Organizational adaptation to the rapidly changing external environment: A case study of strategic marketing at Notre Dame College in Ohio

This thesis examined the role of strategic marketing in organizational adaptation to a rapidly changing and competitive external environment among institutions of higher education. Colleges and universities adapt to external pressures as open systems operating within a broader external environment (Bess & Dee, 2008; Keller, 1983). How does adaptive change occur, how are strategic marketing concepts part of this change, and how does the organizational structure support the change? These questions made this an ideal case study for contingency theory, which accounts for changes in the external environment and the importance of "good fits" that will vary by organization (Bess & Dee, 2008; Kast & Rosenzweig, 1973).;Notre Dame College ("NDC") in South Euclid, Ohio, was selected as the research site partly because private liberal arts colleges are particularly vulnerable in the current tumultuous environment (Kirp, 2003). This case study found that NDC's president, Dr. Andrew Roth, as de facto chief marketing officer led an effort to make strategic marketing adaptations by engaging in strategic planning through the lens of the marketing mix (product, price, place, and promotion). NDC's student enrollment more than doubled after creating new curricular, co-curricular, and extracurricular programs; keeping tuition and net price competitive with other private colleges; expanding into online courses; and improving personal selling and advertising.;The primary and most significant implication from this thesis is that colleges and universities cannot leave organizational adaptation or marketing planning to chance in the current rapidly changing and competitive environment.