Watch the Full Conversation (23 min)
Every campus has spaces that are classrooms on paper and something else in practice. At Texas Tech University, that gap was costing the institution on a metric the state of Texas actively grades: the Space Usage Efficiency score. Lissa Munoz, Senior Managing Director of Space and Resource Management, spent the better part of a decade rebuilding the foundation underneath higher ed space planning at Texas Tech — consistent room coding, an academic schedule mapped onto the facilities inventory, and a governance model that separates the analysis from the decision. The score moved 6%, and the process now answers a space request in a click.
→ Space efficiency scores are capped by coding consistency long before they are capped by real demand. Two rooms coded differently for the same use will quietly distort every number downstream.
→ A facilities inventory alone cannot explain underperformance. The academic schedule is where percent fill and utilization actually come from, which means the registrar and departmental schedulers are part of the space conversation whether or not they know it.
→ Departments behave predictably: they want the room down the hall, and they want to teach between ten and two. Naming those constraints out loud is more productive than treating them as bad behavior.
→ Credibility is the real currency. Clean floor plans and clean room codes are what earn a seat at the table when it is time to ask another department for their data.
→ The most useful space wins are often adjacent to space: research expenditures tied to a principal investigator and then to a room, emergency occupancy load, and controlling who holds a key to which door.
→ Separating the model from the verdict protects the working relationship. When the analyst provides options and a committee decides, the data stops being something departments defend against.
See how other institutions are approaching space and facilities data
Bow Tie Tuesday features higher education leaders working through campus space planning, utilization, and facilities challenges. Explore all episodes and resources.
Welcome to another Bolo Tie Tuesday as I am privileged with my special guest Lissa Munoz from Texas Tech. And of course, I didn't just bring the Bolo tie for interviewing another Texas institution with my fellow Texan. Of course, I had to also bring the cowboy hat so we can have a real conversation about space management today. But welcome, Lissa. Lissa is the senior managing director of space and resource management. She has been at Texas Tech for almost a decade now. She's a board member of CFTA, and has done really amazing things, including boosting their space usage efficiency score from the SUE score in Texas by 6%.
Lissa, welcome to Bolo Tie Tuesday. Great. Thanks so much, Aaron. I appreciate you having me on and I'm excited to tell you of how we have wrangled the Wild West in space management. There we go. So I know you've done a bunch of interesting things. Maybe just help set the stage when you first arrived and the movement that you've done to ultimately boost your data integrity that then affects governance. Maybe just help set the scene when you come on to campus. What's going on and what's the big problem that you're asked to go solve?
Sure. So when I was first hired on, I was brought into the analytic side of space management, mostly helping with answer the questions that come up and reporting like how much GSF do we have and how many campuses are there, which brought us into more of the specific questions like why is this not performing well or how can we do this better. So when I talk about the Wild West, it really was that several iterations before my coming to the department, there were people moving into just unoccupied offices at random teaching space, popping up all over the place and departments doing what they wanted to with that.
And as we were looking at performance metrics and resources being spread thin, the question came up, why are we underperforming specifically in teaching space? So how we helped improve our space usage efficiency score, we needed to know where we were. So understanding how the state graded us in that area was really important. Looking specifically at 110 and 210 coding helped us to best understand where our targets were. This is your classrooms and class labs, right? Correct. So this is classrooms, class labs and the better understanding of consistency and even coding them.
So just because it looks like a classroom doesn't mean it is one, just because it's an underperforming classroom doesn't mean it's not one. So we had to do some cleanup on what a consistent interpretation of those two FICM codes were. That was step one, we had to know where we are. Step two is understanding what the driver is for that space. How do we know that it's underperforming? We understand that percent fill and utilization averages were what the state was grading us on. But you can only go so far if you just have what the space coding is.
So we had to take a deeper dive at the academic schedule and how that overlays onto the facilities inventory. So we really took a look at who were scheduling those spaces. Is it the registrar or are they schedulers within the department? If there was a consistent methodology to that. We also had to look at anomalies within the schedule. So although we could have access to pull in some of that data at an automated level, which took what you might know as an act of Congress anyway. But then really getting into the details of are there outliers that are then either skewing the data or how do we recapture that to make sure that certain things get counted?
Then we were able to really take a deep dive in what was happening in those spaces. And there were a couple of things that occurred from that. One, we want space control, right? Departments just really like what they have. They like to be able to walk down the hall from their office to go to their classroom and be left alone. So we're looking at the challenge of proximity is one. And then second would be that we like to teach between 10 and 2. Right. Sure. No one's ever heard that before, have they?
Right. So we want to teach in the window that we want to teach and we want to teach in the classroom next door and just be left alone. And so it sounds like, I don't know if this is the case, but it sounds like there's a certain amount of centralized scheduling and then lots of other decentralized scheduling. And so it's like, how do we bring either these different systems maybe even or at least the data together across decision makers to see where the gaps are? That is absolutely correct. And my sphere of influence only goes so far.
It is not in my area of expertise to help another department with their process. It's my sphere of influence to help understand how other departments are conducting their process and reflecting back to them what the potential impacts might be. That's where we get to buy to gain a buy in with our peer partners in the influence of how space is used. Maybe even just for other institutions that are having similar issues where the data is not quite all there. It's fuzzy. Okay. We need to go understand the process. How long do you think that took you?
And I know it probably wasn't a clean start line and a clean inline, right? But how long do you think it took you before you really understand at least the majority or the great majority of like, how are space decisions around your classrooms and class labs really made where you believe the data that you were also seeing? So really thinking about your baseline and understanding that you have to have clean floor plans and you have to have your clean FICM codes. If you can come to the table with credibility that looks like we know that our information for the most part is accurate, it's much easier than to say, if you'd like this question answered, we need this part to fill in the gap.
So proving out what it is that you have and what you need to move in that next direction. That really helped us have a seat at the table with working with our peers for gathering that information. So aside from jumping through some of the, I would say the authoritative approvals for having access to that data, right? It was easier to say, here's what we're bringing to you. Here's the value of what this is going to add in your area. If you could help us with this piece of it, we'll drive us in a direction that's helpful to everyone, including you, rather than coming to the table saying, I need something for whatever justification that is, it might fall on deaf ears.
So proving that there is shared benefit in the value of what you're producing is going to get you access to more data more quickly. What do you think, can you think of a moment where you were able to give data back to some of those stakeholders? And it was just, it was like, oh, I didn't realize you could do that. This is actually helpful. This isn't just, like, we can do this a different way. Or, wow, this is, you know, this totally changes the picture, like a kind of an epiphany moment, maybe for one of your stakeholders.
Yes. I would say there's probably a couple there. There's one example that comes to mind related to tying research expenditures to the PI and the PI to then the room, which helps then accounting services groups understand more or less the F&A rate or any sort of other funding challenges that relate specifically to the space. It's much easier to hand it back to them. But we have to understand what grants are tied to what individual, and then once tied to the space and reflected back, that has been really helpful. We've also made gains in our emergency management approaches for occupancy, a load and some other areas that help them understand that in a real crisis, what is happening at a snapshot during a time that that might occur.
So most of that is preventative, but having that information is really key. Another common one that is maybe somewhat overlooked or maybe not as thought about is things like access for doors, spaces, whether it's a lot electronic or hard coded keys, being able to tie in some of that access information to the room helps quality control who should or should not have access to privileged spaces on campus. So what does that look like today? Let's say somebody makes a space request for more offices or another classroom or type of lab.
What happens now and what have you all built and what does that process look like today? If we talked about, here's where I was when I first stepped foot on campus and kind of what it looked like, what does that look like today? Sure. I'm so glad you asked. So now that we've tamed the Wild West and you know everybody is corralled worth of supposed to be. We look at a dual engine framework. So we take all of those data integrations that we built in order to be able to produce comprehensive information of where we are, along with an applied space model of what people should have.
Now, whether or not that's true helps us understand a surplus and deficit at the departmental level. So should a department want space? The other side to that dual engine framework is the governance piece. In my role, I don't allocate anything. My job is to facilitate and provide options. It is not to govern space. That helps me keep my working relationship with campus in order to keep this train rolling. So what it looks like is someone will put in a request and we will evaluate their surplus deficit. So we measure against what they have to what they should have.
Then we usually go on site and get a perspective of what's actually happening in their space. It's not appropriate for me to assume that what I'm seeing in the data is absolutely true. There are nuances to space that in my predecessor coached me on this. You are not going to get the qualitative information that you need without at least getting eyes on the location. It will tell you more information than you're going to see on your dashboard. However, a great place to start is understanding what we know to be true within that data and then work with individual groups for anomalies.
At that point, we then put together options for a governance review committee. So this is our space allocation committee. So within our department and other subcommittees of expertise, for example, in teaching space, we work with instructors and those who work on the academic side to support whether or not the direction we're proposing is appropriate to their mission, especially in advancements in pedagogy. At that point, we bring what we think are appropriate options to the space allocation committee. We've put together some outputs that very quickly show, here's who's asking, here's why, here are the impacts, here are the options, here's the surplus and deficit percentage of each option.
They help us then understand if there is a, at an executive level, a certain direction that campus would like to go that supports those options or the timing of some of that may be counter to some things that at the broader campus level, they're working towards. And they'll provide that feedback to us either in the support of an approval or they'll usually table and then we'll go rework or retool either a short term, long term outlook for those groups. And that then gets implemented through a physical construction or relocation process.
And then the whole thing starts all over again. So, I mean, I think one thing I heard that's really interesting is, it is not your job to be the judge, it is your job to facilitate the process. So that way, I mean, like I know a lot of space planners where in some centralized mechanism, right, like there, a lot of people can look at them as the bad guy, right, like they're the person who takes away my space or whatever, whatever that looks like and it sounds like your job is like how do we lay out our standards and make sure we have good data.
So that the stakeholders, if they're, you know, if they request stuff within the data doesn't add up, you can go to them and say, what am I missing? That's absolutely correct. I'll make a statement that is probably naive of me to say, but I almost feel more like an attorney, right, where we're building the case and then we're going to present said case, right. And I know that that's a poor analogy for my friends who have. And so part of my job is to uphold two things on two very different perspectives are the needs of the individual or department, right.
The department level, they're hearing people say, I need more space. We don't have enough space. We don't have these resources, right, and it's probably the same on any accounting or budgetary side. I'm also hearing on the executive side. This is the direction that we need to go. This is the pathway. How do we do this strategically? So somewhere in the middle, we get to bridge that gap that looks like how are we meeting the needs of the individuals so that they can continue to function to support the strategic endeavor of the institution without over subscribing the resource that is the most costly to the university, but also supporting if there's a larger campus initiative.
How do we help then explain to their end user they're a part of a much broader picture, although it feels really crummy not to have a window right now. What does it look like to support the institution? I almost feel like it's like what I said before was incomplete, right, it's facilitating the process, but it also sounds a huge piece is like how we raise the standards through each each iteration. Maybe help me understand and anybody listen to this conversation. What are the standards when you talk about that engine of data that you're collecting, right, like what have you found is like necessary have to get online or there are even other processes or things or tools you built to put in place so that, you know, it's something that works through the process.
So at its foundation, the state of Texas puts together what's called a space projection model. So we tell the state how much space we have based on certain drivers, they then reflect back to us how much space we should have. This then correlates with specific state funding pools of money. Some are competitive, some are not. What that helps us do is add a metric dollar value to what we do. We've then taken that methodology and applied it to a very specific internal space model allocation system and the areas that we look at particularly are in office research and teaching space.
Now there are nuances within that, but like any other kind of industry standard, there's a certain square footage per, you know, FTE in teaching space, you're looking at the academic schedule to help with demand and in research space. Really, you're looking at kind of the expenditures as a driver for should they or should they not have space. So in our applied methodology, we built some tooling that when I first got hired on, the question would come up, hey, is a hypothetical if we want to build a new building at X amount gross square feet, who should go in there?
That's a massive question for someone that doesn't have a degree in math or engineering. So essentially what we put together is a model and it would take an inordinate amount of time and we thought at the volume of requests coming in, there has to be a faster way. So we built an automated application. It's a C# application that just sits on an SQL database and helps us automate. Well, you click a button and it will say, well, here's how much they should have in each area. Here's how much they actually have.
And then here are their demand drivers. Here's also the forecast of what we think their enrollment is going to be like by the next five years out. Here's their historical staff that they've had. Here are their historical research expenditures. So not only do I have a very specific number that says this is how much space you should have. I also have some indicators to show, are they growing? Are they decreasing? Are they utilizing the space that they have? Well, we've also put together a matrix that helps us understand, are they in the right place on campus?
Are they co-located appropriately or adjacently to their peer group? If we're working on more collaborative efforts, do they need to physically go to a different space on campus and will help rank that also? That helps us then prioritize, especially if we have competing needs. Let's say here's our bucket of space. You have two people who want the same bucket. It's not for me to decide. We bring that to the space allocation committee with a scoring methodology and then they can decide who should be allocated based on their long-range interpretation of where they want the college or the institution to go.
That's also not for me to decide. So we try to bring as much comprehensive... Who's building all of that? In my head, I'm like, I want to see what that looks like. I want to dig into that. That sounds really cool. I think a lot of space planners would probably be drooling to hear that somebody has done something like that and go, what does that look like? Or what are the resources that you had to go to accomplish that? Is that all you building it? Is that a team? Maybe it's a really high level.
How did that come to be? What supports that? Sure. Well, just like any other good Texan or Lubbockite, we're going to squeeze every dollar we can out of everything we're given. So I like to just call it out of sheer grit. Did we, myself, I helped build the framework of the analytics, the database architecture. I had my predecessor who was nuanced in C-Sharp and AppDev, kind of build that framework, and then we had a couple other people test it. So really, we built it internally, cobbled together by a loose set of skillset that we were able to kind of put together, which also, it's unique in this kind of department to have had that, where that would look like probably an application development team to help support an end user in tooling something like that.
I got it done. That's awesome. Super impressive. But maybe to kind of close this up a little bit, if you were going to have like one, two, or three takeaways, words of encouragement or challenges that you might issue to either your fellow campus planners or facility leaders, as well as business partners, even, right? Where you, part of your role as I understand it, CFTA, right? How do I better connect business partners with institutions and build that? What might be your takeaways? I think my biggest takeaway is that collaboration is going to take you really far.
I think in this role, it probably feels isolating, because like you said, we might be considered the bad guys, but the more that we can put forward, we're also advocates, which is sometimes hard to see. If we're not advocating for space, we're advocating for information distribution and information quality. And so by being able to collaborate with your peers and your business partners, utilize them. Even in other industry, the more exposure you give to your business partners outside of what you're working on, there are tons of software systems and people who are willing to listen that might just build these things for you.
So I think that there's opportunity there. I would also say this is doable. I know that it's a lot to take on and we've got about 15 years experience, but by no means do I think that we have it all figured out. We still have the same challenges as everybody else and we're still working through them as nuanced as everyone else, but relying on your peers and making friends in order to build what you need is going to get you much further than trying to wrangle the Wild West on your own.
There's definitely grit and love it, but it's available for all to take and go make things happen. Right. Exactly. Awesome. Well, it's been a pleasure. So Lissa, thank you so much for being on BoloTieTuesdays. Great. Thanks, Aaron. We appreciate it.