What the model says about the institution right now, the decisions it needs from you, how each strategic goal depends on capabilities and systems, the initiatives under way, the outcomes they serve and three what-ifs. Every figure links to the view it came from.
Recorded across 17 of 18 systems, including staff time. Qualtrics spend is spread across departments and not recorded.
By cost →Three renew automatically if nobody acts. The largest is the Ellucian agreement: four systems, $3.01M a year, notice due January 1, 2027.
Renewal calendar →569 features across the eighteen ecosystems are done by hand, in spreadsheets or by email. About 17 full-time staff.
Cost of workarounds →Two act on their own: Okta and Microsoft 365. Degree Works and Microsoft 365 combine high change impact with low readiness.
By AI depth →Hold restricted data and sit in the top recovery tier: Banner Student, HR, Finance, Okta, Active Directory and TouchNet.
By criticality →Traced below to the capabilities, systems and initiatives behind each one.
Strategic plan crosswalk →Banner Student, HR & Payroll, Finance and Degree Works. The five-year TCO compares staying on campus, vendor hosting and running it on a public cloud ourselves.
Five-year TCO →Notice due in 17 days; it renews automatically. It underpins the enrollment goal.
Renewal calendar →Where an AI may act without a person approving it. Two systems already do.
Agent workflows playbook →Example State University’s five strategic goals, each linked to the HERM capabilities it depends on, the systems that deliver them, and the initiatives under way. Replace the goals with your own plan using the toolkit template.
Every major initiative in one list, with its goal, sponsor, playbook phase and one-time cost. Two are at risk, and both depend on a contract decision due before the end of the calendar year.
Each outcome is linked to the capabilities and systems that affect it, and to the gaps the ecosystem views show. The model can’t prove cause; it shows where to look.
About 12% of recorded spend scales with headcount: Canvas, Slate and TouchNet fees. The rest is fixed, so technology cost per student rises from about $320 to about $350.
Ask which per-student contracts can flex at renewal. Slate and Canvas both renew within 15 months.
Renewal calendar →Three levers from the model: retire the duplicate survey tools (about $48k), hold auto-renewal price increases at Slate, Raiser’s Edge NXT and Rubrik (about $40k a year), and remove a quarter of the workarounds in finance and HR (about $78k of staff time).
That reaches about $166k. The rest means stopping or delaying an initiative, which is a cabinet choice.
Cost by capability →Over five years: staying on campus costs about $7.31M, vendor cloud hosting about $7.98M, and running it on a public cloud ourselves about $7.37M.
Vendor hosting costs more but moves upgrade work off campus staff. The choice is cost against capacity, not cost alone.
Five-year TCO →