Chief of Staff Hart Selected for TBJ’s Outstanding Women in Business Class of 2024

EAST GREENSBORO, N.C. (March 13, 2024) – North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University Chief of Staff and higher education enrollment management expert Erin Hill Hart is one of 25 extraordinary leaders named to the Triad Business Journal (TBJ) 2024 class of Outstanding Women in Business.

Hart serves as principal liaison and senior adviser to North Carolina A&T Chancellor Harold L. Martin Sr. and is a member of the chancellor’s Cabinet – the university’s senior executive leadership team. In collaboration with the Cabinet, she is responsible for planning, organizing and driving initiatives and activities of A&T, providing strategic and operational support for internal and external constituencies of America’s largest historically Black university (HBCU) and one of North Carolina’s top three public research universities.

Before becoming interim chief of staff in July 2018 and being chosen for the permanent position in June 2019, Hart served for two years as associate vice provost for enrollment management in the Division of Academic Affairs. She led A&T’s record-setting enrollment successes at a time when enrollment at many other HBCUs and national universities was in decline. She did so while also significantly raising the academic profile of incoming first-year students.

Under Hart’s leadership, A&T in 2019 completed a holistic redesign of its website, which serves hundreds of thousands of prospective students and parents, other external constituents, faculty and staff each month. It was completed just as the COVID-19 pandemic was surfacing and online instruction gained a sudden new importance. It also supported A&T’s emergence as the largest HBCU in the history of the nation in 2021 through strong integration of marketing, application and admissions tools across the site.

Today, Hart assists Martin, the longest-currently serving chancellor among HBCUs and within the University of North Carolina System, as he approaches retirement later this year. She is simultaneously assisting the advisory committee charged with identifying his replacement – one of the most important searches in the history of this 132-year-old institution.

Beyond her professional accomplishments, Hart gives back to the community through a range of service commitments to Jack and Jill of America, the Grandiflora Chapter of The Links (the invitation-only national social and service organization of prominent Black women), Second Harvest Food Bank, The United Way of Greater Greensboro, The V Foundation and the Susan G. Komen Foundation.

Before A&T, Hart served in leadership roles within admissions and enrollment for more than 14 years at two institutions: Appalachian State University and Delaware State University. She earned her bachelor’s degree in communication and master’s degree in higher education administration from Appalachian State. She is also a graduate of A&T’s Executive Leadership Program and the UNC System’s 2021 Executive Leadership Institute.

She and her husband, Eric Hart, Ed.D., have two young sons.

TBJ will celebrate the 2024 class of Outstanding Women in Business during a business dinner Thursday, April 25, at Cadillac Garage in Greensboro. It also will recognize award winners online and in a special Friday, April 26, print publication.