Buy-in depends on clear, consistent communication throughout the change process. From the beginning, clearly articulate the need for change and explain how the change will benefit the department. Consider how the proposed change aligns with colleagues’ interests, connects with their motivations, and provides direct tangible benefits. For example, common faculty and staff motivations include:

• Enhancing students’ engagement, learning, and persistence
• Reducing the time, effort, and resource burdens in their workloads, and 
• Feeling that their concerns are heard. 

With the change team, incorporate tools that specifically guide team discussions and consensus building, such as the NCWIT TIJs. The TIJs also provide opportunities for shared decision-making and feedback from stakeholders outside of the change team. 

Identify and approach colleagues (e.g. faculty, staff, chairs, deans) and students to provide feedback. To drive collaborative change across system components, change leaders and teams must actively engage colleagues and stakeholders in developing strategic plans and gaining buy-in. Providing space for meaningful feedback throughout the change process can generate more and better ideas and messages, and establish that systemic change has value.

• Communicate the overall vision in a variety of ways with multiple audiences in the department (e.g., speak at faculty and staff meetings, invite talks by industry partners, share in newsletters or emails with students).
• Ask your colleagues what their bandwidth looks like, and what activities and efforts they would be both willing and able to engage in during the organizational change process. Would they be willing to fill out feedback surveys, look at preliminary documents, or participate in a focus group? 
• Bring attention to your efforts within the institution (e.g., informing the dean and provost), and then generate additional momentum by sharing updates externally (e.g. alumni newsletters). 

Point to free support for organizational change efforts, such as NCWIT’s Gearing Up for Change resource which talks through the change process and the ways in which departmental leaders and teams assess and address readiness for change.

Utilize one of NCWIT’s online decision-support tools (TIJs) to frame conversations. The TIJs enable a departmental team to assess current practices and conditions in their computing programs, set strategic goals and make action plans, and connect to relevant resources to effectively carry out their plans. The NCWIT Resource Pages offer evidence-based strategies and practical tools for implementing change across the three NCWIT Postsecondary System Models – Undergraduate, Graduate, and Workplace.

Use multiple sources of data and illustrative examples, stories, analogies, and metaphors. Share compelling evidence in multiple formats, to ensure that the data will appeal to different stakeholders and their interests. For example, quantitative data and tables will engage some audiences, whereas qualitative data and quotes will resonate with others.

Consider both internal and external sources of information:

• Present longitudinal and current enrollment and graduation rates in your department.
• Describe national trends in degree attainment and workforce participation.
• Share information from student experience surveys.
• Report anecdotes and quotes from students’ stories, ensuring anonymity is protected.
• Describe the attrition of specific students who had the interest and talent to succeed in the program but ultimately left for another degree major or another institution.
• Benchmark peer and aspirant institutions that have made organizational changes with positive results and share the outcomes with your own department.

For more information and ideas, check out the Data & Evaluation Resource Page.