I’ve spent nearly the last 20 years of my life working in the area of higher education focused on adult degree programs at private, non-profit institutions. I’ve worked in every area related to these programs except financial aid. I’ve watched programs grow and decline. I’ve seen effective and ineffective leadership. I’ve worked with individuals who “got it” and some who never quite seemed to “get it.” The adult degree program as practiced by many Christian institutions could only be described as an “odd” duck to those familiar with traditional higher education models. That odd-ness affects student management systems, financial aid, curriculum, advising, and admissions, not to mention the relationship with faculty and administration.

At one point along the way I had the opportunity to look specifically at admissions for these type of programs from a different perspective. Working with an institution with multiple campuses and a large number of admissions advisors, I wondered what, if any, would be the correlation between the most effective admissions advisors and the Strengths Finder results. I had been reading Strengths Based Leadership by Tom Rath and Barry Conchie. I theorized that in the same way that the strengths from this popular personality profile could be applied to leadership, they might also be able to be applied to the best admissions advisors and show some common traits. Although the sampling wasn’t sufficient to be definitive, I believe it is possible to predict which advisors will be more successful in this role based on the outcomes of this profile.

Personalities rarely change, although our ability to portray ourselves in ways different than our actual personality makes hiring the right admissions advisor a challenge. When filling a position for an admissions advisor, it can seem as if the person you interviewed is a completely different person than the one who shows up to work after being hired. Although it is possible that the candidate was trying to deceive, I honestly believe that in most cases the candidate actually believed they could change to become the individual you needed for the position. They thought they could change but very few actually can change their basic personality and strengths. We are all uniquely designed, and regardless of my desire, there are some things for which I am not suited. Conversely, because of my unique design, there are areas where I can excel and areas which are personally fulfilling. My best life comes at this juncture of interest AND ability; of desire and strengths.

When we hire admissions advisors whose strengths don’t lend themselves to the role, they become more and more dissatisfied and complacent. Mediocrity becomes the standard, although they may make great contributions to other aspects of the organization which are more in line with their strengths. Those managing these individuals strive harder and harder to find ways to train, or to motivate, convinced that if they only find the right “silver bullet” they could “fix” the advisor and everything would be right with the world. The manager is frustrated. The admissions advisor is frustrated. As far as the admissions advisor is concerned they are doing their best. Which is, sadly, true. The problem is that they simply are not suited for the role for which they were hired. They have the wrong personality, the wrong strengths, to meet the demands of the position but no one is confronting the obvious elephant in the room.

I’m not suggesting that finding individuals with the correct set of strengths will solve all your admissions problems. However, I do think you will find some benefit in at least considering fitting the strengths of your people to their roles within the organization, especially in the area of admissions. Of course, all of this depends upon your definition of high achieving in the area of admissions advisors. My understanding would be that those who fit this description are capable of consistently meeting, or exceeding, the metrics your institution has set for conversions, be they application to enrollment, application to attendance, enrollment to attendance, etc.

The recommendations below are NOT definitive. With that in mind I want to propose that the highest achieving admissions advisors have at least one of these strengths, preferably two:

• Achiever, Activator, Competition, Maximizer, Significance

Additionally, high achieving admissions advisors will have at least two of these strengths:

• Belief, Connectedness, Developer, Focus, Includer, Positivity, Relator, Responsibility, Restorative, Strategic

Finally, some strengths are NOT conducive to high achieving admissions advisors. No more than one of these should be in the profile, if any.

• Context, Deliberative, Woo

Perhaps you have a different set of criteria or a completely different take on this. Remember, this is only my humble opinion and not based on sufficient research to be definitive. I’d love to hear your thoughts.