Preparing for What’s Next: Understanding the Forces Shaping Your Next Major Academic Decision

Financial pressures, enrollment uncertainty, workforce demands, and evolving institutional priorities are forcing leaders to make significant academic decisions in an environment where every option involves tradeoffs. Yet many institutions struggle not because they lack solutions, but because competing constraints make it difficult to determine where to begin.

This interactive session introduces EAB’s Change Readiness Diagnostic, helping provosts move from a broad sense of urgency to a clearer understanding of the specific forces shaping their institution’s next major academic decision. Through research insights, guided reflection, and peer discussion, participants will identify the factors driving change, examine the constraints limiting action, and clarify the leadership approach needed to move forward.

Attendees will have the opportunity to:

• Diagnose the forces creating pressure for academic change, from financial strain to shifting workforce and enrollment demands
• Assess where governance dynamics, campus politics, organizational fatigue, or data limitations may slow momentum
• Clarify which constraints require leadership action and which may need sequencing, negotiation, or additional evidence
• Determine what leadership approach is needed to build confidence, reduce resistance, and sustain progress
• Prioritize the next steps needed to advance a high-priority academic decision over the next 90 days

Designed for provosts who were unable to attend EAB’s Provost Roundtable, this session provides an opportunity to engage with peers facing similar challenges while leaving with a structured framework that can be applied immediately to a real institutional decision. We also encourage provosts who attended the roundtable to send a senior delegate to help apply these insights to upcoming academic decisions.

Session

Click the Register button to sign up.

Attendance is best suited for Provosts and a delegate. Registration is limited to two attendees per institution.

• Tuesday, September 22, 2026 | 1:00 p.m. – 2:30 p.m. Eastern Time