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The Net Assets podcast delves into the most pressing issues in independent school business and operations. Delivered by NBOA, the only national nonprofit membership association focused exclusively on fostering financial and operational excellence among independent PK-12 schools, each episode is based on a popular article in NBOA’s Net Assets magazine. Chief financial and operational officers alongside other leaders of school business share what inspires and challenges them as well as their approaches to problem solving and innovation. In each lively exchange, host Jeff Shields, NBOA president and CEO, teases out the human stories behind the printed story.
I think AI has been really transformational. It's the next level of what we've really all experienced. It just feels different because it's moving at a much faster pace and changing at a faster pace. But we owe it to our students. We are getting ready for their future, not our future.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the Net Assets Podcast, the official podcast of MBOA Business Leadership for Independent Schools. I'm your host, Jeff Shields, MBOA President and CEO. This episode of the Net Assets Podcast is provided with the generous support of IMA. Today, I am absolutely delighted to welcome Nancy Greene. She's Vice President of Finance and Operations and Chief Financial Officer at Pinecrest School in Boca Raton and Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Speaker 2:Nancy is one of the most accomplished and influential leaders at independent school business operations. She's received nearly every major award that MBLA gives out, including being named a Will Hancock Unsung Hero Award winner in 2018 for her impact at the Bowles School and the 2022 Ken White Distinguished Business Officer Award recipient, recognizing her tremendous contributions to the entire MBUA community. During her service on the MBUA Board of Directors, Nancy chaired the Strategic Initiatives Committee, and her leadership was integral to the development of the MBUA Financial Dashboard and the Composite Financial Index Calculator, both connected to the Biz Data Collection Platform and designed to help school leaders better understand and communicate their school's financial health. Nancy Greene, welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 1:Thank you. I'm delighted to be here with you.
Speaker 2:It's so great to be here at the twenty twenty six MBUA Annual Meeting in Orlando, Florida, which is right in your backyard. Did you drive in or did you fly in?
Speaker 1:Actually, we took the BrightLine, the train in, and it was wonderful.
Speaker 2:That's right. That's kind of a new thing.
Speaker 1:It's a new thing.
Speaker 2:Yep. I love that. Now you've got deep roots in Florida independent schools. You've worked at several across the state, and you've certainly been actively involved in the Florida Council of Independent Schools, better known as FCIS, for many years. What's it about Florida that makes it such an active community for independent education?
Speaker 1:So I think Florida, Jeff, is really a unique in a unique situation in that the average starting year for our in independent schools was 1986. So rather young. There were a number of smaller, all pretty much religiously affiliated schools in the eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But we don't have that same kind of depth that a lot of the northeastern school has Sure. Which I think has really brought us together to help build each other up and make each other successful. And so I think that's maybe a big difference.
Speaker 2:I never knew that. So you all are starting out together. You're all in independent education vernacular. You're all kind of startups in a way. Right?
Speaker 2:And you're all scrappy and trying to find your niche. That's exactly right. And you like that?
Speaker 1:I like that because I think we're we have proven our tenacity and our our belief strongly in what we do
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:In our independent school space for the students that we serve. And I think it keeps us on our toes and fresh, and I think it's probably what defines a little bit of the type of CFO that I am. It's the environment that I've been brought up in.
Speaker 2:That's awesome. I didn't know that, and I I love learning that. At this meeting, you'll be accepting, and this is embarrassing to say, but it's the name of the award, and I think it was your idea, not mine, the 2026 Jeffrey Schills Innovation and Independent School Business Operations Award on behalf of Pinecrest School, recognizing your school's leadership in advancing AI, particularly in transforming business operations. Now, you've been presenting on this topic around the country, I happen to know, and you'll be presenting on it here on the program here at the annual meeting. For those who aren't familiar with Pinecrest's work in AI, how would you describe its impact in a nutshell?
Speaker 1:I think AI has been really transformational, even though we were already an innovative school. I know we have interweaved that all throughout our curriculum and our core beliefs. I think about AI as it's the next level of what we've really all experienced. It just feels different because it's moving at a much faster pace Super. And changing at a faster pace.
Speaker 1:So I go back to for several years, I taught higher level math at one of my schools. And I remember when the TI 84 calculator came out, you could hook up to your TV, and the kids would be able to do all these advanced calculations, and they were worried that our students would not then be able to think anymore. You remember that? Obviously, we used that calculator to find higher level discovery, and our students took it to whole new levels, much like the computers when they came out in the way they came out and everybody having laptops. So AI is really a natural progression.
Speaker 1:Great. It's just that the abilities are getting higher and higher level, and they're moving at a very fast pace, which is hard to keep up with. But we owe it to our students. Again, I go back to that because that's we're really student centric at Pinecrest.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And that's really who we are getting ready for their future, not our future.
Speaker 2:Not every business leader feels the same way about AI that you do. So let's talk about what impact has it had on your school's business operations. Yeah. I appreciate that students have led the way, but our listeners wanna hear what's the impact on the business office?
Speaker 1:First of all, I'd like to give a little context to the fact that not everybody is ready to go. You know, we as an institution, that's to be respected. I will even say in my ops team, I had a couple of people on the team less interested in pursuing this.
Speaker 2:That's a very nice way to put it, Nancy.
Speaker 1:But it what's amazing is they still remain part of the journey. We just didn't pick projects in their areas to start. And as they learned or saw the winds that were happening in other areas, it became exciting to them. And I actually after just doing a training session on AgenTic AI, I had two of them come up and say, We're ready now. We think we can use AgenTic AI.
Speaker 1:We know we were really bucking the system with RPA, but now we see that there is some work that we think could really benefit. So I would encourage everybody out there who's maybe meeting or resistant yourself to look for these kind of opportunities.
Speaker 2:So that's a huge list of earns. So even though someone's not excited about it right away, be patient. Be patient. Just keep the door open. Keep the conversation going.
Speaker 2:Demonstrate for them. And then, in your case, they'll walk through it. They'll walk through it. They'll get there.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Be patient. And I think just be respectful. Respect. Saw everybody in a different time.
Speaker 1:And so I had some early adopters who really embraced it, and we ran with it. And I will say it's brought huge efficiencies to our office. What's exciting is I'm leveraging off of these for succession planning and for PD development of people who are in tiresomely boring positions with a lot of redundant tasks. I'll use one that is often burdened with that, where they can't do anything that would be more fun, AP. The AP process.
Speaker 1:It just feels heavily burdened with routine practices. Giving my person two weeks of free time to now learn other things, plus I'm succession planning her and developing others and taking some work away from them that's growth work for her and redundant for them. And we're moving things down the pathway. And I think largely my team is really now they're coming to me, Jeff Yes. With ideas Yes.
Speaker 2:Beyond what I initiated. And you kept your commitment to them because you said AI is not about replacing any of you. AI is about being efficient and creating, it sounds like, growth pathways allow you to build out your skills or allow you to do more strategic work. And that's really how it's played out for you. Exactly.
Speaker 2:That's so exciting. I love that. As more schools explore AI, the question quickly becomes not if, but when and how. So what's the single most important thing that business leaders need to consider when developing a strategic AI plan like Pinecrest?
Speaker 1:Yeah. And you absolutely need to have that plan. First, I would say that it needs to fit within your overall strategic planning goals for your school, and it needs to be respectful of your particular culture. We do work with other schools when they come to us and ask questions about this, about that, and we're really mindful of trying to understand what their culture is. Sometimes they have religious beliefs or other beliefs that are contradictory to some of what they're concerned about in AI.
Speaker 1:Okay. And we talk about how we can work through those and honor those cultural things. And, also, what are their end goals, and what does it look like for them? Could be very different than what it looks like.
Speaker 2:So you started, what are you trying to accomplish? Exactly. What are you trying to do? And how can AI support that? Which really is the same as any technology that you would be considering at your school, isn't it?
Speaker 2:Correct. Answer the what. Don't just buy the technology and import it into your system, if you will. Exactly. But answer, what are you trying to accomplish and how can technology, in this case AI, facilitate that?
Speaker 2:Now here's a big question because you're being recognized. Everyone knows Pinecrest is a huge school. Yes. Right? Multiple campuses, big school, lots of students, lots of resources.
Speaker 2:Can any school, large or small, pursue this work? Or does it require certain conditions? And it may. Is it people? Is it resources?
Speaker 2:What makes it ripe for a school to really explore an AI strategic plan?
Speaker 1:Yes. So that's a great question, Jeff. And I would say, yes.
Speaker 2:And Yes.
Speaker 1:So the answer is yes. Every school, regardless of their size, can benefit. In fact, one could argue smaller schools
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Have some huge efficiency gains because they often don't have the resources. Larger schools have the resources, but are they deployed in the most effective manner? They could be even if they're retained. So I think that there's inefficiencies potentially built into both structures that Why? That can be filled in with AI.
Speaker 1:But, yes, you must have resources. So you have to have people in place, whether that be through partnerships, which is where I think a lot of people should start as you're building and learning your PD.
Speaker 2:Tell me more about that.
Speaker 1:So I think that there's people out there in this space that are operating at it and have already done, developers that
Speaker 2:have Oh, I see.
Speaker 1:Developed so you could work with partners that have the experience to help you. But then after leveraging off them and learning, you begin to see what new skill sets you need within your organization so that you can become self sustaining. So that's where we are now at Pinecrest. We've changed. We had a whole hiring list we thought we wanted last year, and the IT positions we thought we needed, we no longer need.
Speaker 1:We don't even want them. We need people who can program. We need people who know RPA. We know people who can work with Agenic AI. We need different kinds of skill sets because we partnered with companies to place our RPA, and now you need to maintain those robots.
Speaker 1:So, you need a whole another skill set. The resources do need to be deployed. You do need to actively work them into your budget, but the return on the investment is the key. So you evaluate each project, calculate the return on the investment, and start with the lowest hanging fruit.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Those where the return on your investment are going to come back quick enough
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:To keep the generation going and moving. And the truth of the matter is all schools need to be looking to start this movement. I think it's one of those things. It's like when laptops came out. And then it just became, were you gonna be a one to one school or not?
Speaker 2:Wasn't that a quaint debate that we used to have? Bring your own device or one to one. Was such an easy time.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yes.
Speaker 2:Independent K-twelve schools need a strong business continuity plan, not just an emergency plan, to stay resilient through disruptions. Key priorities include identifying risks beyond natural disasters, engaging stakeholders, protecting core operations like payroll and learning delivery, and testing and updating the plan regularly. Governance responsibility sits with the board, head of school, president, and key administrators who must oversee and execute the plan to support recovery and accountability. If you're wondering how to get started, visit imacorp.com to connect with the IMA team and learn more about best practices for building a business continuity plan for your school. I have to ask you, a lot of schools, their academic side of the school were further ahead because everyone's trying to sort through AI and how it's going to impact students, etcetera, etcetera.
Speaker 2:So tell me about your relationship with academics. Yeah. Because I know for a lot of schools, the AI implementation started with the academic side because schools were scrambling to figure out how is this going to impact academics and students. And you have a really interesting story about your relationship with academics at Pinecrest. You can tell me more about that.
Speaker 1:So that is a key critical component of a relationship. And, yes, I have a great one with our vice president of strategic initiatives and academics, and she will be joining me to accept our innovation award. I love hearing that. We are really partners on the tracks. And, honestly, most of this is driven directly from our president, doctor Dana Markham, who is phenomenal in in in the academic space and knowing what our kids need for the future.
Speaker 1:So she drives a lot of the leadership behind it. So we are incredibly blessed, and all those really have to be in place to make this a successful journey. But I had a revelation here at an NBOA conference. I went to, a few years ago, an AI presentation, and I was sitting in the audience thinking, oh my god. If I don't get on board with this, I'm gonna be a dinosaur in short order.
Speaker 1:And I need to embrace this because this is happening in our classrooms already. I know that. I sit in on meetings. I know what the students are doing and know where we're trying to drive them. And I need to drive this as best I can, and I can't do it without the support of my academic and, of course, our president.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:And I came back from that conference, which is why I think this is the best PD. And I thought we need to make a movement here. And Lisa Ackerman, my VP for Strategic Initiatives and Academics, said, I love it. Let's get everybody together. And we just we designed a comprehensive every single department played a role in the process, and we led them through a very structured process of beginning to think about what were our opportunities because that's people's biggest weaknesses.
Speaker 1:Really, they don't even know what's possible. Yeah. What are the possibilities? It's so new.
Speaker 2:And it's changing fast, right?
Speaker 1:When you open up that view, it's amazing what happened institutionally.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I love that conversation. And we know that people can read more about what Pinecrest is doing at mboa.org. But I want to talk about your career and where you gravitate as a professional. And what I've observed, and I'm a super fan, so I have to tell our listeners that I'm a super fan of yours, but you always seem to be where the profession is changing, where the shifts are happening, whether it's head of school compensation, whether I mentioned working with the CFI Remember you were the queen for a couple of years there and talking about how important that is.
Speaker 2:Now AI adoption. Why are you always in that space? Why do you gravitate towards that space? Is it instinct, curiosity, your appetite for risk? Tell me more about that because you agree that's where you end up.
Speaker 2:Right?
Speaker 1:Yeah. I think it's all of those things a little bit. I do taking risks. I don't like getting stale. I have to be constantly learning and understanding what's happening.
Speaker 1:And so I think some of that is it's internal drive. I just don't Have
Speaker 2:you always been that way?
Speaker 1:I think the answer is yeah.
Speaker 2:Okay. It seems to me, so I agree. I'm not gonna argue.
Speaker 1:But I don't like to get bored either, Judd. So I feel I don't wanna come in routine and Yeah. Not know what's next and what's next for my team.
Speaker 2:You know that when you say that, I don't think I've ever had a conversation with Nancy Greene about the audit or your September or managing your 04/2003 or maybe even health insurance. It's just that's not what you tend to talk about. You're where the profession is going to next. So that's my observation about you.
Speaker 1:Although I do have something with health insurance. Oh, you do? We can talk about that in another time.
Speaker 2:We could talk about that on the next podcast. I love that. Help us program our future podcasts. You've also been a prolific and highly regarded presenter. I know you love presenting at the Business Officer Institute.
Speaker 2:You've been a faculty member there several times. You're a regular on MBLA Annual Meeting Programs, and you're currently a mentor for the MBLA Leadership Academy. What drives you to give back so generously with your time? You're always at big schools. You're always doing big things.
Speaker 2:But where do you find that space to give back? It seems to be really important to you.
Speaker 1:First, I feel like so many people gave to me, and I've learned so much from people. Even sometimes we impact people or people impact you, and they don't even know they are. And I feel like I was given the gift of a lot of things like that, and I feel like it's my obligation to give back. That's one. If I can give to others.
Speaker 1:But, really, Jeff, I think I'm driven by the bigger picture. Again, I go to the future of the world, the students that we're developing, and the students that will come behind them, and how can we best equip them to make our world a better place. And so if I'm helping others to move that needle in their school communities, then we have that many more students out there doing great things.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh. I love hearing that you are the second guest that's talked about how important their work is to students. So you're talking about future students. The last guest talked about working on financial aid and creating opportunities and access for students. So if anyone out there thinks that CFOs aren't student centered, at least the very best ones, I'm going to prove you wrong with these podcasts.
Speaker 2:So thank you for sharing that. What's one thing you've gained personally or professionally from being engaged with MBOA?
Speaker 1:Oh, that's countless things. Friendships Yeah. Business partnerships
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1:That really have strengthened me. I don't wanna minimize our vendor partners that you've brought to the table and that the team has puts together, the collaboration, the friendships, the willingness of others to speak where I've gone to their presentations, and they've ignited a thought or a fire in me. Sometimes it's not even necessarily directly what they're presenting, but it creates a catalyst for thinking in another way that Love it. People may not even know. I think coming to NBOA, I think, no.
Speaker 1:I've never missed a year.
Speaker 2:I didn't know that, but I like hearing. I know. It makes sense.
Speaker 1:And I think that this is the most important PD that we can come together as leaders in independent schools and get new ideas and remain relevant.
Speaker 2:Our time's coming to a close, but I know, and I don't know if it's near or far. I just know you're not going to do this forever. None of us do this forever. But what do you want your legacy to be as a professional to the profession, to NBOA, to Florida? But when people talk about Nancy Greene, when your work in this particular space is done and you move on to a a different chapter, what do you want people to say about you?
Speaker 2:What do you wanna leave behind?
Speaker 1:I think I would hope that I have contribute to helping people develop and enhance their strategic thinking, that I moved the needle in their favor in some way, either by personally developing them or by making an impact with something they were able to take to their schools, that have strengthened maybe the integrity and the integrity of the profession and maybe was a good role model for others that would come behind and that other people might wanna do this same kind of a work. Because of something they heard me say or share so that it can go on into perpetuity. And I think at a personal level that I was generous, that I was kind, and that I somehow created a better space for everyone.
Speaker 2:I think you've been successful in doing that, and so I appreciate our time together so much. Thank you for joining us today and for the extraordinary thought leadership, generosity, I will remember you that way, and innovation you bring to independent education and to MBOA. To our listeners, I mentioned it before, but it bears repeating. You can learn more about Pinecrest Schools innovation in AI at mboa.org. And remember, MBOA is your partner in leading innovation in the business of independent schools.
Speaker 2:Thank you again to IMA for supporting this episode of the Net Assets Podcast. So until next time, thanks for listening to the Net Assets Podcast.