On April 9th, I hosted a webinar about "Web Governance in Higher Education" at the invitation of Siteimprove.

This is something I am eager to talk about. Indeed, I believe the challenges of governance in HigherEd are amongst the most onerous of any industry.

This was put to me pretty bluntly on a project I did few years ago. 

I was told... "Shane, if this university was a country, it would last about a week before breaking apart in civil war!"

It sounds funny, but there is a kernel of truth to it. Think about it.

• A university has a large population. 
• Is highly diverse. 
• Is geographically distributed. 
• Has lots of politicized stakeholders and special interest groups. 

So, short of calling out the troops, what can you do to get everyone acting in a unified way online? 

The answer lies in recognising that professionalism in Web Governance must keep pace with online ambition.

That is, if you want a sophisticated online presence, you must invest in sophisticated web governance. Anything else is just wishful thinking.

In the first instance, this means adopting a better top-down model of online management. And second, it means investing in better bottom-up supports for staff, to help them maintain quality.

I examined both of these approaches in more detail in my webinar presentation.

You can watch a video recording here or download the slides below.