Department conflict
Two senior faculty members have stopped speaking. The chair is in the middle. The dean is being asked to weigh in. There is a paper trail nobody has read recently.
Higher-education consulting
For the people side of academic leadership.
Faculty Focused Solutions partners with deans, department chairs, and academic leaders on the situations that don't fit a generic HR playbook: conflict between long-tenured faculty, the second year of a chair role, a climate problem in a department, a grievance that has stopped making sense on paper.
We work confidentially, write things down, and stop when the objective is met. No frameworks borrowed from industry, no quarterly retainers you can't account for, no slide decks unless you need one.
30-minute discovery calls. No prep required. No sales follow-up.
When clients reach out
Most calls start in the middle of a situation, not the start.
A few patterns we see often. If any of these sound close to your week, a 30-minute call is the fastest way to find out whether we can help.
New chair, year two
The role made sense from the outside. From the inside, it is mostly people work. The support most institutions offer is generic. The chair needs a confidential thinking partner who already knows the terrain.
Climate read
Something is off in a department, but the symptoms are diffuse. Leadership wants an outside reading before deciding whether to launch a formal process.
Stalled grievance
A grievance has gone through the early steps and is no longer making sense in writing. Everyone wants it to end. No one wants to be the one to end it badly.
What we do
Four lines of work, one consistent posture.
Most engagements draw on more than one of these, but each starts with a clear primary objective. We name it before we begin.
Conflict Resolution
We work as a neutral third party, interviewing, listening, mapping the disagreement back to documents and prior decisions, and surfacing the workable next step. Most engagements close in four to eight weeks with a written summary the institution can act on.
What this looks like
- Mediation and facilitated conversation
- Document and policy review
- Written recommendation
- Optional follow-through with leadership
Call when a dispute has stopped resolving itself.
1:1 Coaching
The work that matters most in academic leadership is rarely on the position description. Managing senior colleagues, communicating up, surviving the first hard personnel decision. Sessions are weekly or biweekly, time-bounded, and aimed at concrete questions rather than open-ended development.
What this looks like
- Confidential one-on-one sessions
- Defined engagement length (3 to 6 months)
- Practical focus on real situations
- Written summaries when useful
Call when the role is the job, and the job is the people.
Leadership Development
Off-the-shelf leadership content was not written for academic environments. We build custom workshops and longer cohort engagements: for newly minted chairs, for groups stepping into associate-dean roles, for institutions reorganizing a school.
What this looks like
- Half-day to two-day workshops
- Multi-session cohort programs
- Custom materials and case studies
- Post-session written summary
Call when you need development that fits the institution.
Climate Audit
Confidential interviews, document review, and a written report with prioritized recommendations. Not an investigation; a structured outside read of what's actually going on. Useful when leadership senses something is off but the symptoms are diffuse.
What this looks like
- Confidential interviews (8 to 20 participants)
- Document and policy review
- Synthesis and prioritized findings
- Written report and optional read-out
Call when something is off and you need a read before deciding.
How we work
Four habits that shape every engagement.
None of these are slogans. They are operating rules: the things that shape what we will and won't do once a contract is signed.
01
Confidentiality by default
Nothing said in a coaching session is shared upward without explicit permission. Conflict-resolution work is governed by a written confidentiality protocol agreed before interviews begin.
02
Document-first
Most academic situations are already half-documented. We read the handbook, the policies, the prior correspondence, and the actual grievance before recommending anything.
03
No corporate playbook
Frameworks built for industry get academic environments wrong in subtle, expensive ways. We work from the institution's own norms outward, not the other way around.
04
Plain numbers, plain endings
Engagements have a defined scope, a defined price, and a defined ending. We close out when the objective is met, not when the retainer runs.
Why FFS
Built by someone who has done the work, behind the scenes, for years.
Daniel Zummo · Founder
JD, LLM · 12+ years HR / ER / LR
Faculty Focused Solutions was founded by Daniel Zummo, a labor and employment lawyer with twelve-plus years across HR, employee relations, and labor relations, six of them in higher education as Chief Resolution Officer and Director of Academic Employee Relations at an R1 medical school. The work that fills an academic leader's calendar (faculty disputes, grievances, chair transitions, climate concerns) is the work he has spent his career inside, on the institution's side of the table.
FFS exists because the consulting available to academic leaders tends to come from one of two places: large firms that bring a corporate playbook into a place where it doesn't fit, or solo practitioners who specialize in coaching but haven't sat in on a grievance. The institutions we work with want a third option.
"Academic work runs on documentation, policy, and relationships, usually in that order. Good consulting respects all three."
How engagements work
Three steps. No sales theater.
Every engagement (subscription or project, conflict work or coaching) goes through the same opening sequence. The point is to make sure we're a fit before either side has committed anything.
01
Discover
You describe the situation; we ask enough questions to figure out together whether FFS is the right fit. No slides, no proposal, no follow-up unless you ask for one. If we're not the right fit, we'll usually be able to point you toward someone who is.
02
Design
If we are the fit, you receive a one-page scope: the objective, the deliverables, the time horizon, who's involved, and the price. You either sign it as written, ask for changes, or pass. There is no negotiation theater.
03
Deliver
Sessions, interviews, document review, mediation: whatever the scope called for. Written summaries when they matter. Regular check-ins with whoever is sponsoring the engagement. We close out when the objective is met, not when the calendar block ends.
Frequently asked
Questions we get on most discovery calls.
- How is FFS different from a generic HR consultant?
- Most HR consulting is built around corporate norms: performance management, employment law, comp design. Academic environments share some of that vocabulary but run on different rules (tenure, faculty governance, peer review). FFS works from the institution's own handbook and history outward, rather than dropping in a generic framework.
- What's the typical engagement length?
- Conflict-resolution programs typically run four to eight weeks. Coaching engagements are three to six months. Workshops are bounded to a single session or series. Subscription retainers are open-ended but reviewed quarterly and easy to pause.
- Do you work with institutions or with individuals?
- Both. The institution is usually the contracting party, even when the work centers on one person. We're transparent about who is paying and what they will and won't see. Coaching sessions are confidential; conflict and climate work is governed by a written protocol agreed up front.
- Will you name our institution in marketing?
- Not without explicit written permission. Most of our work is invisible by design. References, when offered, are handled by direct conversation between you and a prior client, not through case studies on a website.
- Can you work across time zones?
- Yes. The practice splits its time between the US East Coast and Belgium, so US and European institutions are equally well served. Sessions are typically virtual; on-site work is scoped engagement by engagement.
- What does this cost?
- Subscription retainers start at $2,750 / month for the Basic tier. Project engagements are priced to scope; most fall between $4,500 and $9,500. Full pricing is on the services page, and the final number is confirmed in writing before any engagement begins.
Ready to talk?
Most engagements start with a 30-minute call.
No prep required. Bring the situation; we'll figure out together whether there's something useful to do, and tell you plainly if there isn't.
Discovery calls are not billed. Replies within one business day.