Another factor I would note here is an increase in the number of administrators who are hired externally, rather than promoted from within, at least in the category of institutions where you and (barely) I work. I think you're right that "such leaders seem more and more reluctant to call upon their own working histories to forge some form of connected empathy," but a big piece of that reluctance is probably due to their own working histories being at other institutions, with different norms and traditions. It can get kind of tiresome to hear "Well, at my former institution, the way we handled this was..." over and over again, in a way that undermines the empathy you would otherwise be able to generate from that history. My sense is that in the past it was much more common for people to rise through the ranks, as it were, without changing institutions, but more and more that's looked down upon, because it's more prestigious (in a "US News Academic Reputation" sort of sense) to hire a rising star from elsewhere than to promote one of your own. That acts to widen the gap between faculty and administration even more.
(Promoting from within doesn't completely avoid this problem, of course, but it probably helps at least a little bit...)
Word, Tim. I am leaving and will not be looking back, because this crisis seems to have opened the doors to a re-modeling of my liberal arts college that will rip away most of what I spent the past 27 years trying to build. You are too right about the anomie stalking academia, as well.I call my Durkheim as I see him.)
I honestly believe that places where the leadership can see a financial crunch coming are so, so much better off laying all the cards on the table honestly and clearly with faculty far in advance of the crisis moment, and enlisting students and alumni in that discussion. No withholding, no secret side conversations. I know some people think that's unrealistic or utopian, but I think it's utterly pragmatic. I think it's actually the only way to do it right. From the mid-19th Century on, American colleges and universities that have tried to deal with serious problems in what we now conventionalize as a "business model" behind closed doors have generally created conditions that lead to the closing of their doors for real. Those that have enlisted everybody to build a better barn, Amish-style, have survived, for the most part. But you can't conscript people to join in an act of shared faith--everyone's backs have to be in the labor from the outset.
Another factor I would note here is an increase in the number of administrators who are hired externally, rather than promoted from within, at least in the category of institutions where you and (barely) I work. I think you're right that "such leaders seem more and more reluctant to call upon their own working histories to forge some form of connected empathy," but a big piece of that reluctance is probably due to their own working histories being at other institutions, with different norms and traditions. It can get kind of tiresome to hear "Well, at my former institution, the way we handled this was..." over and over again, in a way that undermines the empathy you would otherwise be able to generate from that history. My sense is that in the past it was much more common for people to rise through the ranks, as it were, without changing institutions, but more and more that's looked down upon, because it's more prestigious (in a "US News Academic Reputation" sort of sense) to hire a rising star from elsewhere than to promote one of your own. That acts to widen the gap between faculty and administration even more.
(Promoting from within doesn't completely avoid this problem, of course, but it probably helps at least a little bit...)
Maybe.
But yes, increasingly, the grass-is-greener ideology also affects this.
Word, Tim. I am leaving and will not be looking back, because this crisis seems to have opened the doors to a re-modeling of my liberal arts college that will rip away most of what I spent the past 27 years trying to build. You are too right about the anomie stalking academia, as well.I call my Durkheim as I see him.)
I honestly believe that places where the leadership can see a financial crunch coming are so, so much better off laying all the cards on the table honestly and clearly with faculty far in advance of the crisis moment, and enlisting students and alumni in that discussion. No withholding, no secret side conversations. I know some people think that's unrealistic or utopian, but I think it's utterly pragmatic. I think it's actually the only way to do it right. From the mid-19th Century on, American colleges and universities that have tried to deal with serious problems in what we now conventionalize as a "business model" behind closed doors have generally created conditions that lead to the closing of their doors for real. Those that have enlisted everybody to build a better barn, Amish-style, have survived, for the most part. But you can't conscript people to join in an act of shared faith--everyone's backs have to be in the labor from the outset.