Academics DO make the best university leaders
Amanda Goodall has published a brief piece on why academics make the best university leaders. It’s a powerful argument and it is difficult to disagree with Goodall’s thesis – top universities do need top academics to lead them. Goodall’s recent book, Socrates in the Boardroom, makes this compelling case in more detail.
And yet. There is a suggestion here that it is sufficient simply to appoint a top academic. That, somehow, everything will come good if only the university can find the right leader, someone with the strongest academic credentials, with the most citations:
Why should scholars lead universities? In short, it is because the knowledge acquired through having been a career academic, provides the necessary wisdom to make the right decisions when that person becomes a leader.
The core business of universities is research and teaching. My research suggests that in specialist organisations, such as universities, experts not managers make the best leaders and that the performance of universities improves if they are led by presidents, vice-chancellors or rectors who are outstanding scholars.
Take Queen Mary, University of London. It went from 48th position in the Times Higher Education RAE ranking in 2001 to 13th in 2008. Who led Queen Mary? Adrian Smith, one of the most distinguished academic leaders in post at the time.
My research shows that the higher up a university is ranked globally, the more likely it is that the citations of its president will also be high. In other words, better universities appoint better researchers to lead them. Interestingly, US universities select more distinguished academics as leaders compared with universities in Europe and the rest of the world.
It is not only current performance that is affected. The research shows that the higher a president’s lifetime citations, the more likely it is that the university will improve its performance in future research assessment exercises. Why?
Leaders who are scholars have a deep understanding of the core business and, therefore, are more likely to create the right conditions under which other scholars will thrive. Similarly, professional managers will create the necessary conditions for other managers. These are not interchangeable situations.
The outstanding scholar leader is necessary, I would suggest, but not sufficient. Goodall also argues that:
An administration beset with burdensome managerial processes will likely have a negative impact on the productivity of researchers
Again, agreed BUT if a university simply disregards the importance of a first class administration to support first class teaching and world-leading research then it will end up with disorganised, chaotic and expensive processes which hinder rather than help -it is this scenario which has the most negative impact on the productivity of researchers. It’s like building an excellent football team but paying no attention to the pitch, stadium or finances. You might perform well for a time but not sustainably. And sooner or later those star players will get fed up with washing their own kit, selling programmes and clearing up the stands after the game.
There is also the suggestion here that if only the “power” of the manager could be reduced then academics would be free to deliver on the core business:
The increase in managerial processes is correlated with a rise in the number of university managers: between the years 2003-04 and 2008-09, the number of managers employed in British universities increased from 10,740 to 14,250 (up 33%). During the same period, academic staff rose in numbers from 106, 900 to 116,495 (up 10%) and students rose from 220, 0180 to 239,605 (up 9%), according to the Higher Education Statistics Agency.
It is somewhat surprising, therefore, that specialists in universities – academics – should be expected to concede power to generalists, or managers.
The category of managers identified here makes up only around 7-8% of all non-academic staff in universities and the HESA data doesn’t reflect differences in the way institutions record different kinds of professional staff. For example, some universities will now describe the most junior non-academic staff, who might previously have been categorised as secretaries, as managers, simply because of general moves away from more traditional nomenclature.
However, the key question here is what are these managers doing? In the best institutions, their primary concern is to support and encourage the best academics to do what they do best, to minimise the distractions and to reduce the unwelcome and bureaucratic incursions of the state into academic life.
Top leaders need top lieutenants too. Leaders need to be free to lead and therefore need to focus on the core business as Goodall says. To enable this to happen, the management needs to be strong, supportive and effective. Not dominant but a key element of the infrastructure for success.
The statistics can be seen in another light – the ratio of managers to academics rose from 10.05% to 12.22% over the timescale, which is a less inflamatory way of viewing the numbers.
The usual academics slant that administrators take pleasure in imposing administrative processes on them (as if we do it just for that reason). Much of the pressure that has led to increased bureaucracy in the academy has been due to the increasing need for government in all its forms (BIS, HEFCE, QAA, Home Office et al) to monitor and measure outcomes, to ensure they are getting value for money when they fund HE, and to protect consumers of HE (of all kinds). This scrutiny is demanded by politicians in response to meeting the need of the public to ensure their ‘taxpayer dollars’ and fee monies are well spent. I’d rather say that adminstrators are shielding academics from all of this externally-imposed bureaucracy as best we can (as you imply with your football analogy).
“However, the key question here is what are these managers doing? In the best institutions, their primary concern is to support and encourage the best academics to do what they do best, to minimise the distractions and to reduce the unwelcome and bureaucratic incursions of the state into academic life.”
Well said. I would like to move to one of those universities, because mine sure ain’t like that.
Thanks for this, Paul. Important topic.
I agree that it is difficult for “outsiders” (non-academics) to understand higher education. But it is equally difficult for academics who have worked primarily as subject matter experts and teachers for much of their careers to take on the very different task of managing an organization, particularly one as decentralized and politicized as the academy.
Also . . . you wrote:
“My research shows that the higher up a university is ranked globally, the more likely it is that the citations of its president will also be high. In other words, better universities appoint better researchers to lead them.”
I think what this relationship may suggest is that the more prestigious schools (those that are highly ranked) tend to be more traditional. And in traditional institutions, the organizational culture tends to be less open to outsiders acting as leaders. To the extent that this is the case, the correlation between high-ranking unis and academics as leaders is misleading.
Keith
Another great blog post. I agree with John Britton that most administrators do a lot of shielding academics from external pressures. In my own institution, we try to protect academics from themselves. They complain regularly about red tape, but we do try to keep them out of court and we try to make them see the folly of over-complicating their own academic policies.