How East Tennessee State University streamlined RPT workflows across 975 faculty members
Managing annual evaluations, 3rd-year midpoint reviews, and tenure applications across 975 full-time faculty members is a complex operational challenge. East Tennessee State University (ETSU) overcame fragmented processes, misplaced records, and faculty anxiety by centralizing their review, promotion, and tenure (RPT) workflows using Watermark Faculty Success. They achieved this transformation by prioritizing an empathetic, faculty-led approach to change management.
Hear more about ETSU’s success with RPT workflows
Institution Snapshot: East Tennessee State University
Institution Type: Public, 4-year research university
Scale: 14,500+ students, 975 full-time faculty
Solution: Watermark Faculty Success
Key outcomes
100% campus-wide adoption in 1 year
Program growth from 300 to 446 programs
Shifted faculty sentiment from hesitation to actively requesting system-generated reports
The challenge
Before implementing Watermark Faculty Success, each college across ETSU was responsible for creating its own annual and mid-point review processes. Some departments required physical paper binders, while others managed complex evaluations through email chains.
This fragmentation created significant operational hurdles:
- Misplaced records: Annual evaluations were frequently lost in inbox clutter or physical file cabinets, making them difficult to locate when faculty applied for tenure or promotion.
- Gaps in review cycles: Some faculty reported never receiving a midpoint review prior to submitting their promotion and tenure applications.
“Because things were being juggled in emails and paper, it was difficult finding those annual evaluations when it came time to apply for tenure and promotion,” shared Ashley Sergiadis, Provost Fellow & Digital Scholarship Librarian at ETSU.
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The turning point
To solve these challenges, ETSU expanded Watermark Faculty Success from a single-college pilot in 2022 to full adoption across all academic colleges by 2023. Rather than imposing rigid administrative changes overnight, ETSU gathered continuous feedback through user surveys to refine workflow configurations. “Gathering feedback regularly from all the users has been very helpful,” Sergiadis, noted. “We were able to make incremental changes to make it a better experience for everyone.”
ETSU focused on key operational adjustments to build trust and increase system adoption:
- Calming reviewer anxiety: System notifications were reconfigured for committee members to clarify that only committee chairs were required to submit official evaluation forms.
- Easing the data burden: When faculty voiced stress over manually entering 5 to 6 years of backlogged activities into a new system, ETSU pivoted to simple PDF uploads before gradually transitioning toward auto-generated system reports.
- Controlling the evaluation pace: ETSU introduced custom “Next Step” and “Faculty Notice” holding steps in their multi-stage review workflows. This prevented reports from leaking early and ensured departmental candidates received outcomes simultaneously.
The results
By pairing structured software workflows with an empathetic rollout strategy led by a tenured faculty member, ETSU achieved significant campus-wide improvements:
| Focus area | Operational impact |
| Review consistency | Standardized 3rd-year midpoint reviews to use the exact same submission forms as tenure and promotion applications, removing technical surprises for candidates |
| Self-service support | Created a dedicated instructions portal that drastically reduced support tickets and allowed administrators to answer faculty queries instantly |
| Workflow equity | Controlled multi-tiered routing from department committees up through the provost, president, and board of trustees, ensuring review integrity and consistent pacing |
| Data realization | Shifted faculty sentiment from adoption hesitation to actively requesting system-generated reports to auto-populate future dossier submissions |
Faculty workflow transformations require balancing institutional standards with individual faculty needs. ETSU’s successful deployment highlights that clear communication and supportive administration drive long-term platform adoption.
When advising other institutions navigating similar transitions, Sergiotis emphasizes keeping the faculty perspective front and center. “Try to make it as simple and seamless as possible,” she advises. “Being patient and empathetic has always been very helpful in calming the waters and making it so you can help a faculty member.”