Shared Values
A set of shared values, beliefs, or principles that permeate across the institution at every level, including “Transforming the U,” clusters, EFS guiding principles, and focusing on the human factor.

Strategy
The strategy determines direction. It includes the organization’s goals, objectives, vision, and mission. Colleges and administrative units should review their compacts and strategic plans. The following are some questions that should be answered in determining your finance strategy:

• What do we want our overall strategy and vision to be for our financial operations?
• What is our core business? Are we solely transactional or do we also provide a high level of strategic financial management?
• Where are we going? What do we want to be doing in the next two, five, or seven years?
• What do we want to achieve with our cluster?

The organizational design committees are encouraged to interview or talk with key leaders such as deans, VPs, directors, or managers within their college/admin units to help answer these questions.

Structure
This component defines how an organization looks, what shape it will take, what type of jobs there will be, and how many FTEs will be needed. In addition, the structure should identify reporting relationships and spans of control.

Colleges/admin units will need to determine which cluster model best fits their needs based on size, number of transactions, and type of financial work performed. 

Workforce planning will be an important tool in helping the committees identify the resources needed to fill-in their clusters.

Processes
Processes have to do with the flow of information.  They are the means of responding to information technologies (e.g., budgeting, planning, and work flow).

Committees will have access to the new business processes, workflows, and functional descriptions of the financial activities taking place in the clusters.

Systems
Systems are the tools and technologies that support the people working in core processes.  Examples include classification/compensation, performance management, recognition, IT resources, work space, and equipment.

Colleges and admin units will need to ensure that staff are appropriately classified, that performance management systems are in place, that staff are being recognized and rewarded for their work and also ensuring staff have the tools and technologies need to perform their jobs effectively.

Colleges and admin units should be working closely with the unit’s HR lead in addition to the Office of Human Resources Classification and Compensation unit. 

People
This category includes programs and policies that generate the knowledge, skills, abilities, and talents needed by employees to be successful in their roles. Examples include recruitment and selection, training and development, competencies and performance measures, and succession management. These programs, appropriately
combined, produce the talent that is required by the strategy and structure of the organization to achieve its goals.

The organizational design model and its components are what create the culture of the organization. 

It’s important to keep in mind the following when using the Star Model:

• Different strategies lead to different organizations.
• Structure is only one part of the organization’s design.