Abstract
Although scholars have scrutinized many aspects of academic life in psychology, the topic of leadership for psychology programs has remained elusive. This article describes the importance of high-quality leadership in the development of thriving psychology programs. The author offers a strategy for evaluating leaders to help provide developmental feedback and to promote effective professional development in the administration of psychology programs.
National efforts in assessment of higher education have fostered the spirit of continuous improvement, motivating psychology faculty to strive for high levels of achievement in their programs. Benchmarking literature (cf. Boxwell, 1994) addresses appropriate guidance on the characteristics of high-quality operations. According to ReVelle (2004), benchmarking provides a framework based on an examination of best practices to determine how a particular performance compares to an appropriate reference group. Benchmarks routinely incorporate best practices to facilitate goal setting and attainment.
Although substantial scholarship exists on faculty performance, the same level of scrutiny has not transpired with regard to one of the most crucial ingredients in the complex set of factors that influence high-quality learning and teaching: the quality of the department chair. Gmelch and Miskin (2011) described departmental leadership as perhaps the most crucial and most unique university role in delivering high-quality experience; approximately 80% of decisions transpire at the level of the department (Carroll & Wolverton, 2004).
The job is remarkably complex. The ideal skill sets of chairing reflect expert knowledge in human resources, law, accountancy, negotiation, curriculum quality and reform, grants navigation, entrepreneurship, and development, among others. Chairs must contend with an array of characters that could populate a compelling novel: sociopathic students, hyperbolic helicopter parents, mercurial deans, and colleagues who sometimes ironically feel betrayed by a chair’s elevation, among others.
The job of chairing the department tends to be conflict laden. Gmelch and Parkay (1999) studied new chairs and determined that normal conflicts can compromise effective functioning in the chair role. The job tends to be inherently more solitary than the job of regular faculty role to ward off potential criticisms of favoritism. The nature of the work is comparatively fragmented since every long workday is likely to contain unpredictable elements, augmenting the feelings of lost autonomy. Chairs feel more pressures related to growing accountability requirements than do other faculty. The construction of memoranda substitute for investing time in the more traditional communication forms of faculty life related to the pursuit of grants and disciplinary research. The loss of discretionary time often means that chairs must either set aside or focus less on their research agenda.
New chairs tend to be thrown into the work with minimal or no training and may simply not last long in the job (Hecht, 2004). Thomas and Schuh (2004) estimated that competent function as a chair may take as long as 8 years to develop, but many chairs rarely function in place for 8 years. Gmelch and Miskin (2011) estimated that 20% of chairs vacate their roles each year. They also contend that the chair effectiveness is compromised by limited research on how to develop academic leaders. Although a variety of advising manuals exist to help chairs struggling with on-the-job training, there are few sources dedicated to helping chairs figure out the quality of their contributions and to help them set direction for how to improve the climate to foster high-quality teaching and learning.
The purpose of this article is to provide benchmarks for effective leadership in psychology programs. First, we will examine why anyone would take on such a challenging job. Then, we will explore the various facets of administrative work in psychology using a set of benchmarks to address the preferred practices in administration. We will conclude with some advice on strategies for the optimal use of the benchmarking strategy.
Motives for Assuming Leadership
I do not know whether anyone has ever answered the question of “What do you want to be when you grow up?” with “A chair of a psychology department.” When graduate students make the intellectual and economic commitment to complete a doctorate in psychology, they focus their career-seeking activities on finding the right match for the teaching interests, research productivity, and service commitments, but rarely do young faculty think about administration as a viable career path. As a consequence, finding the right person to assume the chair’s difficult job can produce many unanticipated obstacles. In general, individuals typically “ascend” to chair responsibilities through one of the three general pathways: the rotating chair, the reluctant or defensive chair, and the career administrator.
The Rotating Chair
A long-standing method in traditional departments, appointment of a rotating chair, results in a short-term appointment for a willing individual for a specific, usually fairly brief, term of duty. The implicit agreement among department members is that the tour should be reasonably brief so as not to hamper the real career trajectory of the professor’s teaching development and research agenda. During the chronological course of the department’s function, all faculty will have the opportunity, or burden, to serve at the helm and then beat a retreat to faculty life to resume their true professional agenda.
However, the intricacies of higher education, particularly as accountability requirements have proliferated, and the growing complexities of the job militate against the rotating chair model. In fact, Gmelch and Miskin (1993) described such patterns as fostering instability and amateurism. In periods of economic challenge, the chair, who is merely serving a turn, is unlikely to help the department achieve its goals. The chair may accept the formal assignment but do very little to assist the department to fulfill its potential. At worst, the disengaged rotating chair places the department at serious risk. At best, a short-term chair may do some good, but any gains may not be sustained as the chair’s tour of duty comes to an end and another short timer begins a new tour of duty. Although this approach does provide the appearance of leadership and spreads the obligation equitably, it is unlikely that such conditions will produce high-caliber leadership that will help department members pull together to forge a high-profile program. In an economically challenged era, the very survival of the department may depend on its ability to offer evidence of attainment of high-quality benchmarks.
The Reluctant Chair
Another motivational factor that tends to differentiate candidates is eagerness to serve. Because of the personal cost involved (e.g., lack of control over schedule, lost time for teaching development or research agenda), many must be persuaded to serve. Faculty generally suspect overeager candidates out of fear that the new chair may misappropriate resources or otherwise enact personal agenda that may render harm to the department. A final motivational factor involves the expression of defensive posture.
In some cases, candidates may assume leadership roles out of fear, whether justified or not, that other candidates would do a worse job. Munger (2010) joked about taking a Myers-Briggs test early in his career in which his introversion, intuition, thinking, judgment profile resulted in this conclusion: “You are poorly suited for management…unless you are a university professor. You may be qualified for academic management because your colleagues are worse.”
Reluctant chairs are likely not to use the appointment as a power base from which to curry or grant favors. However, the reluctant chair may have a limited scope of vision and be less willing to invest the energies necessary to conquer the full range of complex demands. They may also end up overworking; they may refuse to delegate operational details to their colleagues for fear of imposing or out of avoidance for having tasks accomplished by those assumed to be inept, thereby neglecting opportunities to help pull the department together through concerted, combined efforts.
The Leader Chair
Alternatively, departments may ask for sustained service from individuals who appear to be particularly well suited to the challenges of administration. This quest often results in an external search for which individuals in the department may apply, but typically an external search concentrates on introducing new energy and new vision. The focus of a search for a leader chair will focus on the range of skill sets, motives, and experiences that will position the department more favorably in the future. Leader chairs tend to describe positive internal motivations for wanting to serve in this capacity that go beyond salary considerations. Indeed, Tiemann and Van Valey (2011) verified in a study of sociology chairs that the majority of academic leaders in their discipline report positive motives of protecting the department, enhancing their programs, or taking on new challenges as rationales for embracing the job.
Chairs who are pursuing leadership roles as a primary focus of their professional identities may be appointed for a specific term or may serve “at the pleasure” of the dean. Such leaders tend to endure through reappointment based on earning the high regard of their colleagues and supervisors; however, career-oriented leaders may also opt to move on to the next level after an appropriate term of service, leaving the department once again to search for and secure a new standard bearer.
A Rubric for Benchmarking Department Leadership
Dunn, McCarthy, Baker, Halonen, and Hill (2007) developed benchmarks by which undergraduate psychology faculty could judge the quality of their programs. Their work identified relevant domains of effort (e.g., advising, curriculum structure) in undergraduate psychology programs and described levels of functioning from distinguished through poor for various aspects of each domain. The authors suggested that departments could use the framework to foster comprehensive evaluations to contribute to self-study or external academic program review.
That approach will be adapted in this current exploration of departmental leadership for understanding and promoting more effective administration. The rubric for effective departmental leadership consists of six functional domains, including operational concerns, supervision issues, communication skills, interactions with supervisors, related professional roles, and character. Each of those six domains is further subdivided into the most prominent aspects of function that comprise the domain. We will return to the details of those functions in the following section.
The rubric describes a range of quality for each function using a 5-point scale. “Distinguished” performance represents a clear, compelling, and reliable strength in performance; this designation constitutes “best practice” or “preferred practice.” An “Excellent” rating captures a performance that is laudatory but does not quite achieve the magnitude of “Distinguished” performance. The mid-range designation of “Good” represents a blend of strengths and weaknesses for this specific function that suggests minor problems with reliable achievement. “Fair” performance tends to demonstrate more weaknesses than strengths. Finally, “Poor” designations are reserved for performances that render harm or represent disengagement by the chair.
Operational Concerns
Keeping a psychology department operationally on course represents the cluster of functions that are core to effective management. This domain includes the use of strategic planning to help the department achieve its goals and be consistent with the universities mission. Running an effective operation involves managing budgets to enable departments to live within their means. Astute department heads also recognize the connection between budgets and enrollment patterns.
Effective enrollment management can facilitate the best use of resources by careful planning to reduce or avoid undersized classes. In general, psychology courses tend to produce strong enrollments, as the major is typically one of the most popular on campus (American Psychological Association, 2008). However, challenges in managing the resources still abound. Effective managers do not have to engage in a flurry of activity to add or cut sections at the start of the term.
Effective managers also adopt an entrepreneurial approach to resource development. They recognize that by securing additional resources beyond base budgets, effective department heads can maximize the autonomy of the department. Once they recruit new sources of funds or friends, they serve as careful stewards of the investment to produce sustained advantages.
Chairs do not worry just about funds; they worry about friends. Chairs who are active in partnership development give priority to engaging in conversations beyond the confines of the department. These efforts can take the form of interdisciplinary collaborations, work with local business and agencies on the development of internships, or securing service learning opportunities for the improvement of student engagement. In such cases, the department’s reputation can loom larger in importance for the university’s service agenda. Because psychology has such powerful intrinsic interest, the prospect of developing friends for a psychology department may not be as onerous as friend raising in other disciplines.
Effective managers also demonstrate strategy in optimizing the membership of the department to promote heterogeneity. In this case, “managing diversity” across department members can include a reasonable representation of the subdisciplines of psychology. For example, a small department can little afford to invest two positions in social psychology if the major is going to provide experiences across the breadth of psychology. Similarly, department heads attend to the balance of gender, generations, and heritage to ensure that students from diverse backgrounds will find professionals with whom to identify.
Assessment planning has become a prominent feature of operations. Universities typically obligate chairs to provide assurance of learning through a thoughtful and reasonable assessment plan that will generate data for consideration at department meetings through the year. Although a chair may delegate the primary responsibilities involved in data collection and interpretation, the chair remains uniquely responsible for failures to comply with assessment activity that is now considered standard operating procedures due to regional accrediting agency demands. Distinguished assessment planning in psychology would entail being familiar with the growing literature of assessment specific to the psychology curriculum (cf. Dunn, Mehrotra, & Halonen, 2004).
Effective chairs also must be aware of the range of rules and regulations that will keep the department functioning without the entanglement of lawsuits and grievances. At minimum, the expertise involved in adherence to regulations may entail knowledge of the faculty handbook, tenure and promotion regulations, student handbooks, human resource rules, and perhaps collective bargaining agreements. This landscape has grown increasingly more complicated in recent years due to Family Education Right to Privacy Act (FERPA) regulations protecting student privacy, reporting practices for child abuse, and lock-down procedures to protect students during episodes of campus violence. In addition, psychology chairs should be familiar with relevant codes of ethics that govern practice, research, and education (see ethical principles of psychologists and codes of conduct hosted on the website of the American Psychological Association at http://www.apa.org/ethics/code/index.aspx).
Organizational skills represents a skill set that can contribute to or detract from all aspects of operations. Effective managers put in place systems that prevent them from missing deadlines. They pay careful attention to context (e.g., reading university news releases) to help them make connections to the tasks that will eventually wend their way to their administrative queue. They rarely create unnecessary work for others through careful attention to deadlines, context details, or other elements of successful work completion strategies.
Skilled leaders are accessible. The most effective leaders create availability opportunities through multiple means, both formal and informal. They post and hold office hours, manage by “walking around,” write newsletters, and keep appointments. Although time consuming, being available in predictable ways can minimize complaints about leaders being out of touch with their constituents, including faculty, staff, and students.
Table 1 summarizes how operational factors can be assessed over a full range of quality performance.
Benchmarks for Operational Concerns.
Supervision Issues
This category represents specific aspects of the chair’s job that involve working effectively with faculty and staff both on an individual basis and collectively to enhance department function as a whole. For example, effective chairs are concerned with identity promotion. They want department members, faculty and staff alike, to feel part of the enterprise and proud of the association. They take specific steps to foster involvement in decisions, and they listen carefully to constituent input. They also foster pride not just through association with the department but the discipline itself.
One of the trickier aspects of supervision is navigating boundary management. This emphasis entails the protection of student rights through vigilance about ensuring respect for FERPA, fostering respect for confidential treatment of touchy personal issues, and promotion of an appropriate climate free of sexual harassment or other forces that poison a working climate. The best managers work on climate concerns proactively rather than merely reacting to a “crisis du jour.”
Faculty development concerns should be a substantial part of a department’s chair’s agenda. Developing and executing individualized plans for mentoring and career advising can transpire either through formal or through informal means. These functions can also be delegated to a department member with strengths in colleague relationships. However, the point is that a chair knows the faculty at a level of knowledge that enables appropriate advice about career decisions, including when to say no to service obligations with an appropriate appraisal of the risk. Psychology chairs should also be familiar with the variety of professional development opportunities sponsored through the American Psychological Association, Society for the Teaching of Psychology, and other national and regional convention and conference opportunities (e.g., National Institute on the Teaching of Psychology; Best Practice in Psychology Conference).
Effective chairs recognize that the multitude of tasks that must be completed for the effective function of a department represents ideal opportunities for leadership development. Not only do chairs themselves pursue development opportunities, they conscientiously assign new activities to others in the department to enhance their understanding on the institution and to promote project completion. These opportunities can help an existing chair formulate reasonable legacy plans for what will happen when the chair vacates the position.
Higher education fosters quite a few opportunities to recognize high-quality teaching, research, and promotion. To address achievement promotion, effective managers understand what opportunities apply to their constituents and consistently and fairly advocate for their pursuit of those opportunities. Their scope is not limited just to campus awards and recognitions, but they may turn to outside agencies for additional sources of external validation. For example, they might nominate individuals for the Society of Teaching of Psychology’s annual teaching awards (see http://www.teachpsych.org/members/awards/eta.php) or for the National Academic Advising Association NACADA Advising recognition (see http://www.nacada.ksu.edu/Events-Programs/Awards.aspx). If there is no existing award to recognize exemplary contributions, they figure out independent means of recognition, even if that represents drawing public attention to the achievement.
Effective supervisors build community through celebration. Annual year-end celebrations provide a minimum strategy for helping community members thrive. More skilled managers pace celebrations to offset periods of hard work and underscore the manager’s appreciation for a job well done. One former psychology chair used a Thanksgiving feast as a departmental opportunity to acknowledge helpful contributions both from individuals within the department and from allies outside of the department. Such rituals fuel strong identification with the department and provide a welcome respite from routine.
Table 2 applies the benchmarking strategy to characteristics of supervision.
Benchmarks for Supervision Issues.
Communication Skills
The third domain of department administration captures the overall abilities of psychology chairs to connect with and influence others. This category begins with colleague interactions. Although no one is designed to get along perfectly with everyone else, effective chairs need to create that illusion. They are able to transcend their personal preferences and biases to interact in a manner that produces desirable outcomes for all concerned, including those colleagues who are less collegial, helpful, or appealing.
An element that contributes to success in communication is the degree to which managers demonstrate communication clarity and effectiveness. The skilled communicator has substantial control of both verbal and nonverbal communications to produce desired ends. They are sensitive to word selections appropriate to different audiences. The most distinguished performers recognize subtle nuances in desirable communications that grow out of disparate experiential or cultural backgrounds.
Conflict management is a prominent focus of departmental administration. The most successful department chairs accept that conflicts are inevitable and anticipate ways that conflict can lead to new and satisfying solutions. They strive to solve conflicts constructively and can often approach the challenge creatively. They are likely to recognize the personal challenges that conflict engenders and will take steps to minimize negative consequences from differences of opinion.
One of the primary communication characteristics that can influence the course of relations with supervisees is feedback accuracy. Exemplary managers strive to produce developmental assistance to their charges through feedback that is timely, accurate, and fair. They take into account extenuating circumstances in making calibrated performance judgments. When delivering feedback that is hard to hear and incorporate, they take special precautions to deliver the conclusions in a way that will minimize bad feeling. Consequently, effective managers tend to get positive reviews for their feedback quality even from those who receive negative feedback.
A department chair is an agent for the collective faculty being served in the department. Chairs differ in their reputations, but their reputations clearly reflect on the department’s representation to campus community. To the extent that the chair has a solid reputation, the department will benefit because the perception will be that the department is in good hands. To the extent that a chair’s style produces an abrasive effect, the department will suffer from lost opportunities.
Table 3 suggests benchmarks that can promote effective evaluation of communication strategies.
Benchmarks for Communication Skills.
Interactions With Supervisors
Part of what makes the chair’s job so challenging is the balancing act that must transpire between keeping department members happy while simultaneously satisfying the dean. On many occasions, there may be a clear conflict between what will be satisfying to one entity or another. In such circumstances, the chair will actively be caught in the middle. Those tensions can erode enthusiasm for the job over time. However, a variety of tactics can assist chairs in developing strong relationships with the dean starting with responsiveness to requests. Exemplary chairs not only respond to all reasonable administrative requests but, whenever possible, heed the call for volunteers. Occasionally, deans will need chair-level expertise in committees or as emissaries to external groups. Volunteering reduces the workload for deans and tends to produce a stronger social bank account that can offset future troubles.
Many chairs believe the less contact with the dean, the better. They are not likely to thrive in their roles with this style of contact frequency. Better chairs take advantage of any and all opportunities to connect with a supervisor to maximize advantages for the departments. The contact may transpire as a regularly scheduled supervision meeting or an informal opportunity at the faculty club, community event, or charity golf competition. However, the underlying philosophy is to reduce the high drama quality that often transpires when contact is too limited; in such cases, rare encounters must necessarily cover too much territory for mutual comfort.
Disclosure strategies tend to vary as well. Better chairs are strategic about determining the value of information they need to impart “above their heads.” Too much detail about minutia can be alienating to supervisors; too little detail can leave a dean feeling out of the loop. Purposefully failing to disclose potentially turbulent situations that might “blow up” virtually guarantees that they will. Better chairs are intentional in making sure that disclosures are relevant, well timed, and useful for navigating what is in the best interest of the institution as well as the department.
Deans are allergic to “end runs.” Better chairs also understand the significance and value of abiding by the chain of command. Not only do they stay “in channel” when addressing concerns and complaints, but they make a point to counsel others in the unit to behave in a similar fashion. Respecting the chain of command minimizes the chaos that can result when too many individuals are working independently to resolve the same problem. In addition, the accretion of detail and perspective as one gathers additional information while moving up the chain can promote more viable solutions.
Where reasonable to do so, competent chairs will solve problems without asking for supervisor assistance or clarification. This problem-solving autonomy helps to establish the chair’s campus reputation for understanding how things work on campus and for expert navigation of the challenges. Even when problems are complicated, the chair can figure out the best path for resolving the problem without involving the dean. However, they also know when it is legitimately time to call for assistance. Chairs who are destined to be short timers involve supervisors in even the most minor challenges; they simply wear out their welcome. Highly unskilled chairs may invoke the threat of the dean’s displeasure as a way of motivating faculty when their own persuasiveness is not successful.
Department chairs must necessarily provide department advocacy in working with those who have a larger say in the distribution, enhancement, or diminishment of resources. The most effective chairs strive to balance the requests they make in the larger institutional context. For example, although they have a pressing need for a new line, they may yield and withdraw the request when confronted with more robust enrollment patterns in competing departments. They recognize that to yield gracefully during some times of high tension will build their social credits and perhaps yield better results in the future linked to their good sense and cooperativeness.
Table 4 provides benchmarks to address the dimensions of relations with supervisors.
Benchmarks for Interactions With Supervisors.
Related Professional Roles
Just because an individual assumes the complex responsibilities of being a chair does not mean that the chair leaves other aspects of being a faculty member behind. Gmelch and Burns (1993) reported that pressures on chairs are effectively doubled. Chairs are not only expected to be effective institutional leaders but also should serve as appropriate models of faculty activity. This domain addresses all the ways in which the faculty remain active as teachers, scholars, and servants beyond chair responsibilities. It is not expected that every chair is likely to exhibit distinguished performance in all dimensions; however, many chairs continue to provide exemplary performance in the dimensions that are most professionally meaningful.
Most undergraduate psychology chairs continue to teach despite the abundant workload they must assume as a chair. However, the caliber of their teaching effectiveness may vary wildly. Some will be able to deliver high-quality student learning experiences as indicated by strong teaching evaluations, overflowing classroom enrollments, and even award nominations. Others find that the strain of responding to the more chaotic demands of administration will take a toll on their classroom preparation time and settle for levels of accomplishment that are merely satisfactory rather than stellar.
Another arena that often demonstrates suppression of activity because of chair pursuits is the scholarly agenda. Particularly, when chair activities limit the number of uninterrupted hours available for research design, data collection, and scholarly production, the chair’s research agenda typically takes a back seat to other more pressing concerns. However, particularly well-organized chairs can still lead high-quality research activities that can contribute broadly to the department’s recognition among their peers. The agenda can also include participation in grants, but normally the time constraints dictate these activities are more likely to be successful when chairs assume the status of co-principal investigator (Co-PI) rather than PI.
Chairs differ in the degree to which they pay attention to currency of scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL). Many psychology chairs make a point of reading Teaching of Psychology or other general journals that can keep them apprised of developments in teaching and learning strategies, including knowledge of relevant curricular guidelines (APA, 2005). The quality of attention that they pay to the curriculum and its delivery is directly reflected by their awareness of the literature. On the other hand, some chairs see SoTL work as less valuable or as an intrusion in their ability to navigate curricular matters instinctively.
Community service opportunities tend to be enhanced for individuals serving as the chair, because they may be the first point of contact for outside agencies offering potential opportunities to the department. Some chairs embrace service commitments on the larger campus or in the local community because these uniquely satisfy their own values and it simultaneously enhances the department’s reputation. Fortunately, a psychological perspective is often perceived as valuable in community services, so opportunities should be abundant for the chair. On the other hand, some chairs will feel so overwhelmed by the routine commitments of their work that other service obligations will be substantially reduced.
A final related professional role involves rendering disciplinary service. Chairs may remain active in their professional societies, but they will need to make some decisions about how to allocate their discretionary time. For example, should they attend the annual convention of the Society of Industrial and Organization Psychologists or instead reserve funds to head to the Council of Graduate Departments of Psychology (COGDOP)? Many chairs will opt toward the latter because their dominant role is administrative and COGDOP would provide the greatest help in that aspect of the job. Despite the challenges, many chairs remain active in disciplinary societies, up to and including serving in leadership functions. It is not unusual to see the presidency of the Society for Teaching of Psychology held by an individual who is also simultaneously serving as a department chair.
See Table 5 for the complete benchmarking rubric on related professional roles.
Benchmarks for Related Professional Roles.
Character
The last of the dimensions is the most controversial. Abraham Lincoln stated, “Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.” Appointment to the chair’s job does provide new access to power. Many individuals handle the responsibility with panache, whereas others fare poorly and consequently threaten the larger well-being of the department. Table 6 applies the benchmarking framework to aspects of character.
Benchmarks for Character.
Chair performance makes problems of ethical judgment transparent. Effective chairs will demonstrate an appropriate moral compass, doing the right thing for the right reasons, not just to promote the most effective problem-solving strategies but also to model preferred behavior within the department. When one’s moral compass is off, it will have damaging effects that will show up in the other dimensions described in this domain.
Concern and respect for others should be an implicit factor in the decisions and judgments the chair will render. Demonstrating respect and concern can be complicated by sociocultural differences between chair and supervisees. However, the exceptional chair makes explicit the intention to show respect and concern even in heated circumstances. A related dimension is decisions that demonstrate equity. Effective chairs work hard to render equitable judgment even in small details. They strive to overcome personal preferences and avoid favoritism in making assignments or distributing resources.
Similarly, effective chairs take quality of life into account when making decisions that are meaningful to faculty. This gesture may translate to making teaching assignments that provide for extended blocks of time to promote scholarship or accommodating preferences about time of day to facilitate more functional classes. However, the emphasis of quality of life concerns is apparent at the end of deliberations.
Chair temperament also contributes to perception of character. The most successful chairs manage emotional control even under the most stressful of circumstances. Chairs with more mercurial temperament will complicate relationships in the department by giving off messages of unapproachability. Linked to temperament is the demeanor that supports delivering developmental feedback. Some chairs are hypercritical in both the speed and the depth of their feedback when others disappoint them. On the other hand, effective chairs tend to show constructive criticality. They strive to provide accurate and careful feedback to produce optimal outcomes.
A trio of related characteristics also builds chair reputations: courage, candor, and trustworthiness. Chairs are often confronted with difficult situations that require immediate, authentic, and deft handling. Effective chairs steel themselves to manage the unpleasant, maintain honesty in their communications, and succeed in being trustworthy.
A final characteristic that rounds out sound character is the ability to admit responsibility for own error. Tolerance of error is essential because humans are destined to deliver flawed performance from time to time. Effective chairs are patient with error and try to construe errors as opportunities to learn in the performance of both others and themselves. Effective chairs see the development of error as an opportunity to derive new solutions.
Using the Rubric
Although faculty routinely endure evaluations from above (the chair) and below (the students) as a regular part of the evaluation of higher education landscape, formal evaluations of chairs and their contributions tend to be less systematic or predictable. At minimum, upper administrators should undertake a comprehensive evaluation in advance of decisions about whether or not a term of service should be extended. For example, if a chair is in the final year of a 4-year term, a comprehensive evaluation early in the year will assist all concerned in either providing direction for the second term or preparing for a replacement strategy, an activity that can consume much of the academic year.
An optimal implementation of the rubric involves triangulating ratings on the various dimensions among the chair’s supervisor, the collective judgment of those whom the chair supervises, and the chair. Feedback sessions on chair performance can concentrate on providing appropriate reinforcement for areas perceived as strengths across groups. Similarly, low ratings across groups can serve as the basis for goal setting if the low ratings are in areas deemed critical by the chair’s supervisor. Discrepancies among the three sets of ratings can also be explored to determine why perceptions differ.
Once baseline ratings transpire, the benchmark profiles can also be examined in subsequent administrations to determine progress over time. Redeploying the process in subsequent years can verify whether the chair is effectively dealing with relative weaknesses as evidence of professional development planning.
The value of such deep evaluation strategies is substantial. Being able to recognize aspects of function that are less well developed can render the chair more attuned to problem areas and perhaps more open to alternate strategies. However, being willing to subject oneself to this level of scrutiny also signals to constituents that assessment is a helpful tool, regardless of the target of measurement. The strategy helps to legitimize the pervasive practices of evaluating faculty.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.