Gallos Joan V. Bolman Lee G. - Reframing Academic Leadership

Contents

Copyright 2011 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Quotations from speeches of Arizona State University President Michael Crow in Chapter 7 used by permission of Michael Crow.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Bolman, Lee G.

Reframing academic leadership / Lee G. Bolman, Joan Gallos.1st ed.

p. cm.(The Jossey-Bass higher and adult education series)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-7879-8806-7 (hardback)

978-0-4709-2925-4 (ebk)

978-0-4709-2932-2 (ebk)

978-0-4709-2933-9 (ebk)

1. Educational leadership. 2. Education, Higher. I. Gallos, Joan V. II. Title.

LB2806.B583 2011

378.1'01dc22

2010042999

The Jossey-Bass Higher and Adult Education Series

To our family

Those who have paved the way:

Florence and Eldred Bolman

Elizabeth and John Gallos

Those who enliven the present and determine the future:

Bradley Garrison Bolman

Christopher John Gallos Bolman

Scott Parker Bolman

Lori, Barry, and Jazmyne Holwegner

Shelley, Christine, and Foster Woodberry

Edward, Cat, and James Parker Noel

... and Douglas McGregor

Preface

We wrote this book for readers who care deeply about higher education, appreciate its strengths and imperfections, and are committed to making it better. If you are comfortable with the status quo and aspire to no more than a paycheck, or if you believe that nothing short of revolution can save a dying industry, this is not your book. If you strive to be a leader with impact and a significant force for good, we hope you find in these pages a readable, intellectually provocative, and pragmatic approach to your work and its possibilities.

There are multiple roads to careers in higher education administration. Some leaders in student affairs, advancement, business, operations, and other nonfaculty posts bring extensive training in their fields and in higher education administration. Other administrators are scholars and educators who have made a conscious choice in response to disappointment with the pace and focus of faculty life or an honest assessment of their interests and strengths. Then there are the many accidental leaders for whom an administrative career just seems to happen. A nudge from somewhere combines with a willingness to serveto fill an unanticipated administrative gap, to take ones turn as a division chair, to use ones talents to salvage a program or launch a needed project. Before long, service turns into more than a temporary assignment. Many an interim becomes permanent after a year or so on the job. This sets in motion a series of choices, consequences, and rewards that can turn an initial administrative foray into a longer commitment. Sometimes the small detour becomes a longer journey down a road with no turning back: years away from teaching require retooling for the classroom, and scholarship once put on hold gets ever harder to restart as fields march forward.

The administrative world is different from faculty life, and it offers many rewards. Academic leadership is a highly social endeavor. The collaboration and partnerships needed to get things done foster a sense of community, connection, and shared purpose often missing in the isolation of the classroom, research desk, or laboratory. Much as we may complain about it, a calendar filled with meetings and events has its charms. Administrative life offers a pace, rhythm, and structure that focus ones time and energy. Deadlines and academic calendars encourage discipline and closure. And there is deep excitement and satisfaction in seeing tangible and measurable outcomes from ones efforts. A new degree program, dormitory, or sports complex has a durability and sense of completeness that are not always as easy to find in teaching and research.

But along with its benefits, academic leadership brings challenges and even heartaches, particularly in an era of political controversy, public doubts, technological changes, demographic shifts, mission drift (Kezar et al., 2005), and financial crisis. Higher education administration is demanding work that tests the mind, soul, and stamina of all who attempt it. We know because weve done it, and we have worked with many others over the years to help them learn to do it better. We have studied the factors that make the work so difficult, written about them, and benefitted from the research of colleagues. Colleges and universities constitute a special type of organization; and their complex mission, dynamics, personnel structures, and values require a distinct set of understandings and skills to lead and manage them well. That is what this book aims to provide: ideas, tools, and encouragement to help readers make better sense of their work and their institutions, feel more confident, and become more skilled and versatile in handling the vicissitudes of daily life.

Our approach builds from multiple sources. One is our experience both working in and teaching higher education leadership for more years than either of us likes to acknowledge. One or both of us have served as tenured faculty member, alumni affairs officer, principal investigator, academic program director, campus accreditation coordinator, department chair, dean, and special assistant to a university president. We have studied, lived, and worked in elite private and urban public institutions. We have years of experience teaching higher education leadership to aspiring professionals in graduate courses and to experienced administrators in executive programs and summer institutes. We hope this book reflects all that we have learned from our students, colleagues, and experiences.