Cole Clark is a managing director within the Higher Education sector at Deloitte Services LP. He has more than 30 years global experience engaging with education and research organizations, with a focus on the enabling capabilities of technology within the unique culture and context of the sector. In his current role, Cole engages with the higher education community on issues ranging from cost and revenue challenges, administrative systems modernization, technology transformation, and enterprise risk and resiliency.
In addition to the core business functions of the institution, he has experience in areas of the “front office” of higher education including research, student engagement, enrollment, and student success. Cole has served on the corporate advisory committee for EDUCAUSE and is a trustee for Western Governors University. He has co-authored several monographs on higher education and regularly contributes to the development of Deloitte’s annual Higher Education Trends report.
Recently, in an exclusive interview with Higher Education Digest, Cole shared his professional trajectory, insights on the role of education technology evolving in the next 5-10 years, significant career milestone, future plans, words of wisdom, and much more. The following excerpts are taken from the interview.
Hi Cole. Please tell us about your background and areas of interest.
My own higher education experience was a B.A. from Rhodes College in International Studies and Arabic. I had ambitions to be a diplomat or have some role in the foreign service. But during my teenage and college years, the advent of the personal computer was taking place, most notably the introduction of the Macintosh from Apple in 1984. I was mesmerized by what these devices could do to writing, foreign language study, and graphic design. After graduating I had an agonizing decision to make – attend Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service or join Apple instead. Ultimately the alure of what Apple was building and creating in the personal technology arena was too irresistible, and so I chose to join Apple in 1989. I was immediately assigned to their education division and my relationship with higher ed was solidified. After nearly 10 years with Apple, I spent the next 20 with Sun Microsystems and (by way of acquisition) Oracle Corporation, always serving higher education, academic medical centers, and non-profit research. Oracle afforded me the opportunity to lead their global education and research industry organization, and through this role, gained significant experience with higher education in many other regions. It was also during this time that I joined the advisory board of Western Governors University and eventually became a trustee in 2016. In that same year, I joined the higher education practice of Deloitte and have been serving higher education clients across many aspects of the academic enterprise for the past 9 years. Besides being an eternal “student” of all facets of the higher education sector, I enjoy tennis, meteorology (I was a TV weatherman for several years during my time at Apple), and vintage science fiction (major “classic” Dr Who fan).
What do you believe are the most significant challenges facing higher education institutions today?
American higher education has never faced such a broad set of challenges and risks, at least not during my 30+ years in the sector. It is difficult to prioritize the challenges, as different parts of the higher education panoply are impacted differently, but certainly in the past 6 months the change in administration in the US Federal Government and their proposed and enacted policy and regulatory changes have brought pressure and uncertainty to nearly every revenue source of virtually all higher education institutions. This includes pressure on research funding, tuition revenue sources, and endowments. Aside from this, declining public perception in the value and “ROI” of postsecondary education is a serious threat that is acute and largely falls along partisan lines, although trust and confidence in higher ed has declined across the political spectrum. Leadership turnover is another major challenge as the average tenure of the president continues to fall (and with it, the turnover rate among the major senior executive roles in the institution both academic as well as administrative). Given the pace of change in higher education, rapid leadership turnover is antithetical to making progress on a transformation agenda.
What do you love the most about your current role?
I would say the most gratifying aspects of my role in higher education client service is learning more about the qualities that some of the most successful leaders in higher education possess as they face a myriad challenges and find ways to navigate through the uncertainty. I also have a deep appreciation for working with like-minded colleagues on some of the thorniest problems that our clients face and seeing the fruits of our efforts manifest in greater institutional efficacy, student success, access, affordability, and outcomes. Lastly, one of the things I’m most passionate about is the Forum for Higher Education’s New Era, the annual presidential convening I had the privilege of launching after the pandemic. It is incredibly rewarding to see the impact it has on institutional leaders’ perspectives and opportunities facing higher education. In many ways, it feels like group therapy for presidents!”
I believe the aspect of my board service at WGU that I appreciate the most is being a part of an entity that has thrown off the traditional constraints of higher education governance and has impacted so many lives by providing the opportunity for economic mobility to a population that would most likely be unable to access higher education otherwise. I also find the breathtaking pace and dynamism that WGU has brought to higher education quite refreshing.
How do you see the role of education technology evolving in the next 5-10 years?
While I know it is a ubiquitous and massively overused buzzword, AI (specifically generative AI) has the potential to have the greatest impact, good and bad. It can bring intelligent automation to so many manual processes (both back office as well as student-facing) with speed and precision that can revolutionize how institutions deliver services to constituents. It will also have a profound impact on teaching, learning, and research, both in terms of productivity as well as in the “what” and “how” we teach. I believe the change and technical developments are moving at such an incredibly fast pace that the dangers posed by the technology are as significant as the potential for benefit. But it does have tremendous potential to allow us to scale “personalization” of education at unprecedented levels.
Who has been a significant influence or mentor in your career, and how have they helped shape your professional journey?
There have been several over the years, but I will mention three. One would be Mark Becker, the current president of APLU (Association of Public and Land Grant Universities) and former president of Georgia State University. Mark has taught me no matter how good a leader’s ideas are for shaping an institution through change, if you don’t learn and observe the process and norms of the place you will never get anything done. You have to take the time to understand the culture in order to affect change. He was a master of this at Georgia State and the place is forever different and improved because of his leadership.
A second would be John Curry. John was the senior administrative and finance leader at three very distinguished institutions: UCLA, Cal Tech, and MIT. I encountered John after he had left institutional leadership and had joined the consulting firm Huron. He heavily influenced my decision to enter the higher education consulting profession (he later left Huron to join Deloitte and was part of the effort to recruit me). He taught me the art of storytelling and how critical this was to successful client service in higher ed. John also introduced me to the convening where I met my third mentor Joel Meyerson.
Joel was at the center of the creation of Forum for the Future of Higher Education, initially a very small group of operational leaders in higher ed that eventually became the hottest ticket in US higher education. Joel was masterful in his careful curation of agendas, presenters, and attendees; his gift for building what was an almost magical experience for those of us fortunate enough to attend for any portion of our careers was unmatched. Joel taught me everything I put into practice today in the creation and evolution of the New Era Forum.
How do you stay current with the latest trends and innovations in education technology?
My clients are usually the best source of intel on those developments that are delivering value. Ed-tech is a shiny-object filled arena full of opportunism. I do believe that despite the somewhat chaotic nature of the event, ASU+GSV is a good source for trends and innovation. Educause is another. I follow the writings and podcasts of Phil Hill who I believe is an excellent authority on the subject, and has a keen sense of what is substantive and what is flash.
What has been your most career-defining moment that you are proud of?
It is difficult to pick one “moment” because I think of my 3+ decades in education as a series of chapters, each with their own triumphs and failures (the failures, while painful, can be better teachers than the victories!). But if I’m forced to select one I would have to point to something I built with Educause in 2019 – the Convergence Forum. We had this idea that there were topics on which the leadership teams in higher ed rarely communicated effectively, Information Technology (IT) principle among them. We built something designed to bring collections of leadership roles (provost, CIO, CFO, etc.) to come together and “converge” around a series of topics important to higher education’s success. We held the meeting in Toronto and had tremendous receptivity across a broad cross section of American (and some Canadian) higher education. This would have been perpetuated (the intent was to make it an annual affair) but a certain global pandemic had other ideas. Educause had rarely collaborated with an external organization in this way before and there were serious questions about whether we’d be able to generate enough interest in the “convergence” concept to attract an initial cohort of attendees, yet we ended up exceeding even our most optimistic projections.
How do you see your role as a leader in the arts and education sectors evolving in the future, and what impact do you hope to make?
One area in which I hope to have greater impact is mentoring and coaching talent that want to make an impact in higher education, especially those desiring to make an impact by serving in a leadership capacity within an institution or system. The turnover rate for most senior executives in higher education is north of 20%. We will need a lot more individuals willing to serve who bring an appreciation for the need for the core mission – delivering credentials of value, research that advances the human condition, and community service. There has never been a time when the sector had a greater need for leadership. My never-ending attraction to the higher education sector is the potential for learning; I am still fascinated by how much there is to discover about institutions I’ve never engaged, leaders I’ve not yet met, approaches to higher education in regions of the world I’ve not yet visited. I hope to be able to continue to have impact on transformation and modernization (while preserving the ineffable qualities that make higher education intuitions unique) as long as I am able, whether through client service or within an institution in a leadership capacity.
What are your long-term career aspirations, and how do you see yourself evolving as a leader over the next five years?
I like building and shaping, and know enough about myself to realize that if I’m not in that mode for a significant period of time, complacency sets in. Career “evolution” for me over the next 5 years could take many forms: helping an organization (a technology concern or consultancy) who wants to make an impact in higher education build a business or a practice… settling down at a specific institution with a like-minded leadership team and president who wants to make substantial change in how the place serves its constituents and delivers on its mission… or getting back to serving international higher education where there is so much opportunity for growth and impact. Regardless of the path, I am constantly working on blind spots and surrounding myself with people who not only shore up those areas of weakness but also continue to be in a learning mode. It’s never too late to reinvent yourself, especially incrementally. In some ways (connecting the dots in reverse) my entire career has been about that relentless incremental reinvention.
What advice would you give to education technology professionals looking to make a meaningful impact in the higher education sector?
By far, the most important thing you can do is strive to understand, really understand, the enterprise that your particular “product” or tool is purported to impact. You’ll truly set yourself apart from most ed-tech firms and professionals, who often view the “tool as the end in and of itself” rather than a means to a greater purpose. Far too often, even in my home setting, I see this mindset prevail. What higher education truly needs is transformation in its operating model, process and culture. Technology can support and enable that change, but it can’t drive it on it’s own.