Background Reading for Strategic Imperatives

The Accelerate 2025 strategic plan addresses several important issues identified as the highest priority challenges and Robinson's most significant opportunities. Each identified strategic imperative along with background reading that helped frame the issue is shown below.

Strategic Imperative 1: Robinson’s core strategic differentiation around innovation adopted in the previous strategic plan is having a positive impact. How can we accelerate momentum to achieve even greater differentiation around the innovation theme in a rapidly transforming digital economy?

Background Reading:

• "After Covid, get ready for the Great Acceleration" - The Spectator
• "The future of business education: A commentary in the shadow of the Covid-19 pandemic" - Journal of Business Research
• "Dear Colleague Letter: A Broader Impacts Framework for Proposals Submitted to NSF's Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences Directorate" - National Science Foundation
• Reimagining Business Education: A World of Ideas - Business Education Jam
• [SUMMARY] Business Education Jam
• "Who Becomes an Inventor in America?: The Importance of Exposure to Innovation" - National Bureau of Economic Research
• [EXECUTIVE SUMMARY] "Who Becomes an Inventor in America?: The Importance of Exposure to Innovation"

Strategic Imperative 2: What does success look like if Robinson is able to anticipate and meet the shifting marketplace demands around the Future of Work?

Background Reading:

• The Work of the Future: Building Better Jobs in an Age of Intelligent Machines - MIT Work of the Future
• [Work of the Future summary] "Report outlines route to better jobs, wider prosperity" - MIT News
• The Future of Jobs Report - World Economic Forum
• [EXECUTIVE SUMMARY] The Future of Jobs Report

Strategic Imperative 3: How should Robinson create physical and virtual environments where students connect and learn by engaging with each other, their faculty, and strategic partners?

Background Reading:

• "Reimagining the Urban Office" - Harvard Business Review
• "Rethinking Campus Spaces: How to Prepare for the Future of Learning and Work" - The Chronicle of Higher Education
• "The future is now: imagining university life in a post COVID-19 world" - Aurecon

Strategic Imperative 4: There is increasing recognition that both the business and societal case for diversity, equity, and inclusion based on social identities and diverse perspectives can lead to better outcomes. How can Robinson position itself to anticipate and meet the needs of our graduates, strategic partners, and society to address systemic inequities and to identify solutions for building a more diverse, inclusive, and stronger workforce?

Background Reading:

• "America 2021: The opportunity to advance racial equity" - McKinsey & Company
• "Defining Atlanta: Booming, diverse tech sector offers stage 'most cities dream about'" - Atlanta Business Chronicle
• "Democratizing innovation: Putting technology to work for inclusive growth" - Brookings

Strategic Imperative 5: What should Robinson do now to position the college for success in the forthcoming predicted decline in college enrollments?

Background Reading:

• "How to Survive the Enrollment Bust" - The Chronicle of Higher Education
• MBA Enrollments from 2013-2019 - Eduvantis
• “Boston University’s New $24,000 Online MBA Is a Big Hit” - Poets & Quants
• "Race, Poverty and SAT Scores: Modeling the Influences of Family Income on Black and White High School Students’ SAT Performance" - Teachers College Record
• "The Looming Higher Ed Enrollment Cliff" - Higher Ed HR Magazine