Academic culture now places high expectations on researchers to demonstrate research productivity alongside teaching, leadership and knowledge exchange. In two studies of researchers across career stages in UK higher education institutions (HEIs), we examined workplace climate within academic departments as (1) supportive of researchers' needs for…

Purpose: This research aims to investigate and define the eight wastes of lean philosophy in higher education institutions (HEIs) by proposing a multi-stage model. Design/methodology/approach: The authors have used a specific multi-criteria decision-making method, fuzzy decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory, to investigate the…

Studies since the mid-1980s suggest that university heads of schools experience the role as a series of tensions between enlightenment and enterprise-building agendas. It is apparent that the headship requires skills in management and capacities in leadership not necessarily furnished via typical academic pathways. In such light, the present…

For the study we report here we used the theoretical framework of organizational justice to examine academic administrator's perceptions of resource distribution decisions. We asked deans, school directors, and department chairs in one midwestern state about their perceptions of the fairness and likelihood of use of various distribution principles…

This paper investigates the efficiency of university departments in science, technology and medicine in an Italian Region (Lombardy). The aim of the paper is twofold: (i) to analyse the changes in productivity in recent years (from 2004 and 2007); and (ii) to detect factors that are potentially affecting efficiency. The research benefited from a…

Research leadership in Australian universities takes place against a backdrop of policy reforms concerned with measurement and comparison of institutional research performance. In particular, the Excellence in Research in Australian initiative undertaken by the Australian Research Council sets out to evaluate research quality in Australian…

American Sign Language (ASL)-English interpreting education, which began as a community apprenticeship and vetting process, has within the last several decades moved into higher education. Most recently, the number of baccalaureate-granting ASL-English interpreting programs have continued to increase while the number of associate's degree…

Change itself often threatens efficiency. This is ironic, given that organizational changes are frequently made because of a need for increased efficiency. Academic departments within a wide variety of institutions are wrestling with this irony on a daily basis. Expanding systems and staffing, and adoption of new computer systems, all intended to…

Promoting academic departmental productivity requires vision, passion, and sensitivity while coping with the rapid pace of change. This paper presents 10 proven strategies for managing some common challenges faced by academic department chairs: (1) building a sense of family purpose; (2) establishing mechanisms to assure accountability; (3)…

A discussion of college faculty renewal looks at the word's etymology and at concrete ways for departments and their administrators to promote quality faculty research. It also describes four archetypal examples of faculty in need of research renewal, each related to literary history and the workings of a research committee. (Author/MSE)

Reviews the roles the department chairperson is expected to fill and offers a firstline defense against burnout. (PD)

As departmental program review becomes more common in college resource reallocation, department heads will be key figures in decision making. They must know what evaluation criteria will be used, such as program role in institutional mission, enrollment or credit-hour production, job-market demand, external support, program quality, and…

In this study, the social structure and output of scholars at the University of Illinois are examined in terms of the task characteristics of their academic areas. On the basis of an earlier multidimensional analysis, academic task areas were clustered according to their: (1) concern with objectivity and physical objects; (2) concern with…

The installation of 275 microcomputers in 34 academic departments over 18 months at the University of California, Santa Barbara, is discussed. This undertaking by the Provost's Office of the College of Letters and Science was designed to enhance faculty productivity by increasing access to computing, and to enhance administrative support to…

Resources available to department chairs from the following sources are described: the department's discipline; the national higher education community; the local institution; and the chair's own skills, background, roles, and structural placement within the organization. The use of these resources to deal with common problems faced by chairs is…