Vancouver Community College • Volume 2, Numbers- January 25,1994 Planning activities gather speed The VCC Planning Team will meet for a full day on Friday to synthesize the 100 pages of raw data from the Futures Conference. tone" used to report on the conference in last week's Exchange newsletter. Faced with over a thousand ideas gener¬ Specifically, they complained that the Ex¬ change highlighted the good news from the con¬ ated from participants at the conference, the ference and didn'tprovide adequate coverage of next step will be to pull together those ideas into the many concerns regarding inadequate fund¬ more concise concepts of vision, values and ing which were raised by participants. mission. These concepts will, within the next 30 days, be presented to the entire VCC commu¬ AECBC proposes nity for further comment, along with two other B.C. wide mandate documents: one which is being referred to as "round two" of the proposed organization struc¬ The Advanced Education Council of B.C. tures for Langara and VCC which first came out has issued for discussion a draft mandate state¬ in December, and another paper from the Col¬ ment for colleges, the final version of which will lege Board outlining the proposed governance be presented to the provincial government. of VCC and Langara after separation. consideration, is the first draft of the AECBC resources of the College's Institutional Research mandate statement for B.C. colleges: Department, will conduct an environmental "B.C. colleges are community based teach¬ scan. The scan is a means of gathering precise ing institutions committed to life-long learning data on the internal strengths and weaknesses of for adults of all ages. They shall provide continu¬ VCC as well as external opportunities and threats ing educational, developmental, career, techni¬ to the new college. cal, vocational and academic programs. President John Cruickshank told the Plan¬ "These programs, both formal and non- formal, shall address the needs of the geographic, ments will be posted in every classroom and will daily social, economic and cultural communities of be included in every administrator's job de¬ the college region. news seek similar support for the value statement updates "These are just a few examples of how we multi-year education and training, enabling will institutionalize these values," said learners to enter and leave at various levels of Cruickshank. formal recognition and accomplishment. phone 7099 after 2:30 pm ; Within the same 30-day time frame, a VCC Planning Team sub-committee, using the ning Team that once finalized, the value state¬ For | The release of their interim report is timely for both Langara and VCC, so here, for your scription and job evaluation. He also said he will from the unions. "Colleges shall emphasize provision of ac¬ cessible full and part time programs and serv¬ ices. Programs shall range from short cycle to Otherwise, Planning Team members "Colleges shall connect and articulate ac¬ agreed that feedback from the Futures Confer¬ tivities in order to ensure recognition of previ¬ ence participants was generally optimistic and ous learning. Programs shall reflect community enthusiastic. Some Planning Team members, needs, respect community values, and shall be however, took exception to the "overly positive recognized by other institutions. "Colleges shall base their services and pro¬ But on our plane, the process involved a grams on continumg contact with advisory groups lot of non-value added time. The attendant and constituencies, and on ongoing evaluation of wasn't properly trained and had to read up on the relevance and quality of programs and serv¬ how to make a martini, the ice dispenser didn't ices. These consultative and evaluative proc¬ work properly, and the attendant was inter¬ esses will guide College development and re¬ rupted by a request for Kleenex because some¬ source allocation." one else hadn't filled the box. College operations turned upside-down Last Thursday marked the first meeting of Because our airline is losing business due to customer dissatisfaction, they eventually em¬ ploy a business systems, or business engineering approach. The end result is a computer that rolls the new Systems Committees which will be down the isle and performs all of the value added involved in developing new ways of doing busi¬ elements at a quick touch of the button. The ness for both Langara and VCC. computer, as a tool, solved the problem, but it couldn't have solved the problem without an Before you nod off at the thought of just examination of the system. another committee, consider this comment from And examining systems is what the VCC- Controller Chris Ebbehoj: Langara process for developing new ways of "This is the first step in turning both col¬ doing business is all about. leges up-side-down and rebuilding them from the users' perspective instead of administra¬ The Systems Committees will look at ex- tion's perspective. Each committee will be pri¬ istmgproblems, but more importantly they will marily staffed by the users of the systems." originate new and more efficient ways of doing just about everything the colleges do. In this The word "systems" does not mean just computers or accounting practices; it's every way, the objective will be to develop an inte¬ grated solution. system—or practice—which occurs in the opera¬ And by the way, it's right at that point tion of the college. where statements of mission, vision and values If you have any com¬ ments or questions, please send them to Chuck Poulsen, Man¬ ager of The Exchange, in care of College Ad¬ ministrative Services. Page 2 To help explain, here's an example from may come into play as frameworks in which the outside the college which we can easily relate to: new ideas will grow. Said Cruickshank: "This is You're on a flight from Vancouver to the real-life connection between what was done Edmonton and you order a martini to sip on at VCC's Futures Conference last week and the during the trip. However, the martini doesn't nuts and bolts of the jobs we will be doing every arrive until the plane has begun its descent, in day." other words, too late for you to enjoy it. The Adds Ebbehoj: "Do not assume that the length of time from ordering the drink to its objective of this process is to find ways to make delivery is called cycle time, and in an efficient people's jobs redundant. It is not. Instead, it is a business it would consist of four simple value- way to empower people to do their jobs better." added steps: mix the drink, pour the drink, put ice in the drink and deliver the drink .Total time: two minutes. There are three systems sub-committees-Finance, Student Records and Human Resources continued.. and Payroll--and an overall Systems Steering Committee. As well, there willbea coordinating group which will ensure that the practices developed by the committees reflect the integrated approach. Sub-committee members and technical observers are: Human Resources and Payroll Student Records Bonnie Baty Tosh Ikesaka Jean Cockell Penny Gallagher Margo Lupien Gail Rochester Ann McMillan Valerie Dunsterville Moira MacLeod Carol Mercier Dorothy Ho Cynthia Howman Felicity Bums Agnes Seto Jackie Sandy Martin Gerson Carol Harrison Ken Pawlak Therese Paradis Wynn Keenan Karen Kelly Jerome Schatten Michael Sharzer Ron Ross (observer) Tom Szeto (observer) Ron Mertin (observer) Hazel Kwok (observer) Carolyn Brown (observer) Finance Linda Arnold Terry Longair Fred Inglis Jay Strachan Pat Mulvihill Jackie Ehlert David Kolot Judy Boxler Jo Toon John Vandenakker Syd Hartley Wayne Matthewson Stanley Foo (observer) Steering Committee John Cruickshank Linda Holmes Chris Ebbehoj Terry Longair Fred Wylie Jim Goard John Vandenakker If you have an idea about any new way of operating the colleges, regardless of how minor you may think the idea is, contact one of these people. "This is another shared agreement which will grea tly benefit both institufons ."said Cr uickshank. "We'll be hearing from these committees for up to the next three years."