With eight schools and around 4,200 faculty serving more than 12,000 students, Case Western Reserve University is a leading R1 institution with research and educational opportunities spanning hundreds of degree programs. The Faculty Affairs Office at Case Western Reserve plays a crucial role when it comes to processes and policies related to each step of the faculty lifecycle, handling appointments, promotions, tenure, sabbaticals, and other career milestones. However, the existing HR and document management tools supporting these processes not only hampered operational efficiency but also compromised transparency and security. In 2022, institutional leadership initiated a search for a solution that could help streamline efforts.

As one school at Case Western Reserve University had already seen positive results with Interfolio Faculty Search, usage was expanded across the institution. In addition, prior experience with Interfolio Review, Promotion & Tenure (RPT) at another institution led Lindsay Jacobs, Director of Faculty Affairs and Information Systems, to suggest implementing the platform at Case Western Reserve. “We did consider developing our own in-house system to manage promotion and tenure processes,” said Jacobs. “However, we had a lot of shifting priorities and limited resources, so we decided that a vendor solution would be the better option. Since I had implemented Interfolio RPT in a previous role, I knew it would be a good solution for Case Western Reserve.”

Themes discussed:

• Making Faculty Hiring More User-Friendly
• Greater Efficiency for Promotion and Tenure Workflows
• Transforming Faculty Affairs Processes

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Making Faculty Hiring More User-Friendly

Before Interfolio, Case Western Reserve mostly relied on an HR system for faculty hiring, but this system wasn’t ideal for users on either side of the hiring process, resulting in cumbersome processes and an inconsistent applicant experience. “It wasn’t really the perfect solution for faculty recruitment because it was more geared toward staff hiring,” she noted. “And from what I’ve heard, it wasn’t very user-friendly.” Frustrated by the experience, some schools would simply end up using email for this process, while other schools turned to Google Forms or spreadsheets instead. “None of these are the most efficient way to manage applications—there’s always the potential for misplaced or lost documents.”

The existing HR system didn’t offer applicants the ability to confirm that their application had been received—or see where it was in the process. It also didn’t give the Faculty Affairs Office any visibility into the positions that were being posted. “What I heard from our administrators was that there wasn’t an easy way to view applications, rate applicants, request letters of reference, or report on data—all of the things that are actually needed for the faculty hiring process,” shared Jacobs. “We knew there was a better way out there to manage faculty hiring.”

Case Western Reserve implemented Faculty Search in March 2023, and the team made the transition from the old system to Interfolio in just a few months, posting all Board of Trustee-appointed positions within the platform by July. “The implementation process was quick and painless, which you can’t say about all platforms,” said Jacobs. Faculty Search has helped streamline faculty recruitment and hiring at Case Western Reserve, enabling better collaboration and organization while driving transparency. “Interfolio has helped organize the faculty search process for applicants, search committees, and administrators. Our applicants like the ease of applying and insights into the status of the position, our search committees like that they can rate and categorize applicants, and our school administrators are able to track things more easily since everything’s in one place.”

Administrators also benefit from robust reporting capabilities on open positions and employment data, enhancing transparency, efficiency, and fairness at the institution. Before Interfolio, Case Western Reserve used spreadsheets to enter and track employment data, but they are now able to streamline this process with a built-in report. “We now just click a few buttons, and we’re able to pull all the data that we need,” said Jacobs. “Overall, implementing Interfolio for faculty recruitment at Case Western Reserve has been really beneficial for our hiring processes.”

Greater Efficiency for Promotion and Tenure Workflows

Promotion and tenure workflows occur twice a year at Case Western Reserve University, with the team typically handling around 150 cases annually—each consisting of hundreds of pages of documentation. Before implementing Interfolio, administrators relied on Box for cloud-based document storage and management, which lacked the approval workflows and tracking the team wanted to ensure a smooth, timely process for all stakeholders. “I would have to download every file, get it signed off by every party, and then upload it back to Box every single time,” noted Jacobs. “That was just really inefficient and time-consuming, as you can imagine, and there wasn’t a way to maintain document security.”

Case Western Reserve is currently in its second cycle using RPT, and the benefits are being seen by candidates, review committees, and administrators alike. “Our faculty candidates like the ease of uploading their materials—they’re able to see what those requirements are on the front end. They fulfill the requirements, submit the document, and then their case is submitted,” said Jacobs.  “All of those packets are usually 200 or more pages long, so it’s a lot of paperwork. The workflow at each of our schools is nuanced, but packets are generally reviewed by the department faculty, a department chair, a school-level committee, and the dean,” she added. “Then it comes up to the university and gets reviewed by the vice provost, the provost, the president, and the board. So, we have a pretty long workflow.”

The team is able to limit access based on a person’s role at the university, ensuring that each user can only access exactly what they’re meant to throughout the workflow. And since each action is dated and timestamped, the team has greater transparency into what’s happened and when. “It’s so helpful when someone comes to me and says, ‘When was this sent to me?’ and I can confirm it was sent on this date, by this person, at this time,” noted Jacobs.

As cases go through the process, the committees reviewing the submitted documentation appreciate having everything they need in one place, simplifying the review process. “They’re not having to search through a Box folder or a Google Drive folder to find everything,” said Jacobs. Additionally, administrators are able to keep cases moving through the process while customizing the approval workflow down to the department level—a crucial feature when different departments have different needs. “We no longer have to download those packets and get them signed. We can simply approve them within the system, move them forward to the next review step, and that next reviewer will have the option to either send it back—if something is missing—or send it forward.”

Transforming Faculty Affairs Processes

Since using Interfolio for promotion and tenure proved to be so successful at Case Western Reserve, the team decided to broaden its use to include all of the actions approved by the Provost’s office. This means that the team can now streamline a wide range of processes—faculty appointments, sabbaticals, endowed professorships, emeriti appointments, and more—leveraging Interfolio.

“It’s been a great tool that we’ve been able to expand the use of within two years of implementing it. We’re able to customize all the templates in order to have those actions submitted and approved, which has been so helpful for me,” said Jacobs. “I’m able to keep track of everything in one area—versus having 30 or 40 Box folders that I have to constantly check.”

The transition to Interfolio has transformed faculty affairs processes at Case Western Reserve, delivering a better user experience while saving the team considerable time. “It’s given me back hours of time—maybe even days. It’s tough to put it in a number, but it’s a lot!” she shared. “Interfolio has made parts of my job a lot easier, a lot less time-consuming, and a lot quicker. I’m able to focus more on things that I didn’t have time to focus on before, including implementing structural and organizational improvements for our office. I really can’t say enough good things about what Interfolio has done for Case Western Reserve’s Faculty Affairs Office.”

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“Interfolio has helped organize the faculty search process for applicants, search committees, and administrators. Our applicants like the ease of applying and insights into the status of the position, our search committees like that they can rate and categorize applicants, and our school administrators are able to track things more easily since everything’s in one place.”

Lindsay Jacobs
Director, Faculty Affairs and Information Systems, Case Western Reserve University

Nestled in a small mountain town in West Texas, Sul Ross State University combines transformational education opportunities with breathtaking scenery. With 178 tenure-track and non-tenure-track faculty members, Sul Ross is able to provide an incredibly personalized experience to its population of approximately 2,000 students. Given the importance of faculty to this excellent student experience, the institution’s strategic plan highlights a goal to retain and empower faculty, including providing faculty with opportunities for career advancement and pathways to upper career mobility. To support this goal, Sul Ross implemented Interfolio Review, Promotion & Tenure (RPT), which helps the institution deliver a smoother review process for faculty—especially those with unique items to include in their packet.

With faculty-student relationships being so crucial for a smaller institution like Sul Ross, reducing the administrative burden on faculty was a priority, helping to free up additional time for them to focus on student-centered activities. Prior to launching Interfolio RPT on campus, faculty would spend a great deal of time compiling their physical promotion and tenure packet materials in binders, which would then be transported via wagon from one committee to the next and stored in various places around campus. And since each member of the committee required their own copy for review, this could mean creating up to 15 copies of a single candidate’s binder, taking away valuable time from institutional administrative staff as well. “That’s a lot of hiking around campus or digging through archives or filing cabinets—it was so time consuming,” noted Michelle Lancaster, Director of Academic Affairs at Sul Ross. “I don’t have to do all that anymore, so I appreciate this product very much. It allows me to do my job better.”

By implementing tools that simplify essential processes for faculty, institutions can better support faculty satisfaction and retention. “The easier we can make these processes for faculty, the more likely they are to appreciate the institution,” noted Lancaster. “These efforts contribute to retaining faculty, which contributes to student retention as well. If you don’t have the faculty, you’re not going to have the students—they may show up, but they’re not going to stay without quality faculty.”

Themes discussed:

• Showcasing Faculty Work Across Disciplines
• Streamlined Support for Smaller Schools
• Lightening the Load for All Stakeholders

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Showcasing Faculty Work Across Disciplines

Digitizing faculty reviews in RPT has been particularly beneficial for faculty in Fine Arts disciplines, who often submit unique materials to help tell their stories. “If you have a four-by-eight-foot canvas that you’ve worked on for a year, the full picture doesn’t quite come across when you have to put it on a piece of paper and add it to your binder,” said Lancaster. Because Interfolio is built to enable every faculty member to tell their distinct story in a way that reflects the full scope of what they do, the digital approach is a game-changer for painters, musicians, actors, and other faculty members in the arts. “With Interfolio, you can digitally scan it, you can take photos of it, you can video it.”

Lancaster recalled a music professor who was up for tenure and submitted a video of a conducted piece rather than a written list outlining their efforts. “You can get a list of their works, but it’s just not the same as being able to click on a link to hear it, see it, and almost experience what it was like to be there. It’s so much more evocative, and you can just understand so much better what’s involved—the effort, the work, the blood, sweat, and tears.”

Streamlined Support for Smaller Schools

For smaller schools with limited resources, getting up and running with new technology can sometimes feel like a lot to take on. However, the small team at Sul Ross had RPT in place in just two months to support their review processes. “We were motivated!” said Lancaster. “Interfolio may be the most user-friendly platform I use. And the Services team is just spectacular—they are very responsive, and that’s made all the difference.” 

After a new provost instituted third-year reviews for tenure-track faculty members, Lancaster was able to quickly create the new template within RPT. “It was really simple,” she shared. “It took me less than an afternoon to create a new process in a template.” Looking ahead, Lancaster noted that she intends to set up templates within Interfolio to streamline annual evaluations for all faculty members next. “It gives us a way to get all of their documentation in one place,” said Lancaster. “Anytime administration wants to take a look at what faculty are doing, it’s right there. Who’s doing what? What percentage of them are publishing? What percentage is actively doing research? What do our grants look like? These details can all be centralized and used for so many different things.”

Lightening the Load for All Stakeholders 

The days of dragging around canvas wagons full of paper materials are over for the team at Sul Ross, and campus stakeholders are really seeing the benefits. “It has been easier for the administration and for faculty,” shared Lancaster. “It is so much more convenient. The whole process is faster, smoother, and more reliable—nothing gets lost between buildings or damaged.” 

While having faculty make the shift from print to digital wasn’t initially mandatory as the institution rolled out RPT, Sul Ross has now completed the transition and ensures faculty are using the technology to make the process smoother for all stakeholders. “The more we can digitize things, the more processes we can put online, the better it is for everybody,” said Lancaster. “This year, we have almost three times the number of candidates who are eligible—RPT is going to be such a time-saver.”

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“The easier we can make these processes for faculty, the more likely they are to appreciate the institution. These efforts contribute to actually retaining faculty, which contributes to student retention as well. If you don’t have the faculty, you’re not going to have the students—they may show up, but they’re not going to stay without quality faculty.”

Michelle Lancaster,
Director of Academic Affairs, Sul Ross State University

Supporting around 43,000 students and 11,000 academics, the University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego) isn’t just a large institution—it’s essentially a mini city. When it comes to coordinating the various processes and policies for these thousands of academics, all roads lead to one central office: the university’s Academic Personnel Services (APS).

In order to streamline academic review processes for both faculty and administrators across 11 academic, professional, and graduate schools as well as eight undergraduate residential colleges, UC San Diego implemented Interfolio Review, Promotion & Tenure (RPT). “Faculty are reviewed from the point they get here all the way through to when they retire, with two-, three-, or four-year review cycles,” shared Julia Partridge, Director of Academic Advancement and Compensation within APS. “This means that we need a product that can incorporate multiple workflows—year after year, cycle after cycle.”

For additional support, the institution also implemented Interfolio Faculty Activity Reporting (FAR), giving academics the power to create and maintain their CVs while also providing administrative staff with an easy interface to pull reports as needed. With 11,000 academics, making the shift from paper to technology made these processes a lighter lift for all stakeholders. “Anywhere between 80% and 90% of our academic population has—or will have—some sort of contact with our implementation of the RPT and the FAR systems,” said Gabriel Lopez, Director of Academic Policy and Family Programs within APS. “So that really speaks to the scale of how we need to leverage these systems.”

Themes Discussed

• Relieving the Workload Burden on Faculty and Staff
• Greater Transparency Across Campus
• Support for Specialized Programs
• Driving Quantitative and Qualitative Impacts

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Relieving the Workload Burden on Faculty and Staff

The university was struggling with a homegrown system that was becoming increasingly tough to maintain. As the people who initially created and maintained it transitioned out of their roles, new people coming in were unable to figure out how to make necessary enhancements—and some were resistant to working with the system entirely. “It was becoming really hard to adapt,” said Lopez. “We were dealing with paper processes and not having a centralized source of data, so we were really struggling to keep track of everything.”

“We are always on the lookout for how we can do things better,” added Partridge. “How do we streamline processes? We look at different steps we can take—not just to relieve the burden on the faculty, but also to relieve the burden on staff.” The team converted an array of processes from paper to electronic with Interfolio, making sure that all changes were a value-add for stakeholders rather than just for the sake of reinventing the wheel. “We’ve had faculty thank us for bringing UC San Diego to the 21st century,” she said. “It’s a continuous process in terms of working with people on change management so that they understand why we are implementing these processes. We do deal with change fatigue on our campus, so we really have to think about the people side of things—not just about the tools themselves.”

Partridge noted that faculty appreciate how empowered they are with Interfolio’s offerings at UC San Diego. “We use two different products from Interfolio: RPT for the workflow and FAR as the data repository,” she said. “The data itself is in the FAR system, and the faculty sign off on the report that is generated and gets put into their file, giving them the final say in terms of what data gets put into their academic review file and goes up the line in the process. If there’s something that they don’t want to put in there, then it doesn’t go into the file.” This helps faculty tell their academic story exactly how they want it to be shared in their review file, saving them time in the process.

Greater Transparency Across Campus

Before implementing RPT, faculty were putting a significant amount of time and effort into preparing their materials and would then have to simply wait to learn the outcome—without any insight during the process, which can take several months. “The most common complaint we heard was, ‘I spent weeks putting this together and gave it to the department, and I have no idea what’s going on,’” shared Lopez. The team launched an initiative to create a transparency dashboard, leveraging data within RPT to offer a centralized location where an academic can sign in, review their profile, and check on their file’s status with just one click. “We’ve been working with the APIs that are part of RPT and are eventually going to utilize some APIs that are also in FAR,” Lopez noted. “Now they can see where their file is, who’s touched it, and how long it’s been sitting in a review step. Our goal is to give faculty full visibility into what is happening with their file and with their career.” 

The transparency dashboard benefits administration and faculty alike, quickly giving both sides access to vital information about the process and status. “We found that this provides greater efficiencies—it’s less time that departments have to sit and explain what is happening, and we’ve been able to help academics identify where the holdups are. It also reduces anxiety on the part of the academic, so we’ve really been pushing that transparency,” said Lopez.

The team also created companion dashboards, including an administrative dashboard, as well as a website to show faculty and departments what the standard process is. This helps everyone know what they need to do and when to do it, ensuring processes stay on track. “The administrative dashboard allows department chairs and deans to be able to see where things are in their department,” said Partridge, “so if it’s been with Ad Hoc for two months, they can talk to the Ad Hoc chair and figure out what’s going on and how they can help.” She also expressed the importance of making sure everyone is on the same page when it comes to what to expect during certain processes. “You’d be surprised in terms of how little faculty may know about the review process—even if they’ve been reviewed for many, many years. The companion website helps them better understand what the process is.”

Support for Specialized Programs

When it comes to data, UC San Diego has a lot to keep track of across its thousands of academics and students, and this data is spread and tracked across many different offices within the institution. “There’s data on teaching, on faculty, on grants—all sorts of different things,” shared Partridge. “If the data exists, our goal is to be able to pull it in from different sources and aggregate it into one place.” Utilizing APIs, the institution feeds data related to faculty appointments, courses taught, contracts, and grants directly into FAR, creating a central database for all offices on campus that serves the varying needs of different offices.

Interfolio also helps UC San Diego better support all of its schools and colleges, including those with specialized needs. “Different areas of campus may require slightly different biobibs or reports, so we have built templates in FAR for the different areas,” said Partridge. “For example, our Health Sciences school requires an additional section because they need to account for clinical teaching.” Since the Health Sciences school uses its own unique system, the team wanted to ensure the data collected could serve different purposes across campus. With Interfolio, UC San Diego is able to house everything in one place while allowing multiple uses for the data, reducing the chance of errors and eliminating the need for duplicated efforts.

Driving Quantitative and Qualitative Impacts

By streamlining faculty processes with Interfolio, the institution is seeing the savings add up. “In implementing the two systems—FAR and RPT—from our calculations, we have seen savings of about $1.66 million per year,” shared Lopez. These annual savings are reflected in both administrative and staff time.

“Specifically, we saw overall file preparation decrease from taking 24 hours of administrative time per file to just 2.5 hours per file in RPT,” noted Lopez. “Additionally, for staff time savings, we eliminated the need to create appointment cases, which saved the team about 5 hours per case file. Faculty impact and time-savings are important measures for us as well, and with FAR, we saw an average of 5.5 hours saved per quarter for faculty updating their profile.”

“It’s been a good experience in terms of savings with some of the quantitative impacts,” he added. “And one thing that we absolutely have loved is reducing a lot of our shadow systems.”

The institution is seeing additional impacts from its Interfolio usage, such as:

• An overall improved quality of faculty biobibs by utilizing FAR as a data repository
• Greater faculty satisfaction
• Elimination of bureaucracy in the evaluation process
• Increased accountability by timestamping cases in RPT, making it more apparent if changes were made or if a file is stalled somewhere in the process
• Streamlined approach that reduces the chances of human error or doubled data entry

“We’re launching these initiatives to help our academics do their research and teaching without spending hours and hours having to do administrative work,” said Lopez. “Our goal is to help them do what they do best.”

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“In implementing the two systems—FAR and RPT—from our calculations,
we have seen savings of about $1.66 million per year.”

Gabriel Lopez
Director of Academic Policy and Family Programs, University of California, San Diego

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Situated in vibrant Greenville, North Carolina, East Carolina University (ECU) is the third-largest university in the state, supporting around 2,000 faculty and more than 26,000 students. Part of the UNC System, ECU is the only university in the state that offers a medical school, dental school, and a college of engineering and technology all at the same institution. Nursing is the university’s highest-enrollment undergraduate program, with more than 2,000 of its students working toward this highly in-demand degree.

With thousands of faculty spread across varying disciplines, the institution was seeking a proactive solution for two major needs related to faculty processes: the need for a centralized place for reporting as well as a way to electronically route personnel actions. Faculty reporting and evaluation processes were mostly handled on paper, and ECU recognized the need to shift to digital in order to capture professional activities—regardless of discipline—and be able to maintain and utilize that data more efficiently. ECU selected Interfolio to help address both of these priorities, and the institution implemented Interfolio Faculty Activity Reporting (FAR) to support data collection for annual reporting needs at the institutional, departmental, and college level along with Interfolio Review, Promotion & Tenure (RPT) to streamline workflows for its personnel processes.

Themes Discussed

• Supporting All Stakeholders Through a Centralized Database
• Providing a One-Stop Shop for Faculty
• Fostering Success in Three Steps

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Supporting All Stakeholders Through a Centralized Database

The team at ECU worked hard to ensure that this technology had faculty and staff buy-in across campus, promoting Interfolio with stakeholders as the starting point for faculty data across departments, colleges, and the institution as a whole. “Interfolio is the centralized source for faculty to document their productivity,” said Cara Gohn, ECU’s Interfolio Coordinator at the institution’s Office for Faculty Excellence. “Whenever there is a need to collect information on faculty productivity, Interfolio is often the place we start.” ECU continuously strives to find effective practices to ensure faculty are set up for success from day one. For example, Gohn presents to new faculty during orientation to help them understand all of the capabilities of the platform. “When our faculty are oriented, I share how they’re going to use Interfolio—in the first year and throughout their career. I show them how we import data on their behalf into FAR and how they can supplement and add any other activities or scholarly works they’re doing.” This data directly feeds into review processes at ECU, such as annual evaluations.

In addition, administrative staff have been able to respond more quickly and effectively to requests for information with a centralized location for faculty and professional activities. “We’re able to more efficiently respond to requests for information in response to an institutional goal or UNC System request by using features like activity classifications and customized activity categories,” noted Gohn.

Gohn also stressed the importance of having buy-in from leadership, setting the tone across the institution to ensure success. “It starts with leadership—ECU realized the need for a centralized and efficient platform for faculty productivity reporting and reviews,” she said. “We understood the need for a support structure, both in the way the system is configured and through resources available to faculty as users of the system.”

Providing a One-Stop Shop for Faculty

With thousands of faculty members to review on an annual basis—plus tenure and promotion considerations to keep track of—ECU utilizes Interfolio to address their needs across disciplines from humanities and business to engineering and nursing. The institution first piloted RPT at its College of Nursing and College of Allied Health Sciences to support annual evaluations. Since then, ECU’s use of the module has expanded, driving efficiency and insights that help both faculty and administrators. “With RPT, we were able to give administrators the ability to track the reappointment, tenure, and promotion process in a way they never had before,” shared Gohn. “Now, institutional administrators are able to more efficiently monitor the progress of various reviews.”

By combining the two Interfolio modules, the institution can easily leverage faculty information and materials curated in FAR to pre-populate review cases in RPT and reduce preparation time for faculty. And by pre-configuring templates within the RPT workflow, the institution is working to streamline the process for all stakeholders. “Everything is in the same place, and faculty are learning exactly what’s expected of them to upload or include or attach—and the same is true for reviewers,” said Gohn. “Committees can determine exactly what’s required of them because we build that into the process.”

ECU has found additional uses for RPT to build consistent practices for supporting faculty workflows. For example, each fall, colleges nominate faculty for awards for teaching and research, and faculty members submit a portfolio to a small committee for consideration. “It just made sense to utilize RPT for this process as well,” explained Gohn. “It’s becoming more of a one-stop shop for our faculty.”

Fostering Success in Three Steps

ECU’s support structure includes three well-defined steps that the team focuses on each year to help ensure faculty succeed: a strategic training schedule, tailored newsletters, and an up-to-date resources website. The training sessions are offered throughout the year and recorded for those who can’t attend live. These sessions, as well as carefully timed newsletters, are aligned with review schedules and deadlines. The comprehensive resources website houses training documents, session recordings, help guides, and more to support faculty efforts in Interfolio—including specific webpages for each of the review processes in RPT.

“We have an annual evaluation user guide page with step-by-step guidance for each reviewer,” noted Gohn. “For promotion and tenure, there’s a separate page where we also link to the Faculty Manual, which has the policies behind the operations. We work together to create a holistic website that faculty can visit to get the information they need.”

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“With RPT, we were able to give administrators the ability to track the reappointment, tenure, and promotion process in a way they never had before. Now, institutional administrators are able to more efficiently monitor the progress of various reviews.”

Cara Gohn
Interfolio Coordinator, Office for Faculty Excellence, East Carolina University

Shakeups in institutional technology can leave faculty and staff scrambling—especially when a long-running system is on its last legs.

Rice University was faced with a university-wide migration of general HR systems as well as a homegrown system for activity reporting that was dying and needed to be replaced, leaving major gaps in capabilities to manage important faculty affairs processes.

Rice decided to implement the full Interfolio Faculty Information System to bridge these gaps, giving the university a singular solution to manage faculty hiring and recruitment, academic appointments and timelines, activity data reporting, and reviews and promotions. “Before we started using Interfolio, we used different tools for different purposes,” shared Celeste Boudreaux, former Assistant Vice Provost for Academic Affairs. “It was important for us to have a tool that covered as many different parts of the faculty lifecycle in one company as possible.”

Themes Discussed

• Greater Transparency in Less Time
• Using Interfolio to Handle 80% of the Data Legwork
• Faculty Buy-in Fuels Successful Implementation

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Greater Transparency in Less Time

After Rice administration announced an upcoming transition to a one-size-fits-all HRIS, Boudreaux and her team recognized the need for a new solution to support the nuances of faculty hiring at the university. Thus, the first priority for her team was implementing Interfolio Faculty Search. The institution followed with Interfolio Review, Promotion & Tenure as well as Interfolio Faculty Activity Reporting (FAR), which helped resolve the issue of the old homegrown system that needed to be replaced. Rice is also in the process of implementing Interfolio Lifecycle Management, filling voids in the new HR system for tracking certain kinds of faculty milestones.

Prior to Interfolio, the promotion and tenure process at Rice was very much manual—with the exception of digitizing papers into PDFs, which would then be uploaded to an online file-sharing tool. “That was a big win for us to be able to make that process more automated and have a workflow where everybody could have visibility,” noted Boudreaux. Interfolio helps bring greater transparency to the process, which is incredibly beneficial if an appeal arises. It also helps save time, as questions or issues that used to require lengthy research to respond to can now be answered quickly by checking the case in Interfolio. “It’s important to have a process that is documented,” said Boudreaux, “and that everybody can look back and see what happened.”

Using Interfolio to Handle 80% of the Data Legwork

In order to save faculty and staff time on data input for accurate activity reporting, Rice also uses Interfolio Data Service—a powerful capability that fuels Interfolio Faculty Activity Reporting. “By bringing in data from our other campus systems, that takes care of about 40% of what we need to be populated in FAR,” shared Boudreaux. “With the Interfolio Data Service, that brings in about another 40% of the publications part. So that only leaves 20% that has to be manually entered by someone.” The Interfolio Data Service seeks out and pulls in data tied to the institution’s faculty from a pool of over 250 million publications from over 260,000 journals and other reliable sources, giving faculty the opportunity to verify the data and, if accurate, add the items to their record. “It brings in the authoritative, complete, accurate data into a structured record,” added Boudreaux. “It makes it very searchable, and it lets Interfolio be able to display it according to the faculty member’s choice in all these different citation styles. We’re really excited about that functionality.”

“The faculty definitely benefit from using Interfolio at Rice,” she noted. “It saves them time on administrative tasks so that they can focus on what’s really important: their research, their teaching, their service.” Boudreaux shared that Interfolio also helps administrators such as herself make decisions that are evidence-based and not anecdote-based, thanks to the availability of more consistent centralized data. “It’s helpful all the way up from the department staff—whose time is also being used more productively— to the faculty, to the senior administrators,” she said. “It’s helping everybody.”

Faculty Buy-in Fuels Successful Implementations

Several years prior to implementing Interfolio, Rice had attempted to roll out another system for faculty activity reporting. Unfortunately, the technology proved to be difficult for faculty to use, resulting in complaints that eventually led to the system being removed after just a few months. “I know what an implementation can look like if it’s not the right product,” said Boudreaux. “You can check all the checkboxes, but if the faculty don’t like it and won’t use it, it won’t succeed.”

Boudreaux noted how intuitive Interfolio has been for faculty, who are able to easily navigate the system and do what they need to do. “What we have learned is that a big value of Interfolio is that it is made with the faculty primarily in mind. It is very user-friendly,” she noted. This ease of use helps streamline processes for faculty, ensuring they can spend less time on things like manual data entry for reports or gathering details from various sources for their promotion and tenure cases. “Anything that you have to train the whole faculty body on how to use is a high-stakes endeavor,” she said. “The less we heard from the faculty, the more we knew we were on the right track.”

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“The faculty definitely benefit from using Interfolio at Rice. It saves them
time on administrative tasks so that they can focus on what’s really
important: their research, their teaching, their service.”

Celeste Boudreaux
Former Assistant Vice Provost for Academic Affairs, Rice University

Displaying current, reliable information about faculty accomplishments on your institution’s website can make the difference to land top faculty candidates. One of the most influential biomedical research institutes in the world, Scripps Research has experienced this hiring advantage firsthand with Interfolio’s Faculty Information System. By powering their web profiles with Interfolio Faculty Activity Reporting (FAR) and keeping them bulk-populated via its unique Data Service, as well as conducting hiring through Interfolio’s Faculty Search, Scripps has maintained its position as a premier graduate school and top research institution.

Themes discussed:

• Up-to-Date Faculty Activity Information Strengthens Hiring, Communications, Fundraising, and Resource Allocation
• Interfolio Helps Drive Efficiency Within Faculty Workloads

Up-to-Date Faculty Activity Information Strengthens Hiring, Communications, Fundraising, and Resource Allocations

Thanks to Interfolio FAR and its unique Data Service, which regularly and automatically identifies and brings in citation data on faculty members’ academic work, Scripps Research’s faculty information stays up to date.

Scripps Research in turn pushes that data to faculty members’ public web pages, which “has been very helpful for recruitment of new faculty,” says Katrina Schreiber, Director of Academic Operations at Scripps. “Many of our applicants say that they applied to Scripps because they were so impressed with the research they read about on our faculty members’ web pages.”

In addition, having accurate and reliable data has helped:

• The communications team to promote faculty accomplishments
• The philanthropy department to match donors with faculty who share their research interests
• Departments to justify requests for additional research space and facilities

Interfolio Helps Drive Efficiency Within Faculty Workloads

Faculty at Scripps Research appreciate that the Interfolio modules have created efficiencies within their workloads, as well as provided transparency into their review duties.

“Our faculty found that the Faculty Activity Reporting (FAR) module made things much easier for them,” explains Schreiber. “Before, we didn’t have any way for them to go to one place and easily look at all their demographics. So their reaction to using FAR was, ‘Oh, this is an improvement to my workload because I can now go to this one place and validate my activity data,’ which is automatically pulled in by the Interfolio Data Service.”

King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) in Saudi Arabia had around 50 faculty members when its doors first opened in 2009, but the institution has since grown to more than 190 faculty members representing nearly 40 nationalities. This robust global community of faculty serves a mix of Saudi and international students in graduate science and technology disciplines. 

KAUST’s ambitious growth goals, both for the institution and for faculty, uncovered a need for technology to support recruitment efforts. In particular, the institution wanted to recruit STEM faculty, including instructional faculty and research professors, while ensuring candidate pools were diverse and equitable. To realize these outcomes, the institution implemented Interfolio to make academic recruitment at KAUST more transparent, collaborative, and efficient. During the implementation process, KAUST partnered with Interfolio to offer training and written documentation for key stakeholders—including graduate program coordinators, faculty, deans, and support staff—for a smooth transition to the platform. 

Themes discussed:

• Digitizing Recruitment to Find the Right Candidates
• A Time-Saver for Faculty and Fellowship Recruitment
• Greater Insight Into Applicant Data

Digitizing Recruitment to Find the Right Candidates

KAUST’s Faculty Affairs Manager, Suzan Abu-Shakra, learned about Interfolio and was fascinated by the digitization of a process she was used to doing on paper. “At the time, we were still doing faculty applications by paper, believe it or not,” shared Abu-Shakra. “Search committee chairs would go through all the CVs submitted to a certain email, and they would print them out. We’d pass them on to all the search committee members to look at them, grade them, shortlist them, and then they’ll go through that process.” 

Shifting to a digital approach has helped streamline recruitment and hiring at KAUST. “With the help of Interfolio, we’ve enhanced our search, our advertising, and the whole process of shortlisting and choosing the right candidate. So it’s a great tool for me,” Abu-Shakra explained. “You enter your notes and annotations, share comments, and highlight parts of a CV—in total confidence. It basically changed the whole scene.” 

Abu-Shakra also emphasized the benefits seen with Interfolio’s integration with other campus systems. “The API enhancement also helped us, because now we post any position on Interfolio, and it talks automatically to our job board on the university website,” she said. “That job board then talks to all the advertising agencies—everywhere it automatically feeds—so I don’t have to worry, except for putting my position properly in Interfolio.”

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“With the help of Interfolio, we’ve enhanced our search, our advertising, and the whole process of shortlisting and choosing the right candidate. So it’s a great tool for me.”

Suzan Abu-Shakra
Faculty Affairs Manager
King Abdullah University of Science & Technology

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A Time-Saver for Faculty and Fellowship Recruitment

KAUST doesn’t just use Interfolio for faculty recruitment—the team also finds it useful for postdoctoral fellow search. Given that they may see more than one thousand applications for a single postdoctoral position, this has been a tremendous time-saver when it comes to filtering through applicants. “Interfolio has helped us a lot in clearing the noise,” shared Abu-Shakra. “Once you know how to advertise for a position—how to put your questions in the right way and use your filters—you save yourself a lot of time.” 

Along the way, Abu-Shakra has discovered actions she and her team can take on their end to make the process even easier in the long run. In particular, she highlighted the value of the forms that help filter applications exactly how they need to be categorized. “That will help the first layer of revision to be much easier,” she said. “You will be able to weed out all the people who do not even meet the minimum requirements, so I highly recommend putting in extra effort when building your ad.”

Abu-Shakra also noted how useful the reporting capability is when summarizing activities for the year, such as how many applications they reviewed and how many people applied. In their previous system, it could take days to track down data about applicants—such as whether or not they had any applicants from a specific country within the past year. Now, that data is readily available in Interfolio with just a few clicks. “It tells us a lot of stories,” said Abu-Shakra. “That will help us direct our recruitment campaigns: Where are we lacking applicants? How are we going to direct our future recruitment? Which areas in the world we’re not getting to, and how do we work on that?”

Greater Insight Into Applicant Data

The forward-thinking leadership team at KAUST looks for solutions that benefit faculty and staff, which includes automating processes and implementing systems that make their lives easier. “We try to minimize the admin work on faculty,” said Abu-Shakra, “and this is exactly what Interfolio does. The system is structured in a way that they can look at the applications in whatever view they want.” For example, KAUST finds Interfolio beneficial when summarizing PhD applicants: Where are their PhDs from? What disciplines are they in? What nationality are they? “This saves us a lot of work, and leadership is very supportive and encourages the platform to be used.”

Abu-Shakra believes that the success of Interfolio at KAUST comes in part from buy-in from both senior leadership and faculty, who are the main drivers of the system. In addition to the training that they underwent when Interfolio was implemented, Abu-Shakra also set up a helpline in her office within faculty affairs to offer timely assistance should any questions arise.

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For many medical schools, effectively managing thousands of faculty members depends upon having good processes in place.

At the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC), which has more than 1,800 faculty members across six colleges, administrators have found that Interfolio enables the efficiency they need to effectively support so many scholars. With Interfolio, MUSC has achieved a centralized, scalable, and customizable approach to managing academic reviews and a single source of truth for internal dashboards and reporting, accreditation reporting, and Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) surveys.

Themes Discussed

• A Centralized, Scalable, and Customizable Platform for Academic Reviews
• A Single, Reliable Source of Truth for Faculty Activities Serves Multiple Purposes
• Internal Faculty Data Dashboards Help Administrators Provide Personalized Support

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A Centralized, Scalable, and Customizable Platform for Academic Reviews

MUSC adopted Interfolio Review, Promotion & Tenure (RPT) in 2020 because the University’s Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost wanted three specific benefits.

“Our Provost wanted a centralized faculty evaluation system that was also scalable and customizable across our six colleges,” explained J. Michael McGinnis, the Assistant Provost for Finance and Administration at MUSC. “Because each of our six colleges has their own approach to faculty evaluations, having a customizable platform was essential.”

A Single, Reliable Source of Truth for Faculty Activities Serves Multiple Purposes

Interfolio RPT was just the beginning of the partnership. “As we got into our relationship with Interfolio, we realized we can accomplish so much more than just evaluations. And the FAR module has been a very helpful tool for us,” said McGinnis.

MUSC uses Interfolio Faculty Activity Reporting (FAR) as a single, reliable source of truth about faculty activities, using data for IPEDS surveys, accreditation, and internal reporting. “It’s been very impactful for all of us, whether deans, provosts, departments, or the University President, to be pulling from the same data source,” McGinnis said. “That has saved us a tremendous amount of time and made us significantly more efficient.”

Internal Faculty Data Dashboards Help Administrators Provide Personalized Support

MUSC has also used Interfolio to create faculty activity dashboards at each of its six colleges. These dashboards enable administrators to stay up to date with faculty accomplishments and have personalized conversations with individual faculty members.

“When each college has so many faculty, like here at MUSC, you risk losing track of what everyone is working on,” explained McGinnis. “With these dashboards, the deans can see the latest publications or grant activities for a faculty member and provide the kind of personalized support and acknowledgment that really benefits not only the faculty themselves but also the institution as a whole.”

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“We have a requirement from the state of South Carolina that faculty have an annual evaluation. Before we adopted Interfolio RPT, our proof of that was just on paper, but with RPT, we can definitively show that we have completed our evaluations. And while we’re in the midst of reviews, it’s very easy to see—at a department, college, or provost level—the status of reviews, where each review is at.”

J. Michael McGinnis
Assistant Provost for Finance and Administration
The Medical University of South Carolina

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About Interfolio

Empowering scholars worldwide, Interfolio from Elsevier is an education technology company trusted by more than 500 colleges and universities across 20 countries since 1999. With innovative products designed to support major milestones in the faculty lifecycle, Interfolio’s technology enables academic leaders to effectively advance institutions and their academic staff.

The most comprehensive platform of its kind, the Interfolio Faculty Information System streamlines processes for faculty hiring and recruitment, academic appointments and timelines, activity data reporting, and reviews and promotions. In addition, millions of scholars have used the Interfolio Dossier service to pursue academic programs and positions.

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What if you could save hundreds of thousands of dollars in faculty and administrative staff time?

The University of Rhode Island (URI) has done just that after adopting Interfolio Faculty Activity Reporting (FAR) in 2018 and Interfolio Review, Promotion & Tenure (RPT) in 2019. Implementing these two modules of the Interfolio Faculty Information System has brought other welcome changes. Department chairs no longer complain to administrators about cumbersome faculty data processes. And, thanks to Interfolio’s superior customer support, URI’s internal support teams are no longer the only resource available to address faculty questions.

Themes Discussed

• The Right Technology Makes Training Easier and Puts an End to Complaints
• Interfolio Support Team Augments Institutional Support
• Massive Time Savings Leads to Increased Revenue

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The Right Technology Makes Training Easier and Puts an End to Complaints

Internal support teams’ lives become much easier when they’re not devoting so much time to supporting faculty members who are struggling with difficult homegrown faculty information systems.

“Our homegrown system was incredibly cumbersome. Faculty would be doing redundant work annually, and we received a slew of complaints,” says Phillip Teixeira, Lead Information Technologist in URI’s Office of the Provost.

“With Interfolio’s modules,” in contrast, “we were able to provide less training than we did with our previous system,” adds Teixeira.

Interfolio Support Team Augments Institutional Support 

Institutions can provide relief to their small internal support teams by partnering with a technology vendor that provides live support.

“Before we adopted Interfolio, I was the one-person support team for 776 full-time faculty,” says Teixeira. “After we implemented the FAR and RPT modules, I could take a deep breath because Interfolio has a support infrastructure for faculty: a 1-800 number where you can get a human being Monday through Friday, 9 AM to 6 PM, within 30 to 60 seconds.”

Massive Time Savings Means Greater Impact by Faculty, Staff

Just how much time can the right faculty information system save you? In URI’s case, calculations suggest that each year, Interfolio RPT saves URI close to 6,000 hours in committee review members’ time and hundreds of hours in staff member time for an estimated total time savings worth over $380,000.

Download Case Study →

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“Before I knew this platform existed, I tried to make it. And then I discovered Interfolio’s Review, Promotion & Tenure (RPT), and it did everything I wanted it to do plus everything I hadn’t thought of. If you’re seriously considering Interfolio’s solution and you have a homegrown option, unless you are MIT or Cal Poly, take a demo with Interfolio. Because for the University of Rhode Island, RPT saves us somewhere around 6,000 hours and $380,000 in faculty time every single year.”

Phillip Teixeira
Lead Information Technologist, Office of the Provost, The University of Rhode Island

Adopting a digital platform purpose built for faculty affairs has many advantages. So many, in fact, that Elizabeth City State University (ECSU) is still discovering new ones. 

One of 16 institutions in the University of North Carolina System, ECSU adopted Interfolio’s Review, Promotion & Tenure (RPT) and Lifecycle Management modules for their annual reviews and faculty lifecycle processes.

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Themes Discussed

• Purpose-Built Platform Far Superior to Paper-Based Process 
• Innovative Platform Suitable for Uses Beyond RPT
• Myriad Advantages of Faculty Information System (FIS) Translate into High Return on Investment

Purpose-Built Platform Far Superior to Paper-Based Process

Before implementing Interfolio Review, Promotion & Tenure (RPT), ECSU had a frustrating, inconvenient paper-based process for promotion, tenure, and annual reviews.

“When they were going up for review, our faculty members would complete these heavy notebooks that they would have to carry to different offices,” explains Dr. Farrah Jackson Ward, ECSU’s Provost and Vice Chancellor of Academic Affairs.

“Faculty reviewers had to check in and check out the notebook, which meant that only one individual could review it at a time. Plus, they had to go across campus to the designated review location. It really was an inefficient use of our faculty’s and administrators’ time,” adds Ward. 

With Interfolio, reviewers can conduct simultaneous reviews. “Faculty have been very satisfied with the new software and process, and it’s decreased the administrative burden,” Ward says.

Innovative Platform Suitable for Uses Beyond RPT

Since implementing Interfolio, ECSU has improved more than just faculty reviews.

“We started using it for Teacher of the Year recognitions at both the departmental and university level,” says Dr. Joy Turnheim Smith, ECSU’s Dean of the School of Education and Business. “And then we started using it for faculty credentialing, and next will be graduate faculty approval. So there’s lots of things that we’ve been able to do with Interfolio because it is such a versatile tool for us.”

In implementing the Interfolio RPT module for course credentialing, ECSU replaced an inefficient paper process. “Faculty were excited to go to Interfolio for this,” explains Smith, “because it meant that they only had to credential once for any given course. And we were excited because, when it came time to make any last-minute changes, such as adding a section of a class, we could generate a report that could tell us exactly who on the faculty was credentialed for that particular class, which was wonderful.”

ECSU also plans to replace a paper-based faculty workload form with a digital form and process within Interfolio.

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“Interfolio was very kind, providing a demonstration for our faculty senate executive leadership team and answering their questions. That gave us initial buy-in from them, which is extremely important when anyone is engaging in change management.”

Dr. Farrah Jackson Ward
Provost and Vice Chancellor of Academic Affairs
Elizabeth City State University

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Advantages of FIS Translate into High Return on Investment

Interfolio’s versatility isn’t the only benefit ECSU has seen from implementing the system.  

“Some of the benefits of Interfolio include securing faculty data as well as enabling transparency into our review process, which promotes faculty trust,” explains Ward. 

Farrah adds that ECSU no longer has to worry about anyone removing documents from a paper review portfolio. Likewise, the electronic records are retained long term, and the review process is automatically documented, reducing any legal risks.

“We definitely got a great return on our investment,” says Ward.

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About Interfolio

Conceived by academics for academics, Interfolio is an education technology company headquartered in Washington, DC, USA and in Cambridge, England, UK. Founded in 1999, Interfolio operates the acclaimed Faculty Information System, the Researchfish impact assessment platform, and the widely used Dossier service. Over 400 clients based in 15 countries choose Interfolio’s technology for hiring and recruitment, academic appointments and timelines, activity data reporting, faculty reviews and promotions, and research impact analysis. For more information about Interfolio, please contact us below.