Strategic Plan

To be a premier source of future business leaders and ideas that will positively transform industry and society. Our research and discoveries will help leaders prepare for the opportunities of tomorrow, and the world-class, inclusive education we provide will produce entrepreneurial, innovative, analytical, and ethical thinkers to solve the challenges of today and prepare for the challenges of tomorrow.

We are Human-Centered.

Putting People at the Heart of What We Do

In a place like Texas, where the state motto is literally "friendship," we understand how important it is to place people at the center of all we do. It's with this in mind that we focus not only on those who make business run, but also those whom business serves. At Texas McCombs, we don't just teach accounting, finance, or marketing; we cultivate within our students, faculty, and staff the spirit and tenacity to make significant contributions to humanity and the world, no matter their final career destination.

Fostering a Collaboratively Competitive Spirit

At Texas McCombs, we view business as a team sport that needs a diversified set of skills to form a championship lineup. Each of us brings our own strengths and views to the table, which fortifies our bonds and makes the whole greater than the sum of its parts. Our relationships are among the most valuable ingredients in our collective energy. It is within this contex that we find ourselves able to compete and collaborate, and ultimately, become bigger than ourselves.

We are Future-Focused.

Innovating for Impact

UT Austin's legacy of launching new ideas is rooted in the hard work, determination, and creativity required to see those ideas to fruition. At Texas McCombs, we're part of a built-in community of innovators, both curious about and excited by the challenge of bringing new theories to life - and ensuring those ideas make a significant impact. By leveraging the university's resources, as well as the entrepreneurial ecosystem and nationwide cachet of Austin, we thrive on supporting our students, faculty, and staff in creating knowledge and realizing their visions.

Preparing Students to Lead Through Disruption

We empower our students to stretch beyond the world as it stands today, to feel comfortable in complexity and uncertainty, and to make a positive impact wherever their journeys lead. With our exceptional faculty, groundbreaking research, future-forward curriculum, and top-ranked programs, we anticipate changing market needs and prepare our students to be agile leaders in a world we can’t yet imagine. Texas McCombs is a shining example of UT Austin’s promise that “What starts here changes the world.

Texas McCombs is primed to continue in its role as a transformative leader on campus, across the nation, and in the world. Our impact derives from a powerful combination of excellence and scale. We serve more than 6,000 students each year — plus another 6,000 who receive one of our business minors — and our community of faculty, students, staff, and alumni cares passionately about knowledge creation, education, and cutting-edge business practices. 

To develop the college’s strategic plan and aspirations, we held multiple forums across our school with faculty, staff, students, and alumni. The information we gathered formed this plan and will help us realize the university's broader strategy goals. Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) priorities are woven throughout the college and university plans, as we see them as fundamental to our growth and advocate for a comprehensive approach to inclusivity. During the months ahead, we will continue to evolve the initiatives described here, and we commit to developing and publishing metrics to judge our success. Throughout this process, we will rely on our mission and our goal: to support a new generation of leaders who will change the world because they, themselves, have been transformed by the education, research, and experiences at Texas McCombs.

Become the highest-impact public research business school by amplifying our vast expertise, our unmatched experience, and our uniquely innovative ideas … from the heart of Texas to the world.

We aspire to build a diverse, equitable, and inclusive community of learners and scholars, leaders and trailblazers.

Texas McCombs aims to attract and retain outstanding faculty and staff members, cultivate excellence and ambition among our students, and engage our inspiring alumni. We'll do this with initiatives that:

1.1 Foster a culture of inclusion that inspires diverse, talented people to bring their perspectives to the table

Work Underway

Hiring a robust team to implement the UT and McCombs DEI plans and disclosing visible metrics

Fundraising for the McCombs Success Scholars Initiative, to attract and support lower income and first-generation college students with the programming, resources, and opportunities needed to excel within McCombs and beyond.

Build a Wellness Hub to spark critical conversations about well-being and mental health, and to increase access to existing campus services.

New Ideas in Progress

Create mentoring programs for underserved students that guide them along the path to a Ph.D. We want to become a leading source of minority applicants to peer and aspirant Ph.D. programs, effectively creating a needed pipeline for diversity in academia and industry.

Develop and deploy "community climate" surveys to faculty, staff, and students. We want to continuously strengthen a sense of belonging at McCombs by seeking honest feedback and responding with appropriate resource commitments and activities.

1.2 Create an engaged McCombs community for life 

We aim to reinvigorate the pride that faculty, staff, students, and alumni feel for McCombs, a pride that has been at the core of our vision for the past century. We are bonded in our mission to transform business, education, and the lives of all who encounter of of McCombs' many trailblazers.

Work Underway

Amplifying the McCombs story throughout 2022 to ensure that our centennial celebrates prior successes and inspires future change-makers.

New Ideas in Progress

Use the McCombs Connect community platform to enhance alumni networking and outreach. This will enable automated, nimble connections for mentorship, alumni, career engagements and resources - and rich internal and external affinity networks for alumni, students, faculty, and staff.

Strengthen staff credentials, skills, and learning agility by offering more opportunities for professional development and crafting clearer pathways for promotion.

Enrich our Study Abroad and Global Connections initiatives in partnership with the Center for Global Business, to help transform our students into ambassadors, forging important relationships between the Forty Acres and our global alumni.  

Plan and implement a strategy to elevate curricular instruction including classroom modality, digital content delivery for the student of the future, and professional development for faculty. 

We aspire to help realize the ummatched potential of Austin, Texas, and become a global center for business innovation.

We seek to become a hub where students, top scholars, alumni, and business leaders connect to shape the future of business. We'll do this with initiatives that:

2.1 Establish McCombs as the convening place for learners and future leaders

Work Underway

Fundraising, planning, and building world-class facilities in Mulva Hall that will connect our undergraduate student communities with faculty and staff. Our centers and institutes can act as a front porch where business school meets business practice, presenting the opportunity for students to experience real-world business challenges.

New Ideas in Progress

Develop and implement an event strategy that uses McCombs facilities to welcome the next generation of Austin innovators to our community of scholars and business partners. Connect those organizations moving to Austin with our programs, talent, and thought leadership. 

We aim to leverage the explosive growth of Austin by creating value for national and international companies that hire our students and engage our thought leaders. We'll do this with initiatives that: 

2.2 Make McCombs an integral part of the value proposition for all companies starting, relocating to, or already doing business in Texas.

Work Underway

Establish McCombs as the primary hiring source and premier degree program and Executive Education location for top Texas companies.

Deepening corporate relationships to solidify McCombs as the essential place for thought leadership. Companies will seek us out for executive education, research collaborations, and curricular enhancement (cases, speakers).

New Ideas in Progress

Enhance our branding to elevate our reputation as the “highest-impact public research university.”  Develop and test our brand awareness annually among Austin, Texas, U.S., and global premier businesses as well as peer universities, prospective students, alumni, and media.

We aspire to create transformative experiences.

Life at McCombs will be greatly enriched by co-curricular and extracurricular experiences that bring classroom education and business practice together. We aim to foster this vision of fully embedded, lifelong learning through initiatives that: 

3.1 Emphasize the full arc of the McCombs journey

Work Underway

Realizing the potential of our Entrepreneurship portfolio to launch student ideas into reality and connect entrepreneurs and venture capital to Texas McCombs, including Energy, Tech, and Health ventures.

Expanding experiential learning and thought leadership in Energy through the Global Sustainability Leadership Initiative (joint w/ Moody) and the KBH Center for Energy, Law and Business (joint w/ UTLaw). This brings business measurement, analysis, and discipline to many heartfelt issues while exciting stakeholders about world-changing solutions. 

New Ideas in Progress

Expand our Real Estate Center into a bold new Real Estate Institute that will offer cross-disciplinary education and research toward solving global housing challenges in the post-pandemic world.

Prepare students to lead the future of work by enhancing co-curricular experiences; providing coaching and advising; elevating student experience on campus through enriched student services; credentialing skills and experiences with badges across programs, including TEE.

McCombs’ focus on the future will energize innovation and meaningful connection across our research, learning, and experience communities. We want to create a culture of delight, appreciation, and shout-outs for internal and external stakeholders through initiatives that:

3.2 Model nimble processes

Work Underway

Building future phases for implementation and ambassadors for Salesforce and Marketo enhancements in our programs, career and alumni relations, and centers/institutes. These platforms help us harness customer relationships and improve experience to drive demand for McCombs offerings.

Leading the way in faculty management practices at UT by adopting best-in-class workforce tools.

Develop nimble processes for course scheduling, classroom and faculty resource management, and classroom space utilization.

New Ideas in Progress

Develop and implement a robust strategy in information systems for strong systems governance and system enhancements to produce data-driven decisions throughout McCombs. This starts with hiring a Chief Information Officer, building an integrated systems/data strategy, and delivering dashboards and information to assist key decision-makers.

Develop and award badges for micro-credential learning achieved through co-curricular experiences and Texas Executive Education courses.

We aspire to teach our students how to change the world.

We aim to help students face the complex business problems of today and prepare them for the jobs and economies yet to come. We'll do this with cutting-edge teaching and initiatives that:

4.1 Educate our students to shape and lead future industries

Work Underway

Reinvigorating our process to manage our portfolio of minors, majors, and degree programs that best equip students for the future of work. Develop metrics to retain, discontinue, or launch programs.

Successfully launching programs and curricula to prepare students for careers in business analytics, energy solutions and sales, while continuing our competitive advantages in developing leaders and critical thought within core disciplines.

New Ideas in Progress

Evaluate the resources needed to grow McCombs' undergraduate enrollment from the 2019 baseline to support UT strategy. This resource need could include hiring additional research and teaching faculty members as well as enhancing academic advising, career advising, and student services to maintain or improve program excellence.

Develop refined measures of assessment, rigor and content excellence in the classroom to inform peer reviews and supplement course instructor surveys.

We aim to foster excellence in instruction and to meet the growing demand for high-quality degrees and lifelong learning opportunities. We'll do this with initaitives that: 

4.2 Optimize instructional modalities and technology for future-focused learning

Work Underway

Designing the curricula and implementing the marketing plan to launch the MSBA-working professional program.

Expand Online Program Management programs for high-volume certificates and short courses through TEE where market conditions predict significant margins for McCombs.

New Ideas in Progress

Assess TEE open enrollment portfolio relative to peer and aspirant schools, developing a strategy for fresh, cutting-edge, open-enrollment offerings. Extend Exec Ed teaching opportunities to more of our distinguished faculty, and provide pathways for TEE portfolio enhancement.

Plan and implement a strategy for optimal mix of online and in-person classes, enhancing digital content for the student of the future.

We aspire to discover the future of business through ambitious leadership. 

Our research should upend the status quo of business practice and education. We'll explore novel theories, methods, and analyses through initiatives that: 

5.1 Support top-tier, high-impact research

Work Underway

Achieve a near-term increase in Annual Discretionary Fund research resources for faculty on merit list, and prioritize resource deployment from revenue programs for research that is best in its class among public schools.

Hire a Distinguished University Chair in Finance (already committed by donor) and champion fundraising for additional DUCs and ambition for hiring prominent thought leaders in other departments.

New Ideas in Progress

Seek material funding increases and stability for research funding through pursuit of department naming gifts ($25 million-plus) and other discretionary research funding donations, and planned allocation of strategic growth in executive education profits.

We aim to have organizations and scholars around the world seek us out for our expertise and experience. We'll garner this prestige with initiatives that:

5.2 Elevate our thought leadership and impact

Work Underway

Measure and highlight scholarship viewed as high-impact in the academy. 

Launching brand and promoting McCombs’ cutting-edge research through media channels.

New Ideas in Progress

Develop automated mechanisms to share McCombs’ research among professional track faculty, students, and staff, with the long-term goal of making this research a point of pride throughout our organization.

Optimize cooperation between and among McCombs centers and UT institutes to elevate research and evidence-based business discussions, inviting academics published in the top journals, fostering research opportunities, and attracting top faculty.