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[secretme]

So... I swap leadership roles in my small sub-department with a person who is mostly hardworking but quite a  bit batty.  He is prone to disagreement and basically goes after adjuncts he doesn't like, unsuspecting secretaries, even fights with our supervisors, and (of course!) occasionally lashes out at me.  I like my job and location enough otherwise, and am about to swap the leadership positions such that I am somewhat in charge of our area (and in some regards, him) during the Fall.  I am kind of nervous because he basically threw together a rambling and unexpected memo during finals week about all these changes he wants to propose to our current program AND THEN promptly went on vacation.  I get the feeling our supervisor is tired of him, because she pretty much left it up to me if I support the memo/proposal and is now metaphorically slowly backing away from the crazy.

I am looking for any approaches to assert my concerns/dissent about massive program changes without becoming a target of the crazy, to avoid over-meeting with this difficult guy in general, and to also generally keep things light in case I am wrong and these sudden changes (or any other hare-brained schemes he dreams up) are somehow actually a good idea.  Any advice to a newbie who's a bit swamped before even beginning?  (I am already pursuing walks with the dog, more time with the kids, and plenty of yoga!)  Much appreciated!

[sinatra]

How is your financial situation in the area you supervise? A very common--and usually true--reason for not pursuing anything that would require major changes is that you are concerned about the financial impacts such a move would make. Beyond that, I would need a little more specific information about the types of changes being proposed. But if this person targets administrative assistants and adjuncts, unfortunately, you are going to need to sit down with hu for a meeting anyway. One that will definitely make you a target... So since you are going to be a target anyway, why not go for double or nothing?
Welcome to the job!

[rear_view_mirror]

If you have any spare time, make friends with as many adjuncts as you can. Although they have no real power, from the point of view of a dean or other third party, it will become that more evident what a bully he is.

[rear_view_mirror]

Maybe I got it wrong. He may be a bully but he also seems like a person with more enthusiasm than common sense.
If he wants sweeping changes to be made in his absence, that only he understands fully, my hunch is, it's not too difficult in any beaurocracy to find reasons why the changes may be found to be, well, a bit overambitious. If he doesn't have the supervisor on board, I don't think you have that much of a problem. I would just find a way to stall any incomprehensible or counterproductive idea, and blame it on circumstances, unless it's a popular idea. Then you probably have to try and do it.
Sorry if I killed your thread.

[brixton]

As a once Chair, now Dean, I use an easy strategy for instituting change.  We take a sliding scale, look at where we are and where we might want to be -- those are the beginning and end points of the sliding scale.  We then talk about what the first step is towards getting where we want to be.   In other words, how might we move from A to C this year?

This serves multiple purposes.  For the enthusiastic, but unrealistic department member, he feels listened to.  With the first step forward, he can see the difficulty of getting from point A to point G.  Occasionally it has served a very different purpose:  we take that first step, and I see how easy it is, so we do move quickly through the alphabet.  (We started a creative writing program that way, realizing that we actually had more resources on the campus than I oriiginally thought.) 

This strategy has been helpful for me because it also allows me to  see where my department/divisions sees us.  I may not agree with them, but at least it keeps me thinking about what we do well and what we might be able to do better without dismantling the whole program and then figuring out that I don't have a clue how to put it back together again.  (I also usually assign the early, heavy-lifting details to the person who wants the changes.  They have the investment, and it tends to slow them down when moving to the next piece.  It's the old:  How do you eat an elephant/one bite at a time issue.  Sometimes you take a couple bites and realize that you never really like elephant much to begin with...)

[larryc]

What he calls vacation is really your chance to build a coalition. Get busy.