Over the next decade, the failure rate of private colleges will accelerate as financial reserves are depleted by these conditions: demographic cliff, rising operational costs, falling preference for degree, and tougher price completion. A recent report in The Hechinger Report[1] reports that more than a quarter of private colleges are at risk of failing in the next ten years.
A private college’s chance of surviving the next decade will depend on presidents who know how to manage power to reshape their colleges. Regrettably, most private colleges presidents come up through an academic system, which co-opts them into believing that change and presidential power is debilitating to the success of the institution. President, both aspiring and sitting chair, have learned that they are mere caretaker who are left playing the game of shuffling ideas though the faculty and hope something of the idea survives. Presidential power is further depreciated because most boards typically choose to avoid conflict and therefore thwart presidential use of power to make change.
This paper examines the presidential forfeiture of power, concept of power, and how power is constructed to effect change that serves the mission and interest of the college.
Why College Presidents Forfeit Their Power?
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- Dual governance, in which the faculty retain the right to veto academic decisions by the president;
- Presidents, who have been directed by the board to avoid conflict with the faculty;
- Presidents, who are wary of revising contracts, handbooks, board policy, and mission statements because they do not understand their prerogatives;
- Presidents, who believe that the college cannot risk bad publicity from large scale changes to policies, procedures, and programs;
- Presidents, who have not established a strong relationship with the board of trustees and have not clarified if the board will support major changes to academic or operational programs.
- Presidents, who do not understand financial reports nor the interrelationships between operation financial decisions and financial statements;
- Presidents, who do not have deep academic experience, as a result, they defer uncritically to the faculty on academic decisions;
- Presidents, who do not know how each of the offices of the chief administrators operate, as a result, they defer to the chief administrators on workloads, policies, procedures, budgets, and hiring;
- Presidents, who do not understand their discretionary authority or their control over resources that can be used to influence the support or damp the opposition of faculty or staff;
- Presidents, who do not understand how to conduct strategic planning and tend to defer planning to large groups, which diffuses responsibility for a decision and tend toward recommendations to continue the current course of action which is not working;
- Most presidents, who are risk averse, because a) they may not understand how their college operates, b) they came up through the academic ranks, which is inherently risk averse, and c) faculty tend to assume that the status quo is preferable and cannot be changed without destroying the tranquil state of the college;
- Presidents who are unskilled in basic management techniques or how to communicate decisions, delegate, authority and responsibility, efficiently manage the allocation of resources, or assess performance;
- Boards of trustees, who persist in micromanaging presidential decisions and meet with faculty and staff without inviting the president; thereby increasing a president’s risk aversion;
- Boards, who do not explicitly tell the faculty that they may only make recommendations to the board and do not make final decisions on hiring, policy, and procedures.
Why Are Presidents of Private Colleges Reluctant to Use Power?
The preceding discussion about presidential reluctance to employ power in decision making can be boiled down to the fear of the faculty. Simply put, the faculty conflict can destroy a president’s career.
Presidents often believe that faculty have greater power than they do because of board policy, contracts, governmental regulations, and accreditation standards. Even presidents, who clearly recognizes the signs of an impending financial crisis, may believe that their hands are tied because faculty power is stacked against them. Under this stress, presidents may shy away from eliminating academic programs, terminating excess faculty, reducing pay, or cutting academic budgets. It is not beyond the realm of possibilities that faculty will vehemently oppose a president attempting to reorganize to end severe financial distress. There are too many examples of faculty opposition that stymies change. In widely publicized cases, the immediate loser is usually the president because conflict and public outcry can end both a job and a career. If the college is in deep financial distress, and the faculty stops large scale changes to save the college, then they too will lose. In their case, the loss may not simply be the loss of a few colleagues, but everyone will lose their job when the college closes.
Basic Concepts of Power and Authority
Before we throw in the towel on making difficult choices and leading a major reorganization, let us first look at the concepts of power, authority, and how power can be used without destroying careers or the college.
Concept of Power
Power is the capacity of a one person to convince another person to serve the interests of both parties.
Power vs. Authority
Power is an overarching concept while authority is an element of power. The difference between the two is that power is accessible to all members of an organization, who may or may not further productivity. Power, per se is not formally assigned within an organization,
In contrast, authority is a grant of legitimacy for decisions and actions subject to corporate charters, state agencies, and state laws.[2] These grants of authority are assigned to certain positions in a bureaucratic organization. Authority establishes the right to direct others to follow orders in order to carry out the mission of the organization. A corollary is that another member of an organization cannot take on authority without the express approval of an upper-level manager/administrator and/or the sanctioning of the change by the board of trustees.
Use of Power in Decision-Making
Charles Dwyer, a noted authority on power in organizations at the Wharton School, describes power as the ability to determine and serve the needs of others to affect a decision that serves both of their interests.
According to Dwyer, members of an organization act in recognition of their self-interest that can be used to shape how we get cooperation.[3] As he sees an organization, it is a legal construct “that [is] nothing more than a [set of] means, tools, and instrumentalities in which members … can exploit for their purposes.[4] Dwyer points out that those purposes may include “power, security, respect, esteem, status, acceptance, approval, gratitude, appreciation, recognition, success, achievement, autonomy, …and transcendence.”[5] Dwyer further notes that leaders will deploy power to effect change by accessing the personal-value structure of the members of the organization
Summary
Large scale change in a private college for whatever reason is a power game that many presidents see as a losing proposition. Nevertheless, Dwyer points out that presidents can access the internal dynamics of their college to attain change. However, there are a few presidents who do take the challenge to save a college because they fear the consequences of losing the battle. Yet, there are presidents who survive a reorganization because they understand how power works and how to design change to serve the interests of the members of the institution. Of course, it is even a difficult task for these latter presidents, because they will need strong board support
Endnotes
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Marcus, John (April 13,2026); (Retrieved April 15, 2028); “More than a quarter of private colleges are at risk of closing”; The Hechinger Report; As one Vermont college finishes its last semester, a new projection shows that 442 more are at similar risk. ↑
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Gertg, H. H and C. Wright Mills, Translators and Editors (1946); From Max Weber Essays in Sociology; Oxford University Press, New York. ↑
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Dwyer, Charles (1991); The Shifting Sources of Power and Influence; American College of Physician Executives; Tampa, Florida; pages 13-14. ↑
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Ibid; p. 16. ↑
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Ibid; pp. 20-21.