Hunt for NCCU chief cost $137,000

Search expenses were less than budgeted

DURHAM -- The search that brought Charlie Nelms to N.C. Central University cost taxpayers about $137,000.

The university spent $137,260.49 on the chancellor search, and all but about $900 was public money, according to figures released this week by the UNC system. The total is in line with what other UNC system campuses have spent in recent years to fill their top jobs. It is higher than the $121,385 that Winston-Salem State spent recently to fill its chancellorship but less than the $145,151 Elizabeth City State spent this year, according to the UNC system data.

"We budgeted $150,000," said Cressie Thigpen, the NCCU trustee who led the search committee. "So 137 [thousand] is a good number for us."

A career educator who had twice previously led college campuses, Nelms was lured to Durham from Bloomington, Ind., where he was a vice president at Indiana University. He was found with the help of Heidrick & Struggles, an executive search firm whose $80,000 fee accounted for more than half of the search's total cost.

Thigpen credited the firm, and its extensive network of contacts within higher education, for finding Nelms.

Though commonly used within the UNC system, search firms aren't always employed when universities are looking for new leadership. According to a recently released survey of 2,200 college presidents, slightly more than half of the searches for university leaders from 2004 to 2006 employed search firms. That survey, conducted by the American Council on Education, found that search firms were hired by 58 percent of public institutions that grant master's degrees -- like NCCU.

Although UNC system President Erskine Bowles issued initial directives and other system officials advised NCCU during the search, the campus alone bore its cost.

"The campuses have to find the money themselves," said Ann Lemmon, the UNC system's associate vice president for human resources. "That's why they take these searches so seriously."

At the outset of the search, Thigpen grilled Heidrick & Struggles representatives on specifics. He wanted to be sure, for example, that finalists flown to campus for interviews would travel in coach, not first class, and stay at moderately priced hotels. Of the six final candidates brought to Durham for interviews, four flew, one was local and one was close enough to drive, he said.

"The biggest thing was making sure we were spending the university's money judiciously," Thigpen said. "If we don't spend it on the search, it can be used for different things."

NCCU's search began in March and took about four months, which is a bit quicker than most UNC system searches. Its swiftness was bothersome to some faculty members who would have preferred more voice in the process.

Still, the cost of the search was reasonable, said John Clamp, a biology professor. "I don't have any trouble with it, personally," Clamp said. "We've got to be sure we got the right guy."