A newsletter for alumni, students, parents and friends.

A Message From Martin

Dear Members, Alumni and Friends,

In August 2006 our Board of Directors hired consultants, Executive Transitions, to complete an assessment of the USCA in order to identify organizational challenges and recommend action steps that would enable the organization to develop a long term vision that would ensure we continue to achieve our mission of providing affordable housing to college students.

In their final report, Executive Transitions identified the “Need to re-organize…central level staff… so that work can be done efficiently, staff performance assessed effectively, and employee roles and responsibilities [are] clearly defined.”

As such, one of my priorities is to follow-up on this finding by conducting an in-depth organizational review of all Central Level (CL) operations.  Over the course of the next few months, I will begin a series of consultation meetings to review the efficiency and performance of our staff. I will solicit input from current members, alumni, and important stakeholders whom can provide creative ideas for how the USCA organizational structure can be improved to meet member’s needs, and successfully achieve our purpose of providing affordable and quality housing.

I want to lead an even more productive and effective CL staff team that will yield greater collaboration and cross-functionality among the organization and within all the different houses.  It is essential that we become a more flexible, highly networked organization with greater strategic planning capacity so that the USCA is prepared to accomplish our long-term goals and mission.

Your thoughts are of interest to me and if you wish to provide me with your confidential comments, you can email me at mreed@usca.org.  In thinking about the USCA, what is the one element that you believe should not be changed? What should be changed?

As the Executive Director I am proud to lead the CL staff team through this process, andgrateful toeach of them for their dedicated efforts to serve ourmembers, the managers and houses.  I look forward to meeting you in the future and sharing the results of this organizational review with you in the spring.

Best regards,

Martin Reed, Executive Director