Progress from the work groups

The Provost’s Steering Committee work groups have developed models for how services and activities are delivered and performed across the Ithaca, Cornell AgriTech, and Cornell Tech campuses, with a shared language and structure for understanding the university’s work and how to organize it.

A shared framework for Cornell’s work

With the help of Huron Consulting, the firm Cornell has retained to support and guide Resilient Cornell efforts, the four work groups (Information Technology, Marketing and Communications, Finance and General Administration, and Human Resources) created models that categorize work performed in those areas as:

• Core: Services that the entire university needs delivered in the same way, supported by a standard set of processes and tools to improve efficiency, economies of scale, and minimize duplication.
• Common: Services and functions that most — but not all — units perform, with room for some variation based on context, while still benefiting from shared standards. These are services that could become core but would remain common if doing so would compromise quality or responsiveness.
• Unique: Services that are specific to the mission or identity of a college, school, or unit, and therefore remain locally delivered. These are functions that have non-standard processes that only serve the needs of that unit.

This approach helps clarify where consistency improves reliability and experience, and where customization remains essential to Cornell’s diverse academic and operational landscape. It also helps the work groups identify functions that could be moved between categories to develop efficiencies.

What the work groups are doing now

Beginning in February and continuing throughout March, work groups in Information Technology, Marketing and Communications, Finance and General Administration, and Human Resources are using this framework to map out the types of work happening across colleges, units, and central offices and identify where they align as core, common, or unique. This mapping is being done in collaboration with college, school, and unit leaders and teams to ensure full and accurate understanding of the work happening in each functional area.

Across all areas, several themes are emerging:

• Greater clarity: Units are surfacing which services are broadly shared and where specialized expertise is required.
• Opportunities for consistency: Many services identified as core and common today already rely on shared processes. Work groups and leaders in colleges and units are now determining how well those processes scale.
• Recognition of local needs: With colleges and units, work groups leads are documenting where unit-specific services must remain unique to preserve mission-critical identity and context.

Where things stand

The work groups are refining their understanding of the current state — what exists today — and are shaping the operational details that will inform workforce realignment. This includes exploring staffing structures, identifying service expectations, and surfacing areas where additional information or alignment is needed.

What comes next

Conversations about final structures will continue over the coming weeks with colleges, units, and central offices. Insights from these discussions will help ensure that recommendations are grounded in real service needs and reflect the diverse ways Cornell’s workforce supports the university’s academic and research mission.

To further explain the individual work groups’ models — including examples of which services and activities may be classified as core, common, and unique and how reporting structures may change — the university will post video recordings with the work group design leads to the Resilient Cornell website in the coming weeks.