Webinar

Succeeding in an Era of Constraints

May 20, 2026 at 1:00pm ET (10:00am PT)

Higher education leaders have spent the last several years doing more with less. The near future will likely continue to be defined by constraint. Most institutions treat that as a crisis to manage.

David Epstein thinks it might be something else entirely—an emotional reframe for leaders who've been asked to do more with less, and a mindset shift toward treating constraints as opportunities to clarify priorities and launch productive exploration.

Epstein is the New York Times bestselling author of Range and, in his new book Inside the Box, he makes a counterintuitive case: constraints don't just force adaptation, they can unlock creativity, sharpen focus, and drive breakthroughs that unlimited resources never would. The institutions and leaders who learn to work within limits, rather than simply endure them, are often the ones who transform.

In this Next Office Hour, Epstein joins us for a conversation about what the science of constraints means for colleges and universities navigating a new era of scarcity. Together we'll explore:

• Why total freedom can be paralyzing — and why limits are often the precondition for innovation

• How institutions can use resource constraints as a forcing function to clarify priorities and launch productive exploration

• What the research says about when boundaries stimulate creativity versus when they crush it

• How leaders can reframe constraint not as failure, but as the conditions for their best work

• What higher education can learn from organizations that turned scarcity into a competitive advantage

Can’t make it live?  Register to receive the recording after the event.