Certified Change and Transformational Leader (CCTL)

Spring 2027

Lead the transformation you've been asked to deliver.

A four-month practitioner certification for leaders translating AI and digital transformation into something their institution can actually adopt—without losing its mission, governance, or people.

The problem: You've been handed transformation as a mandate and a mystery. Strategy decks don't survive contact with shared governance.

The transformation: You don't study transformation in the abstract: You lead one. Four months, four deliverables, one defensible portfolio—an Institutional Diagnostic Report; a Strategic Rationale and Stakeholder Plan in the languages cabinet, senate, board, donors, and accreditors speak; a Governance Framework and Conditions; and a Roadmap and Evaluation Framework—capped by a live panel defense. Built on The Adaptive Institution™, Bot/Agent/Human, AWARE, and MVG.

Spring 2027 (Wednesdays, 11:00 AM-12:30 PM ET)

  • Jan 20 – Milestone I. Diagnose: Institutional Diagnostic Report
  • Feb 17 – Milestone II. Align: Strategic Rationale and Stakeholder Plan
  • Mar 17 – Milestone III. Govern: Governance Framework and Conditions
  • Apr 14 – Milestone IV. Implement: Roadmap, Evaluation, and Capstone Defense

Key Outcomes

For higher education leaders asked to turn AI and digital transformation into something their institution can actually adopt, scale and transform

What you'll leave with:

  • The CCTL credential, earned through demonstrated practice: a rubric-scored portfolio, a live panel defense, and a signed practitioner commitment
  • A complete, board-ready portfolio built on a real transformation challenge at your institution:
    • Institutional Diagnostic Report—a five-dimension readiness assessment across strategic, fluency, cultural, governance, and decision-rights readiness
    • Strategic Rationale and Stakeholder Engagement Plan—the case for change in the languages cabinet, senate, board, donors, and accreditors actually speak
    • Governance Framework, Risk Posture, and Adoption Conditions—AI use policy, decision rights, data and privacy posture, and the human-centered conditions that let adoption hold
    • Implementation Roadmap and Evaluation Framework—the path from plan to traction, with metrics that track trust, capability, and mission impact
  • SBDG's proprietary frameworks: The Adaptive Institution, Bot/Agent/Human, and Minimum Viable Governance
  • Two 1:1 strategy sessions
  • AI Leadership Collective membership, year one

What you'll be able to do:

  • Diagnose where your institution is ready and where it isn't across five dimensions
  • Make the case for change in the language each stakeholder group needs to hear it in
  • Build the governance scaffolding transformation requires: policy, decision rights, risk, accountability
  • Create the conditions that let adoption take hold: psychological safety, experimentation norms, recognition
  • Lead change without positional authority
  • Treat resistance as information, and hold the conversations transformation requires
  • Move from plan to traction with measures that go past adoption rates

Who enrolls: Presidents, provosts, deans, CIOs, CHROs, chiefs of staff, system-level strategy leaders—often as teams. Twenty leaders per cohort. 5-7 hours/week.

Investment: Member, $997 per participant; Nonmember, $1,500 per participant. The CCTL is earned—complete portfolio, live defense, signed practitioner commitment.

Twenty seats. Board-ready in four months. Enroll your team.

Click here to register!

Cancellation and Payment Policies for Spring 2027 program are provided on the registration page.

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