Published Thursday, January 19, 2006 Post Bulletin Commentary

Striving beyond excellence to ‘WOW’ By Merlin J. Ricklefs

Rochester has recently initiated action for several new ventures. When considered individually each presents a significant opportunity and a significant challenge. But if viewed together as a single cohesive plan, it becomes possible to see the total as a greater opportunity than the sum of the parts and the challenges more manageable.

Tom Peters, the well known co-author of In Search of Excellence wrote in his later book The Pursuit of Wow! --- “getting to excellence is no longer enough. We must leap beyond, catapult imaginations, blow mindsets, knock their Nikes off. We must ‘wow!’ them. It is the ‘wow!ers’ who will win ---”. Daniel Burnham, the Chicago architect who spearheaded the World’s Fair of 1893 wrote “Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men’s (nor women’s) Blood ---“.

Today we have 1) a dedicated committee working to define a stronger university for the region, 2) a Downtown Alliance addressing the revitalization of downtown, 3) the Mayo/UMN Partnership Genomics research laboratory under construction, 4) the City’s Economic Development plan for a Bioscience Center, 5) Mayo’s plan for Advanced Imaging Research, and 6) the RPU/UMR geothermal research project at Quarry Hill – to name a few..

An early review of the community’s higher educational offerings showed at least the following missing pieces: 1) a research-driven academic partner to help address issues that are too big and complex to be solved by a single organization. 2) a recognized international academic reputation to attract the brightest minds and establish effective working relationships with the ‘best’ anywhere in the world. 3) a crisp governance structure to establish a clear institutional focus. 4) a focus on Global Social Capital to ensure we not only have leading edge technical prowess but also human skills to ensure idea implementation and working relationships that are fair, effective and successful. 5) a focus on greater financial self-sufficiency --- self-sufficiency achieved not only through traditional research grants, tuition and legislative funding but from sources ready to finance innovative (break-through) teaching methods, and selling and delivering educational services world-wide.

Some thoughts for putting it all together: .  Expand Rochester higher education with the logical choice of the University of Minnesota with its research mission and graduate programs.  Designate the area surrounding Fourth Street South/College View Road as an Academic/Research/Government Corridor with a UMR downtown campus on the West (Biogenetics Center already there) and the MNSCU campus on the East.  Establish a public transportation loop along the designated corridor. Consider the Twin Cities based TAXI 2000 personal transportation system, a revolutionary system for replacing downtown automobile access as we know it.  Consider the UCR breakup as a talented sibling getting wings and moving on to greater opportunities. The empty nest left behind for East campus siblings presents fresh opportunity for new ventures and new relationships.  Expand the MNSCU Honors program to provide additional highly competitive classes that might be shared with the expanding UMR Program. These might be programs focused on creating the student Global Social Capital.  Develop an educational partnership to become a recognized leader in the knowledge and understanding of a global civilization, integration of that knowledge into education programs, and network delivery to the world (Zacks Investment Management estimates a $350 Billion business opportunity).  Seek commitments from larger stakeholders to fund endowed research professorships. Allow each committed stakeholder a roll in selecting the research focus and endowed professor.

As the pieces flow together it seems desirable to include the support of the arts communities by including a space to serve both the conference needs of an expanding university and a much overdue premier performing arts space for the entire community. With a little more stretch we may be able to see where we have achieved the vitality and critical mass necessary to include a Nordstrom’s northern “Last Chance” discount outlet within the downtown, a concept that captured the imagination of the Nordstrom executives a few years ago (currently Nordstrom’s only Last Chance is Phoenix).

These additional ventures would be destination anchors that could lead a renaissance for downtown, unique destinations that would help recruit and retain talented faculty, staff and employees for the entire region. When we put it all together this starts to sound like a Tom Peters’ ‘wow!’

Merlin J. Ricklefs is retired IBM, former positions include corporate director of storage products, Armonk NY and Rochester site quality mgr., a divisional leadership role in winning the 1990 Baldrige Quality Award. More recently he has been the 3M McKnight Distinguished Visiting Professor at UMD and teaches and lectures at several universities world-wide including the University of Minnesota China Center, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok, Thailand and Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, China.