Leveraging Crisis for Competitive Advantage

This essay gets filed under the heading of "Never waste a crisis," this author examines whether institutions are just "weathering the storm" or engaged in significant realignment. He finds that private universities have a competitive advantage in circumstances like the one we are in now.

University competition is a game played on the leading edge of institutional behavior, not at the center. The optimal strategy is to move money from the less productive trailing edge to the more productive leading edge. Executed consistently over time, this strategy delivers an ever-increasing leading edge of highly competitive quality that pulls the center of the university’s operations relentlessly forward towards higher standards of performance. The financial crisis cycle provides periodic opportunities to move more money from the trailing edge for investment in the leading edge. Those institutions that take advantage of these crises benefit greatly.