I think my biggest hangup in this week’s journal entry is the use of the word policy to frame the

discussion. When I think of policy, I think of formal, written down bylaws, procedures, and rules that
dictate decision-making processes. I struggled in part because that is not all that is encompassed in
policy. Indeed, the process of creating somewhat more informal policy—a direction, a plan, a goal—is
also policy at heart.

When considering this, I decided to use this week’s article to help contain my thoughts on how policy is
created in Alumni Relations. First, I would think about my perceptions of how policy is created, and then
use some of the frameworks that the article provides to help formalize my perceptions.

When I think about policy creation in Alumni Relations, I do think it tends to be team-oriented in
nature. Rarely is a decision made single-handedly from start to finish. Often, staff members are asked
for their input, whether informally in conversations in passing during the day, or more formally during
meetings or small committee-type settings. When planning for an event or discussing new ideas, it is
rarely that a single conversation between subordinate and superior determines the course of action.
Though this may sometimes happen, it is something I have rarely seen occur. If it has, it is often
circumstantially-driven—something needs to be decided quickly and definitively, then and there. Such
policy-making situations are few and far between in my experience.

Using the summaries provided in the article of Bergquist’s institutional archetypes of culture, I feel the
previously described policy-making processes best align with what Bergquist called collegial culture.
While not a perfect fit (archetypes are not designed to be, I’m fairly certain), I think collegial culture’s
tenets of “shared governance and decision making” is very much representative of the decision-making
processes of Alumni Relations. Relating this directly to my practicum experience, we need not look
further than the creation of the committee that has been in place to help guide the goals and make
decisions for the job-shadowing and mentoring program. While the funding had originally come from
Alumni Relations funds, the first instinct was to include stakeholders both intra and inter office to help
guide the program’s direction.

As a quick tangent off of this reflection, I am not certain that I best fit in my natural tendencies in this
type of environment. I very much appreciate and support collaborative decision-making and team-
orientated policy processes, I do have a limit, and I do feel that sometimes the policy culture of Alumni
Relations skews too heavily into this realm. This is not to say that I cannot operate in this type of
environment—I do, and I think I generally do pretty well, at that—but the extent of this policy-making
culture toward one end of the spectrum is something I need to account for when going about my day. I
find myself stopping to better understand the processes through which decisions have been made and
plan ahead, as this type of culture often requires conversations and planning to begin earlier than it
does in other types of cultures. This does not mean that it is worse, just that it is something I am
generally more conscious of when doing my work so that I can better align my natural cultural
tendencies with those that are present in the workplace environment of Alumni Relations.

Hours:

Monday, 10/16: 8:30a-1p

Wednesday, 10/18: 8:30-11:30a

Friday, 10/20: 8:30a-1p