to really try to-

Jay Lemons:

Coit Gilman, yeah.

Chuck Welch:

Yes, yes, absolutely. What is it that pushed them? What is it that made them want to be different? One summer I read back to back the biographies of Sam Walton, founder of Walmart, and then Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon. And what I found from both of those was they weren’t interested in doing what everyone else did. They were interested in how can we be different and literally change the face of retail? Sam Walt was one of the first to take items back from behind the counter that you can go up and touch and purchase on your own, obviously Bezos with the online platform. And so it goes back to my comments earlier about change. It’s not, “How can we do what everybody else is doing and do it better?” It’s, “How can we do something different? How can we change the industry?” And all of those books and all of those individuals I just mentioned I think have done exactly that.

Jay Lemons:

Wonderful, great suggestion. Thinking back to SIU, what was your favorite undergraduate experience?

Chuck Welch:

Well, I better say meeting Mandy, my wife, Jay. If I don’t say that, I’ll-

Jay Lemons:

That’s a good one. That’s a good one.

Chuck Welch:

Make sure when you see her you tell her that I said that. But beyond that, I mean I had the great honor and privilege of serving as the president of the student body. And I mentioned earlier that that’s really what led me to a career at higher education. And it did so because it really … I mean, honestly, somebody that had been first generation, I didn’t have a lot of that background and understanding and knowledge of the way that institutions worked. And it allowed me to work very closely with university administrators. And I was able to see firsthand just how big of an impact you can have. And I’ll never forget, one of my mentors, Dan Ferritor was the chancellor of the University of Arkansas at that time, said to me, “Chuck, the greatest days of my year are the days I watched those students walk across the commencement system.”

And knowing that I played some small part in that. And was able to help them find their way, whether it be through making sure we have quality instruction, making sure we have quality facilities, making sure that our financial aid office is working well. I mean, as those administrators, you have a chance to impact all of that. And so I’m forever grateful for what that experience in student government did for me. It taught me about some of the challenges students face, and how we always have to remember them. Because I’ll tell you, Jay, you know this as well as anybody, having been a president for 25 years yourself, the further we get away from being a student, the harder it is to really remember what that experience was like. And then obviously, it’s very different today than it was for us. I’m blessed right now. My daughter is a freshman. I’m in college.

And so I’m relearning through her what are some of the things that are really a challenge for you and that you wish could be changed. But that’s why I tell students, “Get involved on campus. Make sure that you have those extracurricular opportunities, because you’ll learn as much outside the classroom in many cases as you do inside.” And that was certainly the case for me.

Jay Lemons:

Excellent. Favorite tradition at someplace you’ve studied or served?

Chuck Welch:

Wow, that’s a tough one, because there’s many. But I’ve got to go back to my most previous presidency was at Henderson State University, and Henderson is the second-oldest public university in the State of Arkansas. And it’s a tradition-rich institution. As you know, it’s now a member of our system. But they do something every year called the Pine Tree Speech. It’s the first week of school and they bring in the entire freshman class and assemble them in a large auditorium. And they have someone that is an alum of the university to come up and give the Pine Tree Speech. And the Pine Tree Speech is effectively an oral history of the university and of its traditions. And I know that many of those students walking into that room are probably like, “Why do I have to do this? I don’t want to be here.”

But by the end of it you can hear a pin drop in that room. And I mean, I’m getting chill bumps even right now thinking about it, because it’s really an opportunity to impress upon them, “You’re not the first ones to walk through these halls. You’re not the first one to experience these things, so many have come before you and really blazed this trail.” And I wish all of our campuses did that to really tell our story, tell our history, what makes this institution great. And now you, it’s your responsibility now to take this and further it and create the next chapter in the Pine Tree Speech that we’ll be telling students 20 years from now. And I just love that experience. It’s just, every president before me and the ones that I’ve been able to hire on that campus have told me the same thing, “This is unlike anything I think I’ve ever seen.” And it really is something that is beautiful and touching.

Jay Lemons:

I love it. In a world filled with change, the place and the need for traditions and ritual is even more precious is my belief.

Chuck Welch:

Absolutely. Absolutely. We can’t change for the sake of change and we can’t forget everything that’s coming our past. You’re exactly right.

Jay Lemons:

Yes, that’s right. If you hadn’t worked in higher Ed, if you hadn’t had Diane come into your life and say, “Hey,” what do you think you’d have done?

Chuck Welch:

Oh, I think I would have gone to law school. I would have been miserable if I had practiced law. I don’t think that’s something that I would have enjoyed. But I think ultimately, I mean the plan would have been to go into the governmental arena and politics. But funny story I didn’t tell earlier. After she had that conversation with me and I began to change my way of thinking, the plan had always been for me to go to Washington when I graduated as an undergraduate. Bill Clinton was President. There were obviously lots of opportunities for Arkansans. And I went to Chancellor Ferritor and said, “Oh, I’m not going to go to Washington now.” And I’ll never forget what he said. He said, “You’re going, whether I got to drag you kicking and screaming.” He said, “You’re 21 years old, you’ll never again in your life have this opportunity. You can always come back and work in higher education, but you cannot pass this up.”

And so I did. I listened to him. I went, it really reaffirmed for me that I didn’t want to work in politics. Now, I say that to groups sometimes and they laugh, because I do obviously a significant amount of that now in my current role. But it reinforced for me, that’s not what I wanted to do. It gave me some experiences that I will treasure for the rest of my life, but it also really strengthened my resolve to come back and get engaged in higher education. And so I’m grateful for Diane. I’m grateful for Dan Ferritor, and I’m grateful for having those experiences that taught me a lot of life’s lessons.

Jay Lemons:

Wonderful. Well, one of our traditions on Leaders on Leadership is to invite our guests to really share in a brief commercial moment the secret sauce, the DNA that makes the Arkansas State University system a calling for you, worthy of your labor, your love, and your efforts.

Chuck Welch:

Jay, in April I will have been here for 12 years in this position, and obviously I’ve had opportunities presented where I could have left and done other things. But what it comes back to is, number one, it’s an opportunity to serve my home state. It’s an opportunity to serve students and families not unlike mine, that maybe never dreamed of this being imaginable. And one of the things that I love about our system is we’re still young enough, we’re still small enough to be nimble enough to be able to change, be able to do things differently. We have seven institutions dispersed across or main campuses, dispersed across the state. They all are very different in terms of their missions, in terms of the students that they serve, the geographic regions that they serve. I love that. But then I also love that we’re a system that really truly believes in this extends to all seven of our chancellors and to the people that work for them that really believe in collaboration, that really believes in efficiency, that really believes in shared services.

When I went to those campuses a couple of years ago and said, “Let’s move everybody onto the same ERP system.” They said, “Let’s do it.” When we talked to those campuses about, “Let’s create system-wide procedures for X, Y, and Z,” they say, “Let’s do it.” Now, they know that my goal is not, never will be, creating seven clones of one another. My goal is also to never be, to have a lot of system dictate. We want our campuses to be who they are. We want them to be different. We want them to have their own operating policies and procedures, but we also want to find ways that we can maximize and leverage the efficiencies that a system provides and make it easier on our students to reduce roadblocks. And they buy in. And it’s very much a family atmosphere.

And I’ll leave with this last story. We were looking at taking in a new campus into our system, and they got it down to our system and to another system. And they visited. They brought their entire board of trustees, visited with both systems. And when they left, the president of the institution at the time called me and said, “I really thought we were going with the other system until we came to yours and realized just what a family atmosphere it is, how transparent it is, how much you genuinely enjoy working with one another and impacting change.” And he said, “That made the decision for us.” And so that’s what makes it fun. That’s not to say, families fight, obviously that’s not to say that we always get along. But I think we’re all rowing our boat in the same direction. And I think that’s really at the end of the day what’s most important and what keeps me here and what I think makes our system such a special place.

Jay Lemons:

Chuck, thank you for spending time with me and our listeners on Leaders on Leadership. We really appreciate you. And I just want to say thank you and give you a chance for a final word.

Chuck Welch:

Well, thank you, Jay. I mean, I think it’s really important that we pick the brains of some of the leaders around the country, and you do so much good work about academic search and through AALI and the other entities. And you are the person that’s helping us find those best leaders. And so, I appreciate all you do. It’s always a joy to be with you, and I look forward to meeting and working alongside this next group of leaders that we’re preparing for the future.

Jay Lemons:

Well, thank you for those kind words, and right back at you. Listeners, we welcome your suggestions and thoughts for leaders we should feature in future segments. You can send those suggestions to leadershippodcast@academicsearch.org. You can find our podcast on the Academic Search website and wherever you find your podcasts. Leaders on Leadership is brought to you by Academic Search and the American Academic Leadership Institute. Together our mission is to support colleges and universities during times of transition and through leadership development activities that serve current and future generations of leaders in the academy. What a joy it’s been to have Chuck Welch on our show today. Thank you again, Chuck, for being with us, and good luck in all that you do and the impact that you and the whole of the Arkansas State University family have across your great state, so be well.

Chuck Welch:              

Thank you, Jay. Take care.