This lists on this page contain details for all projects related to the Comprehensive Administrative Review (CAR). Visit the CAR Project List page for a simplified list of all ongoing projects. Information is updated on a monthly basis.

Academic Affairs

  • Course Scheduling Grid 
    This project aims to create consistent class times in which courses will be scheduled.

  • Graduation Coaches 
    A Graduation Coaching program is being planned for implementation for all students with an incoming GPA of 2.75-2.99. Coaches will maintain a relationship with students throughout their college experience, and assignments will not change based on program changes.  Coaches will work in concert with Academic Advising. This project is currently in proposal form and is not yet confirmed.

  • Intentional Pathways for Students 
    All students will enter KSU with either a specific major or a focus area, and no students will enter KSU undeclared, giving all students a plan/goal and course of study that will count toward their major.  Focus areas and academic program maps will ensure an initial English and initial Mathematics course during the first year. 

    For students in focus areas, they will take up to 9 hours in focus area courses, so they can decide on a specific major by the end of the first year of college.  Program maps will provide a term-by-term course of study, including milestones, for each major to graduate in four years.

  • Professional Advising Model 
    The university is moving to a Professional Advisor model and has doubled the use of Professional Advisors over the past three years.  KSU currently has a 600:1 student to advisor ratio.

  • Review of Scheduling Process/Systems 
    This description will be added soon.

Communication

  • Intranet / Other Internal Communications Tools 
    This project was formerly listed as "Internal Communications Platform."  It is intended to develop more robust internal communications channels.

  • KSU Today 
    This project was formerly listed as "KSU Inform 2.0."  A revised platform will be launched to continue our internal daily communications in a more streamlined and organized layout.

  • "One Community" Council Meetings 
    "One Community" Council Meetings that bring together the entire marketing and communications community across the university run three times a year (Fall, Winter, Spring). Six "Communities of Interest," which are smaller groups organized by areas of interest, meet regularly to stay share best practices, learn new skills, and update on function-specific topics.

  • Year-Long Calendar of Interaction 
    This project was formerly listed as "Year-Long Calendar of Engagement."  The President has an active calendar both external and internal to KSU. The Year-Long Calendar of Interaction will be developed to show the various internal activities the President will be attending. This will allow the KSU community to know when and where they may be able to interact with the President.

Facilities & Space Management

  • Marietta Campus Life Space 
    Improvements will be made to the Joe Mack Wilson Student Center, which is considered the "living room" of the Marietta campus.

  • Marietta Campus Life Space - Student Center Renovations 
    Efforts are underway to plan renovations to the Joe Mack Wilson Student Center, to be implemented in phases over the next 10 years.

  • Marietta Parking Lot Addition 
    The Board just approved the addition of a parking lot on the Marietta campus.

  • Marietta Rec Opportunities & Facilities - Feasibility Study 
    A new study by Brailsford & Dunlavey on feasibility was completed in spring 2018, and four options for future expansion will be included in the final report.

  • Marietta Rec Opportunities & Facilities 
    Ongoing improvements to facilities and space for recreation activities on the Marietta campus are underway.

Fiscal Affairs

  • Budget Transparency Process

    The Office of Budget and Planning's (Budget Office) customers such as deans, directors, and business managers have expressed concerns regarding the transparency in the budget process and lack of communication. In an effort to address these concerns, the Budget Office has implemented several changes:

    • Updated Website – In Spring 2018 the Budget Office website was updated to include budget trends of Education & General (E&G) funds by division, total budget and fund information, a list detailing the one-time funded projects, an overview of the budget and budget process, detailed annual budget cycle along with the one-time funding and new funding processes and templates.
    • Increased Communications – The budget office now participates in the regular Business Manager meetings to share information and answer questions related to budget and position management. The Associate Controller has also participated in the Chief Business Officer meetings with the deans and College leadership to help answer any questions that may arise; Human Resources Town Hall Meetings to demonstrate coordination between the two offices and outline the vision for the changes to the function of the budget office; and presented general budget information at the Academic Deans Council meeting, Chairs and Directors Assembly, and the Administrators Council.
    • Budget Review Group – The Budget Review Group was established as a steering committee to prioritize new and one-time funding requests and provide guidance on items sent to the Board of Regents (BOR) including the Budget Narrative, tuition rates, and projections.

  • Budget Process Review 

    An extensive review of the KSU budget process and budget allocations identified several points of concern regarding the historical incremental based budget approach.  Each fiscal year the Office of Budget and Planning (Budget Office) sends budget workbooks to revenue-generating units across campus. These units have the opportunity to project revenue and expense and develop the following fiscal year budget.

    While these revenue-generating departments routinely evaluate and update their budget allocation, departments that receive state funds (tuition, state appropriations, or fee revenue) have not. The state-funded budgets, valued at $356M in FY2019, roll forward each year with little attention paid to the base operating and travel budgets. The Budget Office currently focuses on the incremental budget changes including utilities, part-time instructor budgets, and on-going budget requests. This roll forward approach has stagnated KSU departmental budgets. Academic departments have received little to no operating funds to support the new faculty lines and the operating budgets of support functions such as facilities have not grown commiserate with the expense of managing two growing campuses supporting over 35,000 students.

    In addition to stagnation, the roll forward approach lacks strategy. The university does not evaluate current functions, positions, or budgets to ensure consistency with the KSU Strategic Plan. With this, funds are underutilized in some budgets and scarce in others. As year-end approaches, KSU typically pulls unused funds to use on year-end projects.

    To address the issues above, the actions below will create a university budget process based on strategy and evaluation:

    • Projections – KSU approaches revenue cautiously.  In the past, revenue projections were conservative and the additional funds amended throughout the year often went to the year-end process. In FY2019 the tuition and fee revenue and expenses are budgeted to the estimate. This allowed KSU to utilize additional funds in permanent base funding.
    • Budget Office – The Budget Office is broken into two separate functions: operations and strategy. The operations team is transaction based with little incentive to drive down amendments or budget errors. The operations team is separate from the budget development process leaving the individual departments responsible to fix budget allocations. The strategy side focuses on BOR reports, high-level analysis, and budget development. Beginning in FY2019 each analyst will be responsible for operations and strategy for one or more assigned division and perform all assignments related to the division including amendments, budget errors, position management, budget development, BOR inquiries, etc.  Each analyst will drive down errors by fixing poor budget allocations in order to spend more time with their division to ensure the budget is in line with university priorities and strategy.
    • Position Management – In March 2018, the Budget Office assumed responsibility for Position Management. Personal services makes up nearly 70% of the university budget presenting the greatest opportunity for improvement. Analysis shows that several million dollars are budgeted in salary and benefits on positions that have been vacant greater than one year. Many positions have partial funds and others are active with no budget available. In cooperation with the individual divisions, the budget office will clean up erroneous positions and shift the funds from personal services to permanent budget needs approved by the President.
    • Allocations – All departments will have the opportunity to evaluate their current budget allocations and work with their analyst to tie their budget to the strategic plan through the budget workbook process.  The Budget Office will analyze multiple years of expenditures to evaluate how the funds have been used in the past and research comparable institutions and their budget allocations.

Human Resources

  • Compensation Policy 
    This project will create a compensation policy with specific guidelines on how various compensation related employee actions will take place.  It will define what constitutes a reclassification and what the procedure is that will need to be followed if a true reclassification needs to take place.  Currently, the policy is complete, and it has been reviewed by the Division of Legal Affairs, President's Cabinet, and the President. It is now with Policy Committee for review of formatting and style and will be published as soon as it is approved.

  • Department-Specific Onboarding 
    While there is no active project on this as of yet, Human Resources will be pulling together a cross-functional team to draft a recommended onboarding program and is working on identification of team members.

  • HR Academy 
    Both Human Resources (HR) business partners and the central HR team are undergoing training on various HR topics such as Compensation, FMLA Administration, Recruiting, and Metrics/Analytics to increase competencies of staff and ensure consistency in how requests are handled.  In-depth trainings on different topics with a follow-up review each month to ensure understanding also occur. 

  • Class & Comp Structure 
    A rebuild of the current compensation structure is underway, which will result in the creation of a new pay grade structure with standard bandwidth and standard percentages between grades.  Also, work is being done to create accurate job descriptions for each distinct role, with consideration for the market price for each. A published list of all roles with associated pay grade information will be released once the project finishes.

  • Class & Comp Equity Study 
    This project will use the newly created Compensation Structure to determine where staff members pay should be (based on experience and performance) within the new pay range. Recommendations will be made for any staff members that are determined to be underpaid based on this analysis. Pay changes, if necessary, will be made based upon budget availability.

  • New Manager Training 
    Two separate classes are in the design phase – one for newly promoted managers on general leadership/management principles that will include the “KSU Way” and a second for experienced leaders new to KSU that will be primarily the “KSU Way”.  The first program is almost complete, and the second should be complete by mid-September 2018 for presentation to the Cabinet and will launch in October if/when approval is received.

  • Spans & Layers 
    Administrative leadership is beginning work on evaluating the best organizational structure to meet the needs of KSU and increases organizational and operational effectiveness.

UITS

  • DocuSign Electronic Signature 
    The DocuSign electronic signature solution will allow KSU employees to quickly and securely access and sign documents. Employees will be able to easily upload and send documents for others to sign by creation of on-demand adhoc workflows.

    This will help to remove barriers, eliminate inefficiencies, and mitigate risks in the electronic signature process.

  • Electronic Workflow Solution 
    KSU does not currently have a workflow solution that is specifically designed to provide business process automation and the inherent workflow processes.  However, there are several software solutions that are used at the institution that include elements of workflow within them that provide automation for specific business needs.  Examples of these include Nolij (document imaging and retention); AiM (facilities management); and in-house developed applications such as OwlPay.

    University Information Technology Services (UITS) is in the process of gathering requirements and reviewing vendor demonstrations in order to complete a feasibility study for a generalized business process automation tools to assist with workflow automation.

  • Housing WiFi for Marietta & Kennesaw Campuses 
    This project exists in two phases, with separate goals for each:

    • Phase 1: Work will be completed to double existing Internet bandwidth.
    • Phase 2: This initiative seeks to improve network service for students in housing, through a request for proposal (RFP) for outsourced WiFi and Internet services. The RFP includes providing end-to-end services and support. The vendor will be responsible for the provisioning of Internet bandwidth; in addition to the installation, operation, and maintenance of network electronics, wireless access points, authentication mechanisms, maintenance of structured cabling, and customer support services.

Procurement & Travel

  • Concur Live Training 
    This will result in the addition of Approver Training for Business Managers and Speed Chart Owners as well as systematic scheduling of appointments with each college or department to support key contacts or offer to present information during planned department meetings.

  • Concur Online Training & Assistance 
    The creation of new links on the Office of Fiscal Service's Travel website for infrequent travelers will be established, as will automated, timed e-mail delivery of helpful hints and alerts for infrequent travelers before, during, and after travel using Concur Travel reports.

    Additionally, How-To Guides on the Travel website based on local, domestic, or international travel will be either reorganized or consolidated, and an addition will be made to the website section for non-employee travel to include students, interview candidates, and guest lecturers.  Short training videos will also be made that are specific to KSU travelers by topic to answer questions on the top five challenges, such as creating the travel request, air travel booking, or car rental cost comparisons with online views of Concur navigation.  

  • NextGen 
    NextGen is an upgraded version of Concur Expense and Concur Travel. This “Next Generation” Concur Expense is the result of extensive research designed to provide an intuitive and streamlined experience for creating and submitting expense reports.  The implementation date is dependent on the State of Georgia implementing the updates.

  • Training for Procurement Staff 
    We have initiated a protocol for customer service and workload management training. All purchasing staff will be required to take the following instructor-led classes with CUL:

    • Writing Emails, Memos, and Letters that Work
    • Introduction to Project Management
    • Building Trust in the WorkplaceDon’t Waste My Time! Making Meetings Work
    • Design Thinking & Creative
    • Problem Solving

      We’ve also recommended the following free classes – Service Excellence,
      The Power of Positive Influence, and Everyone Communicates Few Connect.

  • Updated Procurement Procedures Manual 
    The Department of Administrative Services (DOAS) Georgia Procurement Manual (GPM), Board of Regents Business Procedures Manual (BPM) and KSU’s Competitive Solicitation Policy establishes the rules under which the Procurement office operates. To ensure the campus is fully aware of all requirements, the Procurement office plans to meet with individual colleges and departments to provide policy guidance. Procurement will also provide regular updates on policy changes through KSU Inform and website updates, i.e. flowcharts, FAQs and How To have.

Regulatory & Compliance

  • Communication Plans on Policy Revisions 
    The communication plan on new or revised policies will be developed to ensure proper and effective dissemination of information to the campus community.

  • Policy Review Electronic Solution for Document Control 
    A new software package (PolicyTech) will aid in making our currently manual process more efficient.  Policy drafts will be managed through the system by applying approval workflows to the process.  The software will also aid in proper revision control and will retain archived revisions for reference.

  • Training Materials on Policies 
    The new software package has the ability to track users who have viewed newly released policies.  This comes at an additional cost.  Alternatively, the Director of Policy should develop a communication template to announce policy revisions to campus.

Senior Administration

  • Brand Strategy 
    Brand Strategy Website

  • Employee Engagement 
    This project will focus on Employee Engagement.  The project team (which is in the process of being identified) will be responsible for overall measurement of employee engagement, as well as the resulting action plans that will be identified in an effort to increase employee engagement, reduce faculty and staff turnover and improve overall productivity. 

  • Strategic / Prioritized Hiring 
    HR is currently interviewing for a leader of this new department. Once on-board, the leader will work with campus leaders to create and implement a strategy to identify key hiring issues and to implement plans whereby this department is responsible for identifying needs, attracting and sourcing qualified candidates, assisting with search committees and on-boarding new hires. A separate team within HR will be working on the overall Talent Management strategy of identifying top performers and creating development plans to ensure we retain and continue to grow internal talent.

  • Strategic Plan Implementation 
    This project will help develop key performance indicators and align initiatives to the strategic plan.

Student Affairs

  • Adult Commuter Student Affairs Tracking System 
    Modification of the Veterans and Military Tracking System will allow for the collection of data regarding Adult and Commuter students.

  • Assessment of Career Planning for Graduate Students 
    Career Planning will host focus groups with graduate students to determine unmet needs and/or better define and describe offerings.

  • Centralization of Events 
    This project will focus on the development and approval of a recommended solution for centralized events management process (Phase I).  The goal of the proposal will be to align the processes and bring consistency to implementation across the different constituent groups.  The recommended process may have multiple paths depending on the needs of the event request.

  • Co-Curricular Credentialing Model 
    Multiple paths to encourage students to become “Engaged Owls.”

  • Graduate Student Mentorship Opportunities 
    The Department of Alumni Relations and Annual Giving is partnering with Career Planning and Development; the Department of Student Leadership and Service; and The Kennesaw State University Foundation to purchase and implement a new software platform that will allow students and alumni to connect with mentors. The new system will also provide the opportunity for graduate students to volunteer to mentor undergraduate students.

    PeopleGrove will allow us to provide personalized support - at scale - and set students and alumni up for success in enrollment, school, career, and as alumni by leveraging our greatest asset – the KSU community.

    The project is in the final stages of procurement now, with an anticipated launch date in February or March of 2019.