Mission

• Provide a business marketing incubator atmosphere that fosters business development in Oklahoma
• Provide an applied technology foundation that permits idea generation and opportunity creation for value-added agricultural and food products and processes in Oklahoma
• Train and educate students of all ages in Oklahoma to optimize technical and business opportunities in Oklahoma
• Provide a climate of diversity and opportunity for high aspirations and mutual respect for Center faculty, staff, students, and Center clients

Vision

Core Values

Excellence - The pursuit of technical and business excellence in all endeavors.

Intellectual Freedom – The encouragement of education and learning for students of all ages, particularly in the food and agricultural business industries of Oklahoma.

Integrity –The principles of truth, honesty, fairness, impartiality and professionalism.

Service – Untiring and exceptional service to food and agricultural business industry clients in Oklahoma.

Diversity – A respect for diversity in employee and client character, in creative thought, in the expression of ideas, and in the workplace environment.

Safety – Safety in all processing, development, research and outreach.

Fraternity – The encouragement of civic fraternity and a respect for agriculture in our society.

Goals, Critical Success Factors, Objectives, and Strategies

Goal 1. Economic Development- Provide technical, business and marketing assistance to Oklahoma value-added food and agricultural production and processing industries.

Critical Success Factors:

• Maintain 3 Business Marketing professional staff to support Oklahoma economic development.
• Achieve and maintain professional staff positions of 1 Microbiologist, Quality Management Specialist 1, Food Processing Specialist 1, Meat Processing Specialist 1, Analytical Chemist 1, Communications Specialist 1, Foods Sensory Specialist 1, and Administrative Assistant 1 to support Oklahoma food industry and agricultural business development.
• Achieve and maintain professional food scientist positions in horticultural products processing 1, oilseed chemistry 1, cereal chemistry 1, muscle food products 1, food engineering 2, food microbiology 2, agricultural economics 1, and forest products 1 to support value-added food and agricultural products processing in Oklahoma.
• Achieve clerical staff to optimally support Center activities to include a Financial Assistant 1, a Conference Coordinator 1, a Receptionist 1, and a Data Control Clerk 1.
• Maintain core competencies in food sector business marketing, economic assessment of food and agribusiness opportunities, food processing, meat processing, food nutritional labeling, food microbiology and food safety, quality manufacturing and food engineering.
• Maintain a program management plan that optimizes the Center resources.
• Function as a catalyst for introduction of new technology, new crop varieties and innovative marketing techniques into Oklahoma’s agriculture and food industries.
• Completion of 100 new or established value-added product projects over the next 5 years.

Objectives:

• Develop a standardized process flow that allows project decisions to be made and economic impact assessments to be developed.
• Develop a data input storage and retrieval system that is compatible with the standardized process flow.
• Develop a scheduling system for facilities and equipment for client work that is compatible with the standardized process flow.

• Plan a system for review of all projects with the Industry Advisory Committee to gain their insight for prioritizing of resources for optimal Oklahoma economic development.
• Develop a contract agreement for all Center clients to ensure access for follow-up assessment at the completion of the project.

• Train the data control clerk to keep and manage the flow chart, the scheduling chart, and the data input system for project reporting and Center accountability.

Goal 2. Diversity- Promote diversity and create an environment of respect for individuals.

Critical Success Factors:

• Maintain a performance-based evaluation system for annual appraisals.
• Maintain a performance-based evaluation for all employee and student hiring.
• Promote diversity of thought in project problem versus solution analyses.

Objectives:

• Maintain training for all supervisors in employee appraisals.
• Ensure all evaluations are reviewed by the Center Director.

• Record and maintain training completion records for diversity education.
• Schedule external experts and scientists to enhance diversity in all work.

Goal 3. Leverage Resources- Maximize human, physical and fiscal resources to Achieve economic and technical development objectives.

Critical Success Factors:

• Provide a method of assessment for the optimal level of physical and human resources required for Center projects.
• Identify and quantify line-item projects and funds for support for the budget year.
• Schedule monthly re-assessments of projects progress for continued support.

Objectives:

• Thoroughly identify facility, equipment, and instrumentation needs at the beginning of each project.
• Assess capability of the Center at the advent of each client project.
• When acquisition of external physical resources is needed for client projects, provide a method for decisions using the Industry Advisory Committee.

• Minimize all non-essential annual budget components to provide funds.
• Ensure stakeholders in Oklahoma support the refocusing of funds for the position.
• Plan the hire for the best time of year to minimize budget constraints.

• Promote professional development skills training for Center faculty and staff on a once-per-year basis.
• Provide for immediate and unusual training requirements when new equipment or instrumentation is acquired.
• Re-evaluate position questionnaires on a once-per-3-year basis to assure the position and pay grade correctly reflects the job.

Goal 4: Recognition- Achieve and maintain excellence in activities to satisfy State expectations and national prominence.

Critical Success Factors:

• Pursue excellence in all Center work.
• Make best use of communications to publish Center activities.
• Maintain an ever-green marketing program for the Center.
• Develop and maintain critical-few key Center publications to herald Center success.

Objectives:

• Include an Objective assessment for creative work in each annual review.
• Encourage extraordinary and extreme thinking for project planning by engaging in a scheduled Center projects presentation on a bi-monthly basis.
• Encourage and reward excellence in publications and publicity in Center accomplishments in employee annual appraisals.

• Challenge each faculty and professional staff member with a minimum number of periodic Center publications required of each of them for each year, totaling 2 for each faculty and staff member for each year.
• Enlist the participation of the Communications Specialist on each project team.
• Ensure one of the Business Marketing specialists is a part of each client project team.

• Continue a news release clipping program to quantify news releases in local, state, regional, and national media.
• Maintain a standardized list for media release of news items.
• Continue a contact networking of fellow professionals in the region and nation for news effectiveness of the Center.

Goal 5. Student Development- Assist in the training of students of every age to be most productive in business life in Oklahoma.

Critical Success Factors:

• Utilize students and graduate students where possible in client project work
• Pursue the use of industry internships for students and graduate students.
• Maximize the education and training of graduate and post-graduate students in contractual applied research and small client research projects.
• Maintain a focus of education and training with all industry training programs and workshops.
• Develop middle and senior management training programs for best operating practices in the food and agricultural business industries of Oklahoma.

Objectives:

• Ensure the criteria of selection of graduate students into food science graduate programs have ‘practical experience’ as a selection tool.
• Employ practical experience activities as a part if the graduate student’s development planning.

• Include as a part of the graduate student’s plan of study a request for the graduate student to actively participate in client work as part of their half-time stipend responsibilities.
• Encourage graduate students to engage in Center project meetings and client discussions.

• Include student work in budget plans for client projects.
• Maintain a student work allocation line-item in the Center operating budget.

• Use workshop, training session and symposia participant rating forms to obtain immediate evaluation of education and training sessions.
• Employ the use of rating summaries to re-structure presentations in education and training programs for best training results.

• Develop a questionnaire that quantifies specific training needs.
• Distribute questionnaires by a selected mail and personal visit plan to ensure the objectives are clear and sound information is obtained.
• Plan training session(s) as needed to meet the needs as identified by the questionnaires.
• Plan post-training class evaluations to ensure usefulness of training.