So, to recap: Nick was born on 4/20. I took the following week off, secure in my recent promotion to Marketing Director nary three months before for the Northwest Region of University of Phoenix. By Friday of that week, I was about ready to get back to work. That afternoon, I got the call.
“Pete?”
“Yeah.”
My boss.
“Pete, I wanted you to get the news from me before you heard the rumor next week.”
“What is it?” Nervous now.
“The Northwest region has been reorganized. It’s been split. I’m now over the Mountain region, and Oregon is in the Western region. I’m not sure I know what to do with this, but we have until June 1 to figure it out.”
“So, if I’m hearing you, at this point, on June 1, my position for your region is no longer a foregone conclusion.”
“At this point, as of June 1, none of our jobs are foregone conclusions.”
The first call I made was to a dear friend in our corporate public affairs department. I told her the situation, and told her I needed to work for her. That I still had ideas to share and exercise, that it’d be too much of a shame for me to take off when I’m just not finished.
What is it that I’m not finished with, exactly? Well, I’m not finished blogging, frankly. I’m not finished exploring the demand our students have to explore these social networking tools and technologies. I’m not finished putting people together to see what these things look like on the other side of this monumental transition that Gen Y is foisting upon us this graduation year. There are exciting times ahead, and I want to be a part of them.
To her credit, she gets it. She gets that there’s a disconnect between our advertising and our enrollment. She gets that there is a problem when our students come to school to learn, and leave without daring to tell their peers where they are going. We’ve created a cult of embarrassment — a wall of internet advertising around us which is becoming increasingly difficult to cross. She gets that we desperately need a position designed to keep us ahead of these technologies and defining a strategy to align ourselves with them appropriately.
The best part is, she gets that I’m the guy to do it.
So, as of June 1, I’ll become the Director of New Media Communications for Apollo Group, Inc. I’ve written the job description and it’s been submitted to the job review committee for approval. And now it’s time to get to work.
I’m toying with starting another blog, maybe over on TypePad, to talk more about these things on a regular basis, particularly how they relate to our efforts to help enrollment and retention. I’ll post a link here when that’s complete. In the mean time, thanks to everyone I contacted to help get me to the other side of this change. Finding out about a potential job loss is a terrifying thing, while out on FMLA with a newborn. The prayers helped, and to those angles who coached me through this, I am forever grateful.