General Problem

Hiring a college president is fraught with uncertainty about the capability of a president to lead an institution during a time of massive change in higher education.

Specific Problem

As threats like COVID-19, aggressive price competition, and sharp declines in the prospective student pool due to falling birth rates erode the financial stability of colleges, boards of trustees need presidents who can effectively lead in response to these threats. This problem is especially acute, when the board seeks a new president because they have been attuned to finding new leaders by drawing from candidates who have risen up the academic ladder. Too often academic leadership do not effectively groom candidates for institutional leadership. The academic ladder trains its leaders to avoid conflict by deferring to collegial decisions by the faculty: for class schedules, new programs, policy, and supervision. As a result, candidates from the faculty may not have developed the technical skills for institutional schedules, integration of new programs into the mission or support the financial sustainability of the institution, rigorously evaluate existing programs, or lead the faculty toward new methods or new institutional goals.

Solutions

In order to improve the probability of finding the best candidate for the presidency, boards need to change how they identify a new president. We recommend that boards take the following steps to selecting a president: Provide evidence of

  1. Academic technical skills – scheduling of classes, reviews of policy manuals, identification of inconsistencies in catalogs, assessment of programs, degrees, and new programs, how to connect the program to the job market, etc.
  2. Financial analysis of programs and degrees.
  3. Academic program connection to marketing – ability to identify target student markets and what students expect
  4. Leading a team versus deferring to a collegial decision.