Deans and provosts hold some of the most powerful, well-paying positions in academe. So why do so few of them publicly admit that they wanted the job? Why, when you ask them, do they often say they never aspired to be an administrator, that the role was thrust upon them, that they're just taking a turn?
Personal ambition may be valued in the corporate sector, but it's not in the academic world, or so many academics suggest. When we interviewed deans and provosts in recent weeks about why they got into campus administration, we invariably heard remarks like, "I feel that I have an obligation to give something back."
The truth is, more people are interested in academic administration than let on, says Janice C. Schach, dean of the College of Architecture, Arts, and Humanities at Clemson University. People conceal their administrative longings, she says, because "other faculty members look at you with suspicion when you say out loud that you're interested in administration."
It's a phenomenon of academic culture: "There's a perception that administrators are burned-out scholars turned bureaucratic drones or academics whose fire was never ignited in the first place," says Stanley Fish, dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
Actually, Mr. Fish says, showing a degree of reluctance for an administrative job can be an effective career strategy. If you let others talk you into applying when you're first approached, you may get the search committee into the posture of petitioning you to apply. "Then, in the relationship between you, you'll have the psychological advantage," he says.
Even if you plan to keep your administrative ambitions quiet, there are many steps you can take to get on the management track, according to those who have made that leap.
Position yourself. Know and understand the issues that the administration is working on, as opposed to simply the issues in your own department, says Adrian Tinsley, president of Bridgewater State College. Take on an additional role -- as a program director or a department chairman, for example -- where you can acquire budget and supervisory experience and demonstrate your leadership abilities. Serve on the faculty senate or volunteer for committee work.
Choose your opportunities wisely. Find out the interests and priorities of the administration and get involved in those, says Sherry L. Hoppe, president of Austin Peay State University. "Your institution may have 30 standing committees, but the president doesn't attend all the meetings," she says. Get on the ones the president does attend, such as the strategic-planning committee.
Use your connections. Every organization has a political network, and you can use that to your advantage. Find out who has access to the president, and keep that person informed about the projects you're working on, even if you don't get to speak directly to the president. (A tip: The person who has the ear of the president isn't always a line officer with a fancy title.) If you keep the right people in the know, you may find support for your project that you otherwise would not have gotten. Or it could simply make upper-level administrators aware of the things you're doing, and thereby alert them to your potential.
Make a name for yourself off the campus, too. Don't limit your leadership experience to positions within the university, Ms. Hoppe says. Seek out opportunities on local community boards, at nonprofit organizations, or in your own professional association. Participating in activities outside your institution gives you added visibility and sends the signal that you're not a one-note scholar.
Find a mentor. Ask a person you admire, preferably someone who's in a position you aspire to one day, to show you the adminstrative ropes. Attend national conferences, professional-development programs, and administrative-leadership institutes -- such as the American Council on Education Fellowship Program or the seminars offered at Bryn Mawr College and Harvard University. They'll help you connect with administrators and learn about the issues that concern them. (See a previous Moving Up column for information about professional-development programs for administrators.)
Moving into administration can be a major adjustment, say many faculty-members-turned-administrators. And there are myriad issues you'll need to consider before taking the plunge.
As an administrator you'll have the opportunity to shape institutional priorities and to make critical decisions, but you'll also be blamed for many, if not all, of those decisions, says Ronald J. Troyer, provost at Drake University. "For every decision you make," he says, "there's always somebody who thinks it was the dumbest decision that has ever been made."
"Administrative work calls for constant teamwork, constant communication, and constant checking with other people to see if they're in line with the approach you're taking," says Jean Dowdall, a vice president at A.T. Kearney Executive Search, which handles searches for senior academic administrators.
In addition, you frequently serve as a "hood ornament," says Mary Cullinan, dean of the College of Arts, Letters, and Sciences at California State University-Stanislaus. "You're expected to be present at functions often for no other purpose than to show support."
Most faculty members set their own schedules and are used to working alone. "When you go into administration," Ms. Cullinan says, "you lose a lot of freedom. You have an office to run and a staff to supervise from 8 to 5, and you have to be there to answer the phone, read the e-mail, and meet with people, so it's really a traditional office job."
It's often difficult for novice administrators to come to terms with their new role, says Mr. Fish of Illinois-Chicago. "There's always the temptation to believe that the somewhat boring meeting you're sitting in, or the annoying conversation you're having with a petulant faculty member, or the awards banquet that you really don't want to attend, that all of these are interruptions of your work. They are your work."
Before you devote your energy to getting an administrative job, ask yourself, Are you and your loved ones prepared to put up with the demands of the job? Are you willing to give up family time and the time you normally devote to teaching, research, publishing, and working with students?
It's not that the life of the mind stops when you're an administrator, says John C. Cavanaugh, provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington. "You'll be productive," he says, "but in a different way. I still teach a regular course at least once a year, and I still publish in the psychology literature. But my publishing area has shifted, and I don't do as many data papers as I used to because I just don't have the time, so a lot of the stuff I do is much more collaborative than it used to be."
Be prepared to lose some friends when you move into administration. Faculty colleagues may feel like you've abandoned them for the "other side." Mr. Fish says a colleague told him that on the same day she accepted an associate dean's job, she attended a faculty party at which the hostess said, "Well, here's a room full of your former friends."
Ms. Cullinan says she misses the camaraderie she once shared with her departmental colleagues. As an administrator, you have a very different relationship with your administrative colleagues. "You're not with them because you all like English literature," she says. "You may be good friends with the other deans, but there's an element of competition among all the different administrative offices that are vying for budget and resources."
Once you're in an administrative job, you'll get calls about other positions out of the blue, says Wendy Wilkins, dean of the College of Arts and Letters at Michigan State University. "Almost as soon as I became a dean here, I started getting calls from headhunters," she recalls. "I hadn't even yet learned how to be a dean."
However, when you're still a faculty member, you'll probably need to take the initiative to get that first administrative job. So how do you do that without announcing your ambitions too publicly?
Let trusted colleagues who may be asked for nominations or suggestions know of your desire to advance, says Mr. Fish, and ask them to nominate you if an appropriate position comes along. (Never submit an application off the street, he says. It'll only diminish your chance of success.)
Don't be discouraged if it takes a while to land your administrative dream job. "I was a good candidate for never getting a position," Mr. Fish says. "By my own count, I got nixed about 24 times."
After you get your first administrative post, there's a fairly standard route of advancement, Mr. Fish says. Never take a lateral position at another institution, he adds, unless the institution is much greater in size or prestige. "You don't want to be seen as sidestepping," he says. "You want to be seen as advancing."
You'll do that more quickly if you move from university to university because you won't have to wait for that next position up the ladder to open up on your current campus, says David B. Ashley, dean of the College of Engineering at Ohio State University.
But there's a price to pay for moving up the administrative ladder.
The higher you go, the harder it'll be to return to the faculty, Mr. Ashley warns. "A lot of people who take on the position of chair don't have the ambition of moving forward, or the opportunity to move forward, and they can easily move back to their faculty role. But once you move to dean, particularly if you've changed universities to become a dean, your pathway back to the faculty is in many cases eliminated. You're not viewed as a faculty member anymore."
In other words, make sure that faculty life is something you're willing to leave behind.
