Haley Hamel

Haley Hamel serves as director of operations for Academic Affairs in the Office of the Provost at North Dakota State University, a role she began in March 2026. She provides operational leadership for the office and supports the coordination of initiatives across Academic Affairs, working to strengthen internal communication, align operations with university and North Dakota University System policies, and ensure that academic priorities move efficiently from planning to implementation.

Hamel came to NDSU from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, where she served as director of business and operations in the College of Journalism and Mass Communications from 2013 to 2026. In that role, she advised the dean's executive leadership team on policy, planning, and resource strategy and oversaw finance, HR, facilities, IT, communications, and business operations teams. She also co-led a campuswide redesign of HR workflows for a shared services center supporting seven academic colleges. Before her higher-education career, she spent five years on the staff of U.S. Sen. Ben Nelson, first as district office manager in his Lincoln office and later as director of scheduling.

At Nebraska, Hamel served on the Chief Academic Business Officers Committee, the Big Red Business Center Governance Board, and the RCM Budget Model Development Committee, and chaired HR for the Service Delivery Initiative Committee. She has been recognized with the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Staff Advocacy Award in 2025, the Staff Excellence Award in 2024 and, the Nancy Kenny Academic Business Leader Award in 2020.