A Retrospective View of Department Chairs: Lessons Learned

Abstract

D epartment chairs hold one of the most critical roles in academe and are key to the academic success of their institutions.The development and support of chairs cannot be left to chance, as they can also contribute to mediocrity and failure in colleges and universities (Ruben, De Lisi, and Gigliotti 2017).The time of amateur administration-where faculty play musical chairs, stepping occasionally into the role of department chair-is over (or should be).Despite the important role chairs play, there is limited research about the position.The department chair is among the least studied and most misunderstood management position in the United States.In fact, one of the most glaring shortcomings in the leadership area is the scarcity of sound research on the training and development of leaders (Gmelch and Buller 2015).With the exception of a few empirically based books in the last few years, the attention chairs receive in the literature is primarily anecdotal.In response, the UCEA Center for the Study of Academic Leadership launched a forty-five-question survey that attempted to collect information related to chairs' motivations, job functions, training, and stress.The survey was sent to 984 department chairs stratified by region, type of institution, and discipline, with a response rate of 31 percent (n = 305 department chairs).In this article, we provide an overview of the 2016 study of department chairs.The article also includes a retrospective look at a UCEA study of department chairs conducted in 1991 by Gmelch, Burns, Carroll, Harris, and Wentz, offering insight into the ways the chair role has evolved over the past twenty-five years.Both surveys contained similar questions that provide a basis for comparison.This article, the first of six in an ongoing series, will address the following questions: Who are department chairs?Has their profile changed over time?Why do chairs serve?How are they prepared and trained?What causes chairs the greatest stress?Is there life after chairing?And, if they had to do it over, would they serve as chair?These are just some of the questions we delve into in this series of articles.

The authors' abstract, as published at the source. The Department Chair, 2017 · DOI ↗