Understanding Faculty Culture to Foster Institutional Success

Throughout my career in higher education, including service as a faculty member, provost, president, and trustee, I’ve had many conversations in which trustees, who often don’t come from academic career pathways, have expressed confusion around the concepts of academic culture and the associated foundational principle of academic freedom. Similarly, I have observed occasional trustee frustration with the pace of change in the academy. Sometimes, the very faculty trustees laud as professors who changed their lives are cast as obstacles to progress at the institutional level.

As someone who grew up adjacent to a college campus with parents (and neighbors) who were faculty, and who went on to become a professor, I had been immersed in higher education from my earliest childhood. Academic culture, academic freedom, and tenure were concepts I understood implicitly. When my career advanced to a point that I began interacting with trustees regularly, I wondered how I might draw on my own experiences as a higher education insider to translate academic culture to those less familiar with it.

Five tenets of how academia works stand out that I’d like to share. I hope that doing so further enhances trustees’ ability to support the institutions about which they care so deeply.

Understanding Academic Freedom and Tenure

Let me begin with a brief explanation of the foundational principle of academic freedom, and how tenure is tied to it. Simply put, academic freedom refers to the ability of professors, as experts in their respective fields, to teach the knowledge, theories, and facts associated with their disciplines without interference of outside entities that may have a vested interest in what is taught (and what is not taught). Academic freedom is a foundational principle on which higher education is based precisely because of historic attempts of governments, religious leaders, and others outside the academy to mandate what students should and should not learn. Tenure is granted by institutions to professors who have meticulously documented their excellence as teachers and scholars, and who have gone through a rigorous, multi-level evaluation over an extended probationary period (often six years). The purpose of tenure is to assure those professors who have established their competence through this review that the institution will protect them in the face of criticism about the teaching or scholarly work they do.

Let me provide a concrete example. Consider the case of a psychology professor who teaches a course on human sexuality. At the beginning of each semester, the professor surveys the students about what they most want to learn in the class and tailors the syllabus to address their responses. And imagine that the students are most interested in learning more about reproductive health. Thus, the professor typically spends several weeks at the beginning of the semester in this course on that topic, sharing up-to-date research on topics ranging from birth control to sexually transmitted diseases. One can easily imagine parents, politicians, business, community, or religious leaders may have opinions about what information they would like to be covered (or not covered) in the course. Such interested individuals may contact the president’s office with complaints. And they could even demand that the professor be censured or fired for what they are or are not teaching. Tenure provides the professor with academic freedom—with the protection to teach the current scientific understanding of the content, independent of outside influences. Professors in all disciplines teach controversial topics. Critical thinking and communication skills develop when students wrestle with difficult topics. Particularly in the contemporary (contentious) social climate, our faculty rely on their institutions to support them as they challenge students to think about difficult topics from multiple angles.

Accountability to the Academy

Beyond academic freedom and tenure, there are other ways in which colleges and universities operate differently than the workplace settings familiar to many trustees. In corporate contexts, supervisory relationships are clearly articulated both structurally and functionally. The same is not true among faculty in many academic settings in which the structures and functions often lead faculty to feel a stronger sense of accountability to their faculty peers (in the department and in the discipline) than to the administration.

Structurally, the faculty member may have a department chair, academic coordinator, or area head with whom they interact on a regular basis, while their actual supervisor may be a dean with whom they rarely interact. In addition, when trustees extend shared governance to faculty bodies (e.g., faculty assembly, faculty senate, faculty council), those bodies do not “report” to anyone. They are responsible for speaking and acting on behalf of the faculty on academic matters as specified in the bylaws of the institution. Although the president or provost can ask faculty organizations to consider certain things, they cannot tell the faculty body what to do.

Functionally, academia relies on peer review as a central component of responsibility and accountability. Whether annual performance reviews, pre-tenure reviews, tenure and promotion reviews, or scholarly engagement, faculty are evaluated by their peers—both on campus and by national or international experts. It is not surprising, then, when faculty feel a deep sense of responsibility to their faculty peers, department, and academic discipline relative to their sense of having an administrative supervisor.

Although this model may feel foreign to those who come to trusteeship from corporate environments, it is one that trustees should strive to understand as key to the function of the colleges and universities they support. Academic culture demands a different style of leadership than exists in hierarchical organizational environments. College and university trustees and presidents must work with faculty leaders in a collaborative—and not directive—way to bring about new initiatives, change, and significant institutional work.

Save Time: Build Consensus

Being collaborative takes time and patience. Academia is not a corporate environment in which a CEO sets expectations and middle level managers execute. Rather, effective presidents and provosts work with faculty governance bodies to clarify the questions to be answered, set timelines for feedback, and then make decisions.

Along the journey of shared governance, it is important to remember that faculty, as experts who operate in a community of experts, place tremendous value on expertise and voice. Within the faculty world, there is a commitment to having the opportunity to learn and to weigh in on the topic at hand. Faculty not only want this opportunity for themselves, but also for their faculty colleagues (and by extension, their staff colleagues and students). Thus, faculty governance relies heavily on processes that ensure widespread engagement and the building of consensus.

Across time, I have encouraged trustees to value the passion and thoughtfulness that faculty bring to the decision-making process, and to respect the value faculty place on process and consensus building. When presidents and provosts face pressure from trustees to speed up the pace of progress and to skip steps along the way that allow for engagement by the faculty, they may be met with faculty frustration and resistance. All too often, this results in a hard reset that ultimately takes more time than it would have taken had the initial process sought widespread engagement and input.

Faculty Are Gifted Critical Thinkers

Throughout my career, I have often asked those with whom I interact, whether fellow trustees, higher education leaders, faculty, staff, parents, alumni, and students—some version of this question: “What is the most important thing to learn in college?” The answers are uniform and focus on two things: critical thinking skills and communication skills. CEOs, HR leaders, and hiring managers alike emphasize the importance of new professionals being able to think critically and communicate well.

Fortunately, college students are taught by faculty who are experts in critical thinking, and who are adept at communicating in a way that demonstrates their critical thinking skills. After all, the terminal degree held by many faculty is the PhD (a doctorate in philosophy). Regardless of academic discipline, those who hold a PhD have gone through rigorous training to become expert critical thinkers and communicators. They poke holes in arguments and find inconsistencies in logic. And they passionately engage in intellectual debate. Indeed, colleges and universities hire faculty to model, teach, and foster these same skills into their students—skills that will position students for success in the professional world after they graduate.

And yet—when faculty apply their critical thinking skills to matters of institutional concern, whether aimed at trustees or senior institutional leaders, it can feel as if they are being adversarial, constructing roadblocks to progress. In such situations, it is important to remember that faculty are displaying the precise skills and passions for which we hired them and that we ask them to instill in our students.

Shared Governance Is Good Governance

Faculty work within an academic context where the culture is different than one finds in other organizational settings, especially in corporate contexts. Within that academic culture, faculty educate students, create new knowledge, and advance their professions. In fact, trustees delegate governance over academic matters to faculty precisely because of their expertise.

Trustees, then, need to rely on and support their presidents, provosts, and other institutional leaders as they lead effectively in a shared governance context. Institutional leaders need to get to know the faculty, and especially the faculty leaders, engage them in appropriate processes, foster consensus where possible, and then make decisions to move the institution forward. Presidents and provosts who have spent significant portions of their careers in higher education have learned on the job how to lead their institutions—even when faculty may not feel accountable to them, expect an inclusive process for expression of opinion prior to decision making, and bring their best critical thinking to their interactions with the administration.

In reflecting on my own experience growing up, both personally, and professionally, in the academy, and serving as a professor, provost, president, and trustee, I am deeply grateful for the independent and cooperative roles faculty, administrators, and trustees each contribute to the daily operations and future directions of their respective institutions. Understanding the mindset of our key partners—the faculty, has been invaluable in my career and across roles. I hope others will benefit from a lens into this mindset as well.

Kathryn A. Morris, PhD, is president and trustee of St. Lawrence University and trustee of Gettysburg College.