Temple University College of Education and Human Development

Fox School of Business at Temple University

Senior Associate Director - Fox School of Business, Temple University, Dept. of Marketing & Supply Chain Management

Lead daily operations for two schools, managing 4,500 students, 450 permanent employees, 100 student employees, 8 academic departments, and 15 administrative service units. Lead project manager for key strategic initiatives to achieve mission-focused objectives in student success, fiscal responsibility, and operational efficiency, while maintaining or improving service quality and outcomes.
Design, implement, and enforce comprehensive fiscal policies and operating procedures, streamlining efficiency and integrating quality and compliance measures in alignment with organizational, federal, state, and local requirements. Negotiate policy amendments with executives to eliminate inefficiencies and bureaucratic obstacles, ensuring diverse stakeholder feedback is authentically represented.
Served as interim CFO for 13 months, leading team of 4 while managing $160 million annual budget under RCM model. Provided detailed oversight of financial policies and procedures, ensured accountability through performance monitoring and reporting, improved grant management compliance and actively collaborated with executives serving as representative at leadership meetings.
Provided coaching support to outgoing and incoming deans for executive financial, operational and HR functions. Advise deans and senior managers on strategic operations, ensuring smooth transitions and continuous improvement in leadership effectiveness. Engage and mentor staff on professional development and career pathing.
Collaborated with senior leadership on department reorganizations, strategically redeploying team members to retain talent facing job elimination and increase operational efficiency of business goals. Create compelling job descriptions aligned with mission objectives and business needs, contribute to hiring and compensation decisions, securing 100% approval for exception requests amidst rigid hiring freeze.

Director, Administration and Operations

Teach one 20-60 student section of online undergraduate Marketing Management or Business Communication per semester; and co-teach 1-2 Online MBA Marketing Management courses per year.
Develop content, assignments, and experiential activities incorporating current events and industry trends; foster open class environment sensitive to DEI and ADA; leverage AI as a tool for student learning.
Act as own instructional designer, building and maintaining LMS course sites aligned with Universal Design Learning, SARA, and ADA requirements, embed program and course objective measurements of performance.

Adjunct Instructor

Designed the COVID-19 Student Service Hub serving over 6,000 students. Created support materials, trained a team of 15, and developed site protocols aligned with federal, state, and city guidelines. Crafted and executed a stakeholder communication plan, achieving nearly exclusive usage of virtual support methods.
Developed a COVID-19 response strategy that implemented a $250K departmental budget cut, maximizing savings while preserving quality outcomes. Engaged direct reports to maintain workloads with revised tasks and projects aligned with their competencies, provided necessary training, and prevented staff downsizing, resulting in 100% retention of permanent staff and 97% of full-time faculty. Maintained approximately 92% enrollment efficiency.
Advised senior leadership on organizational development, including structure, policy creation and revision for organization-wide adoption. Generated job descriptions, coached hiring managers on proper interview and recruitment practices, sat on hiring committees, created personnel development and career path road maps, and advised on strategies for employee performance remedial training and other interventions.
Coached and trained department leaders, including 2 department chairs, 1 deputy chair, and 3 academic program directors. Consulted on operations, strategy, relationship management, and program development projects. Trained faculty and teaching assistants in LMS, policies, homework platforms, and teaching methodologies.
Lead project manager for the largest academic conference held on campus, attracting over 850 attendees.

Senior Associate Director

Streamlined operations, improving course enrollment efficiency to ~93%, eliminating compliance violations, and designing and implementing process improvements that reduced completion times by up to 85%.
Achieved over $2.5M in financial reserves across two departments as the budget unit head under the RCM budget model. Audited financial statements and transactions, implemented proper cost allocation practices, processed accounting adjustments to achieve a $60K in annual operating budget savings per department, per year.
Successfully overturned a restrictive University policy obstructing critical research activities. Negotiated with Controller and Ethics offices revise policy satisfying both federal laws and stakeholder operational needs.
Oversaw the Business Communication Center serving over 6,000 students. Increased staff by 100%, co-selected a new faculty director, and managed onboarding, strategic implementation, and outcome assessment.
Designed sustainable reorganization of department leadership and staff. Created detailed position descriptions executed onboarding of new faculty leadership selections, ensuring alignment with strategic goals.
Organized first LGBT+ in Business event at FOX, coordinating with City officials, students, and university units to successfully promote diversity, equity, and inclusion among student groups.

Associate Director

Co-led the department strategic planning process and implemented activities aligned with mission objectives. Increased internal engagement by establishing committees and integrating shared accountability measures.
Oversaw program portfolio maintaining #2 undergraduate business major status following 20% growth and expanded the graduate program by 35% in two years, and 109% since inception, despite increased licensing board education requirements creating financial and educational barriers for industry entry. Doubled staff and scaled functions to support growth demand through restructuring, hiring, onboarding, and training.
Negotiated mutually beneficial contracts with international partner, created legal and culturally competent admission and assessment improvements producing $650K in annual revenue in saved program.
Supervised four student professional organizations merging common activities and implementing active collaboration methods to address stakeholder feedback, reducing programming redundancy by 75%. Facilitated cross collaboration leadership team-building activities, and successfully mediated conflicts, including EEOC issues.
Organized the inaugural alumni gala, managing project generating over $400K in individual contributions, corporate sponsorships, and matches.

Assistant Program Director

Oversaw programs growing undergraduate major by 20% despite barrier of state licensing board increase of education requirement by 26 credits/1 year of education and launched and grew new graduate program by 54% since inception.
Acted as budget unit head under the RCM budget model for second largest department. Audited financial statements and transactions, implemented proper cost allocation practices, processed accounting adjustments to achieve a $50K in annual operating budget savings per year.
Streamlined operations, improving course enrollment efficiency to ~95%, eliminating compliance violations, and designing and implementing process improvements that reduced completion times by up to 80%.
Supervised and engaged department administrative coordinator and robust student staff, including PwC Tutoring Center tutors.

Nicole L Stilianos