The

Successful
President
of Tomorrow
The 5 Skills
Future Leaders Will Need
TABLE OF CONTENTS

About the Author

4 Introduction
6 Section 1: From Steward to Change Maker
10 Data: Presidential Concerns and the Growing Pressures
12 Skill 1: Analyzing the Business Kelly Field is a Boston-
based freelance writer who re-

16 Skill 2: Innovating ports on higher education and

K-12 schools. She spent 13 years
as a reporter at The Chronicle of

20 Skill 3: Building Relationships

Higher Education, covering fed-
eral policy, student success, and
equity issues. In addition to The
Chronicle, her stories have

24 Skill 4: Careful Communicating appeared in The Atlantic, PBS

NewsHour, The Christian Science
Monitor, U.S. News & World

28 Skill 5: Managing a Crisis Report, and The Hechinger Report.

Her work has received recogni-
tion from the Education Writers

32 Section 2: New Pathways to the Presidency Association, including the Edwin

Gould Foundation’s Eddie Prize
for her series on efforts to get
more Native American students

37 A Final Word
to attend and graduate from
college. She speaks regularly at
education conferences and has
appeared on NPR, C-SPAN,
and other news-media outlets.
Contact editor@chronicle.com if you
have questions or comments on the
report.

Cover photo from iStock

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 INTRODUCTION

C
ollege presidents today face a barrage of chal-
lenges: Enrollment is suffering; in many states,
public funding is stagnant, while tuition revenue
is declining or only growing slowly; and demo-
graphics are shifting, driving institutions to ad-
just to a student body that is often older, more
racially diverse, and lower income.
These trends have strained college budgets,
forcing a growing number of colleges to cut ac-
ademic programs and, in a few cases, even close
their doors. At the same time, college leaders are
confronting unprecedented levels of public mis-
trust and skepticism. Americans want to know why college costs
so much, and they want assurances that their “investment” will
yield a well-paying job. Lawmakers are demanding a return on
public spending, too, with more states linking higher-education
funding to student outcomes.
“Ivory towers no longer work — even the Ivy Leagues can’t
hide behind their walls,” says Eduardo J. Padrón, the longtime
president of Miami Dade College. “A lot of what colleges do is
being questioned, and the public is demanding answers.”
The pressures on colleges are not all external. The risk of a
crisis or scandal erupting on campus seems like it’s never been
higher. College leaders today face a dizzying array of threats to
their institution’s reputation and security — sexual-harassment
complaints, admissions and athletic scandals, violent protests over
controversial speakers. And when a crisis occurs, it can go viral in
minutes, leaving leaders little time to respond, much less reflect.

the successful president of tomorrow 4 t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion

 If you’re a president — or someone who as-
pires to the job — you probably aren’t blind
to these trends. In most corners of academe,
the romantic notion of president as intellectu-
al-in-chief is gone, replaced by a clear-eyed real-
ism about the role.
“People come into it with great hope and ex-
citement, but they’re not naïve about the per-
ils,” says Judith B. McLaughlin, education chair
of Harvard University’s seminar for new presi-
dents. “It’s a complicated organization to man-
age under the best of circumstances, and for
many institutions today, it's not the best of cir-
cumstances.”
Conditions aren’t likely to stabilize anytime
soon. The number of high-school graduates is
expected to plummet in 2025, after increas-
ing slightly, according to the Western Inter-
state Commission for Higher Education, and
it could be years before state funding reaches
pre-recession levels. Barely half of presidents
are confident that their institution will remain
financially stable over the next 10 years, ac-
cording to a 2018 survey by Gallup and Inside
Higher Ed.
Presidents of the future will face funding
volatility, increasing student diversity, and con-
tinued scrutiny from parents and policy mak-
ers. They’ll grapple with tensions between free
speech and safety, and struggle to control the
narrative about events on their campuses.
These challenges demand a new kind of
leader, one who will make difficult, data-driv-
en decisions that prioritize student success.
They require an innovator and risk-taker who
will re-invent the business model while staying
true to institutional mission. And they require
an expert communicator — someone who can
make the case for change, calm the campus
t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion
culture wars, and convince the public that col-
lege is indeed worth it.
Based on interviews with more than three
dozen presidents and leadership experts, The
Chronicle has identified five essential skills pres-
idents and aspiring presidents need for what
lies ahead. The skills are: analyzing the busi-
ness; innovating; building relationships; careful
communicating; and managing a crisis. Most of
these aren’t new to presidents, but they have be-
come more critical as the times have changed.
And several of them connect — building rela-
tionships is key to leading change or mitigating
a crisis, for example.
In most corners of academe,
the romantic notion of president
as intellectual-in-chief is gone,
replaced by a clear-eyed realism
about the role.
This report breaks down the essential skills,
examines how the presidency has evolved, and
explains how the pathway to the top job is
changing. You’ll get practical advice about how
to lead change, communicate effectively, and
navigate controversy, and you’ll learn from the
successes — and the failures — of current and
former college leaders.
5 the successful president of tomorrow
 SECTION 1

GETTY IMAGES

the successful president of tomorrow 6 t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion

 TAKEAWAYS

From Steward Presidents must wear

more hats today.

The job now requires

being comfortable with

to Change Maker
almost constant
transformation.

Presidents need to be
more externally
focused while not
ignoring campus

I
dynamics.

t was a simpler time when Eduardo Padrón

became president of Miami Dade Community
College in 1995. The pace of change was slow-
er, and presidents had time to think, to read, to
converse with faculty members, he recalls. Presi-

84
dents were thought leaders and scholars, focused
on the internal affairs of the institution. They
%
could preside over colleges, stewards of a mostly
stable enterprise.
No more. Faltering finances, increased com-
petition, and heightened levels of scrutiny have
put college presidents on the defensive, forcing
them to turn their attention outward. To cut costs and of academic leaders say
grow revenue, they must forge new partnerships with they plan to start an online
or hybrid degree program.
other institutions and businesses; to compensate for cuts
in state funding or a decline in tuition revenue, they must Source: “Making Way for Innovation,” based on a survey
conducted for The Chronicle by Maguire Associates
spend more time cultivating donors; to regain the public’s
trust, they must get out into the community.

t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion 7 the successful president of tomorrow

 As external pressures mount, pulling presi- Indeed, the president of the future will be a
dents from their campuses, more colleges are change manager, leading the campus through
delegating responsibility for running the insti-
tution to their provosts.
But Laurence N. Smith, founder of New
Campus Dynamics, a leadership consulting For many presidents, success
firm, says “the outward-looking president and
inward-looking provost isn’t going to cut it” in
the future.
will depend “on their ability to
“Focusing on external activities is critical to
survive, but the president can’t be somebody reinvent themselves and their
who provides wisdom with a speech or two and
not be a part of the change process, the inno-
vation process,” he says. “The change needed is
institutions every five years, to
of such massive proportion that the leader has
to be immersed in it.” keep up with the pace of change.”

Advice for New Presidents

Being a new college president can be challenging, to say the least. Here is some advice from current and former
presidents on surviving the first months.

Model the behavior
you want to see in
students. Engage in
civilized public debate with
those you disagree with.
“Kids don’t listen to what
you tell them, but they see
what you do.”
— Daniele Struppa
president, Chapman U.
Struppa, a father of four,
says “The example is what
matters the most.”
Take a break. It might
even help you do your job
better.
— Sian Beilock
president, Barnard College
In psychology, Beilock’s
field of study, there’s a
phenomenon called the “in-
cubation effect”: when you
step away from a situation,
you’re able to see it in a
new way. “You don’t have to
be everything to everyone
all at once,” she says. “It’s
important to be able to ar-
ticulate your own needs.”
Get out from behind
your desk.
— Michael Sorrell
president, Paul Quinn
College
Sorrell has trimmed the
roses, swept hallways and
stairs, and cleaned dorms.
“I wanted to establish for
people that I didn’t think
any job was beneath me,
that I had respect for their
work,” he says. “That sent a
message to people.”
Watch the movie
Groundhog Day. The
character is trapped in
a time loop, reliving the
same day until he finally
gets it right. “University
presidents should realize
that every single day they
should keep at it. If they
don’t want to do that, they
should go back to the
faculty.”
— Michael Crow
president, Arizona State U.

Study up. Make a point
of learning whatever
aspect of the university
you’re least familiar with.
— Elizabeth Davis
president, Furman U.
For Davis, it was athletics.
Don’t take pushback
personally. “You have to
be thick-skinned, physically
robust. It’s not a job for
sissies.”
— Stephen Joel Trachtenberg
president emeritus,
George Washington U.
Get media training.
“You never know when you
will become world news.”
— Santa Ono
president,
U. of British Columbia
Get as many points of
view as possible. “It’s
a mistake to think there’s
only two sides to a story.”
— Teresa Sullivan
president emeritus,
U. of Virginia

turbulent times. For many presidents, success
will depend “on their ability to reinvent them-
selves and their institutions every five years, to
keep up with the pace of change,” says Philip
G. Rogers, senior vice president of the Ameri-
can Council on Education.
More than ever, college presidents are be-
ing told they need a similar set of skills as
their counterparts in the corporate world.
Dianna Sadlouskos, an executive coach, sug-
gests college leaders behave like wartime
CEOs, as described in Ben Horowitz’s book
The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building
a Business When There Are No Easy Answers.
They must push boundaries; foster disruptive
innovation; and show no patience for the sta-
tus quo.
“Peacetime CEOs have time on their side,
which means they can act more slowly, indulge
in more debate, and nurture individuals’ career
growth,” she wrote in a recent blog post. “War-
time CEOs must act quickly, decisively,” with
organizational survival taking precedence over
individual needs.
But there’s a key difference between college
presidents and CEOs. While business execu-
tives are judged primarily by the bottom line,
college presidents are evaluated against mul-
tiple measures of success — from graduation
rates, to fund-raising goals, to faculty produc-
RICARDO SAVI, GETTY
The president’s job is “much more complex
and demanding than it’s ever been,” says Edu-
ardo Padron, president of Miami Dade College.
t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion
More Than a College CEO
T
he role of college president often gets
compared to that of a corporate chief
executive. But some presidents say that
the comparison falls short. Here, three
people in a position to know, suggest other
comparisons:
Politician — Mary Marcy, president of
Dominican U. of California. “You have multiple
constituencies who are often competing, and
you need to reconcile and create a broader
vision that those constituencies embrace.”
Architect — Michael Crow, president of
Arizona State U. “Faculty are the intellectual
architects of the institution. I’m the architec-
tural enabler.”
Town Mayor — Sylvia M. Burwell, president
of American U. In a campus setting, “you’re
closer to those you serve” than in many other
organizations.
tivity indexes. “It’s difficult to do all of them
well,” says Mary Marcy, president of Domini-
can University of California.
College presidents answer to a wider range
of constituents than CEOs, too, with faculty
and staff, students, trustees, parents, and poli-
cy makers all staking a claim. That means they
must be shape-shifters, capable of playing mul-
tiple roles, to multiple audiences.
“Throughout the course of a 10-hour day, a
college president often has 10 or more jobs,”
Rogers says. “That can range from being a dip-
lomat, to a strategist, to an academic.”
To Padrón, who is retiring at the end of the
summer of 2019, “it’s almost a totally different
job today than it was when I started.”
“It’s much more complex and demanding than
it’s ever been,” he says. “It’s a job that requires
a true multitasker, and someone who can keep
their eye on the mission of the institution.”
If you lose that focus, he warns, “you could
become so preoccupied by the pressures of the
job that you lose track of what you’re here for.”
9 the successful president of tomorrow
 DATA

Presidential
FIG. 1: TOP INSTITUTIONAL CHALLENGES
Academic leaders were asked about their major concerns.

Developing new sources

79%
of revenue

Concerns and Retaining students

Competing for students

69%

69%

the Growing Improving graduation rates

Expanding/adapting
academic program offerings
62%

61%

Pressures
Continuing or reducing cost 57%

Upgrading technology systems 50%

and business processes
Retaining faculty and staff 39%

Eliminating siloed or incompatible 29%

technology stystems

Other 4%
Source:“Making Way for Innovation,” based on a 2017 survey of academic leaders conducted for The Chronicle
by Maguire Associates

FIG. 2: TOP FRUSTRATIONS

Presidents were asked what frustrated them about
their roles.

Never enough money 61%

Faculty resistance to change 45%

Lack of time to think or reflect 44%

Problems inherited from 35%

previous leadership
Belief by others that presidents 31%
are infinitely accessible by email,
for meetings, etc.
Source:“American College President Study, 2017,” by the American Council on Education and the TIAA Institute

the successful president of tomorrow 10 t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion

 FIG. 3: ENROLLMENT HEADACHES
The number of high-school graduates is expected to decline sharply in 2025.

High-school graduates nationally

in millions 3.6
Projection

3.4

3.2

3.0

2.8
2001 2005 2010 2015 2020 2025 2030 2032

Source: Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education, "Knocking at the College Door, Projections of High School Graduates, 2016"

DATA POINT: FINANCIAL INSECURITIES

30 42
% of credit-rated public
and private colleges % of private nonprofit
colleges reported in
may face material 2017 of falling short
financial stress in of their annual goals
2019, primarily due for both enrollment
to slow growth in net- and net-tution
tution revenue. revenue.
Source: Moody’s Investors Service; 2019 Outlook for Higher Education; Chronicle survey of the Council of Independant Colleges

DATA POINT: PUBLIC DISTRUST

61 %

41 %
of Americans say of presidents say
higher ed is headed in their state’s political
the wrong direction. climate is somewhat
hostile to higher ed.

Source: The Pew Research Center; ACE and TIAA Institute

t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion 11 the successful president of tomorrow

 SKILL 1

Analyzing the
Business
T
o lead a college today is to be the CEO of multiple
businesses — an academic enterprise, a public rela-
tions and marketing firm, a construction company,
and, on some larger campuses, multimillion-dollar
hospital systems and sports arenas. Presidents over-
see bookstores, medical clinics, catering companies,
and security forces.
Yet for years, college leaders resisted the comparison
to CEOs, seeing their job as more high-minded and mis-
sion-driven. In 2005 when Saul Kaplan founded the Busi-
ness Innovation Factory, a firm focused on business model
transformation, “you couldn’t even use the word ‘business’
in an education setting.”
“We’re not a business,” his college clients would tell
him. “We have a higher purpose.”
That perspective is rarer now. In this era of constrained
resources and increased accountability, boards of trustees
expect their hires to be more business-minded, even when
it comes to the sacrosanct area of academic programs.
They want executives who can make decisions based on
sophisticated market analyses — leaders who can tap into
data about student demand, market share, and work-force
needs, and use that information to decide which programs
to add, which to grow, and which to cut.
“Presidents used to be able to proudly say that education
existed solely for the sake of education,” says Robin Mam-
let, the head of the education practice at Witt/Kieffer, an
executive-search company. “We don’t hear that anymore.”
That doesn’t mean the president of the future will be
iStock

the successful president of tomorrow 12 t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion


a bean-counter. Presidents will still need to
make decisions within the context of institu-
tional mission and legacy.
But it does mean presidents will need to be
sure that every dollar spent is aligned with
institutional mission. That requires a leader
who is more hands-on in the budgeting pro-
cess than presidents have been in the past.
“Presidents have to be personally in-
volved,” says Josh Wyner, executive director
of the College Excellence Program at the
Aspen Institute, which focuses on student
success and equity. “They need
to know where every dollar is
“Presidents used to be able
buried and hidden, and they
have to identify assets that are
misaligned with mission and
bring them back to the core.”
Luckily, more presidents to proudly say that education
existed solely for the sake of
are coming into the role with
budgeting experience. That’s
partly because more provosts
are running colleges as pres-
idents turn their attention to education. We don’t hear that
anymore.”
external affairs, and partly be-
cause more colleges are mov-
ing to a Responsibility Center
Management model of bud-
geting, under which schools
or departments are wholly responsible for
managing their own revenues and expendi-
tures. This shift “gives deans incredible re-
sponsibility for the success of their unit, in
a way that is similar to running a small col-
lege,” says Mamlet, and it’s one reason more
deans are being tapped for the top job.
The Harvard seminar for new presidents
has even stopped offering a primer on finan-
cial management because so few presidents
today need it.
The challenge for future presidents, then,
will be balancing a business mind-set with
the soul of academe. They’ll need to trans-
t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion
TAKEAWAYS
Develop a better
understanding of
form their institutions, shedding old, under- budgeting.
performing programs and adding popular or
lucrative new ones, while remaining true to
their colleges’ missions and legacies. Cultivate new
To build support for their ideas, presidents sources of revenue
will need to tie business decisions to their in-
stitution’s past and present a hopeful vision
that fit the
for the future. institutional mission.
“You need to frame the changes in light
of the values of the institution, the histo-
ry on which you’re building,” says Carol
Don’t get lost in
Quillen, president of Davidson College. financials; articulate
a vision.
65
%
“You’re creating a connection to the past,
so that it’s no longer only about letting go,
but also about fulfilling the promise of the
institution.” of presidents identified
But presidents must take care to not be budget/financial
too prescriptive and risk alienating the fac- management as one of the
ulty. Elizabeth Davis, president of Furman
University, says that to build support for her five activities that most
campuswide mentoring plan, Furman Ad- occupy their time.
vantage, she got faculty and staff to design
Source: “American College President Study, 2017,”
the program, then sell it to their skeptical by the American Council on Education and the
peers. TIAA Institute
“Lead with a vision,” she says, and let fac-
ulty and staff “put the meat on the bones.”
13 the successful president of tomorrow
SKILL 1 CASE STUDY
MICHAEL SORRELL, PAUL QUINN COLLEGE
The Art of the Turnaround
W
hen Michael Sorrell took the job as
president of Paul Quinn College, in
2007, pretty much everyone told him
he was making a big mistake. The
small, historically black college in Dallas was
hemorrhaging students, was on the brink of
losing its accreditation, and had mountains
of debt.
“The strongest encouragement I got was
‘You can’t make it any worse,’” recalls Sor-
rell, who had built a successful career as a
consultant to professional sports teams and
corporations. Friends and colleagues warned
him of the risk, saying, “You’re doing to dam-
age your star.” The only person who support-
ed his decision was his then-girlfriend, now
his wife.
Twelve years later, Sorrell is credited with
saving Paul Quinn College. Enrollment has re-
bounded and continues to grow, and in 2017,
the institution became the first historically
black college to be designated as a “work
college” by the U.S. Department of Educa-
tion. Work colleges are institutions where
all students have an on-campus job regard-
less of financial need. Last year Paul Quinn
announced plans to expand into other cities
and create a consortium of work colleges.
But the turnaround wasn’t easy, and Sorrell
wasn’t always as popular on campus as he is
today. In 2007 he was 40 years old and had,
by his own admission, “no standing in higher
education.” When he announced plans to cut
the football program, pare down courses and
majors, and outsource key business opera-
tions, the pushback from students and staff
was intense.
HIs response to the critics was brutally
honest and unapologetic: “If your ideas were
better, the institution wouldn’t be in the
shape it’s in.”
“The truth hurts,” he says now. “We were
an institution on the precipice of failure. It
was no time for sensitivity training.”
Sorrell approached the college as a failing
business, identifying core competencies and
the areas that weren’t successful. The foot-
ball team, for example, had a dismal record
and was losing money. “When you look at
that,” he says, “you have to say, ‘What is the
return on investment?’”
To reinforce the message that it was “no
longer business as usual,” and to make
the college more appealing to donors and
employers, Sorrell instituted a strict student
dress code: shirts with collars, pants (or
skirts), and shoes.
When students grumbled, he explained his
thinking: “Whether people give us money is
based on whether they think you’re worth
investing in,” he told them. “That may shock
and offend you, but it is what it is. We have
to create the sense that we are worth the
investment."
“The truth hurts. We were an
institution on the precipice
of failure. It was no time for
sensitivity training.”
He created a clothing closet and asked
donors to provide clothing contributions.
When donors gave expensive brands, they
got asked for financial contributions, too.

Michael Sorrell, president of Paul Quinn, says “narrative” is crucial to rebuilding a college. Here he’s speaking at the
SXSW EDU conference.
But Sorrell didn’t just take a knife to the
budget and ramp up fund raising. He also
offered a vision for the future: Paul Quinn
would become one of the “great small col-
leges,” and it would do so by solving not only
its own problems but those of its community.
He turned the now-vacant football field into
a farm that would feed students and neigh-
bors, and he rallied the campus and the
community to fight a city trash ordinance that
threatened to bring more traffic and pollution
to the area.
“People don’t fully appreciate how import-
ant the narrative is in institutional transfor-
TICO MENDOZA
mation,” Sorrell says. “It has to be exciting
and intriguing, but not so big that people
think you don’t have a snowball’s chance in
hell of accomplishing it.”
So Sorrell was deliberate in his choice
of words. He promised not that Paul Quinn
would become one of the great liberal-arts
schools — “There was no path to an endow-
ment that would get us there” — but that it
would be one of the “great small colleges.”
His advice to future leaders of colleges
is twofold: “Pay attention to the money”
and “Don’t take the job if you don’t love the
institution.”
 SKILL 2

Innovating
I
n a future of rapid technological, social, and demograph-
ic change, colleges will have to innovate to survive, much
less thrive. The role of the president will be to create an
environment where change becomes both desirable and
possible — something to be embraced, not feared.
Yet most colleges today are “organized for tweaks,
not for transformation,” says Kaplan, founder of the Busi-
ness Innovation Factory.
“Colleges have the most intransigent business model on
the planet,” he says.
In part, that’s because faculty (like most everyone else)
resist changes that could threaten their own security.
But it’s also because most presidents are accustomed to a
“share-taking” model, where colleges win by stealing cus-
tomers from their competitors.
To compete in the future, presidents will need to be both
“share-takers” and “market-makers,” trying new things
while keeping the old model humming, Kaplan says.
In other words, colleges will need to operate simultane-
ously as a start-up and as a large-scale operation that can
take advantage of efficiencies of scale, says Michael Arena,
a University of Pennsylvania faculty member in organiza-
tional dynamics and author of Adaptive Space: How GM and
Other Companies Are Positively Disrupting Themselves and
Transforming Into Agile Organizations.
Arena, who has worked for GM and Amazon, suggests
that college leaders follow Jeff Bezos’s “two-pizza rule,”
trading task forces for small teams that could be fed by two
pizzas. “You’ve got to lock five people in a room so they
can think like a start-up and execute like crazy,” he says.
And the teams shouldn’t just include faculty. “Tap into
the power of students to create bold change,” he says.
The key is to make the community part of the creative
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the successful president of tomorrow 16 t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion


process, not an afterthought. “People commit
to things they design,” says Sanford C. (San-
dy) Shugart, president of Valencia College.
At Davidson, Quillen ditched the tradi-
tional strategic plan for a “framework” that
described short-term initiatives, and let di-
vision heads decide what those initiatives
should be. She created a way for faculty, staff,
and students to submit their ideas online and
have them vetted by a small group — then
posted them online, so everyone can see the
ideas and what became of them.
Davidson also has a center for interdisci-
plinary thought, where faculty members can
try a course without the college committing
to it long term.
The overarching idea, Quillen says, is to
“lower the obstacles for trying things, but
raise the bar for making them permanent.”
“We get them approved quickly, as a one-
or two-time thing, so people don’t wor-
ry they’ll be institutionalized and in place
forever,” she says. “That’s a problem in the
academy — it’s hard to get rid of anything. It
takes us 10 years to decide to try it, and once
you try it, it’s there for good.”
But for change to really take hold, presi-
dents will need to reward innovation, not just
encourage it. If they want more cross-disci-
pline collaboration, they’ll have to give facul-
ty members full credit when they team-teach
a course; if they want faculty to experiment
with pedagogy, they’ll have to hire and pro-
mote faculty who innovate.
“Align the reward structure with what you
want people to do,” Quillen says.
Experimentation of this kind is what the
Georgia Institute of Technology calls “De-
liberate Innovation.” It is intentional, collab-
t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion
TAKEAWAYS
Organize small teams
to develop new ideas.
Ditch the strategic
plan for a more nimble
approach.
Create incentives to
reward innovation.
70
%
DAVIDSON COLLEGE
As the president of Davidson College, Car-
ol Quillen threw out the traditional strategic
plan for a more flexible approach.
orative, and institutionalized.
Yet much of the innovation taking place
on college campuses today could more accu-
rately be described as “desperate,” says Pe- of academic leaders
ter Stokes, managing director of the Huron reported that a transforma-
Consulting Group. It’s experimentation in tion process was underway
the midst of crisis, where leaders “attempt on their campuses.
to mobilize several sometimes competing
change efforts simultaneously, in the hope
that one or more might pay off,” he says. Source: “Making Way for Innovation,” based on
Often, the result is not salvation, but a survey conducted for The Chronicle by Maguire
Associates
“change fatigue, and a creeping cynicism
among faculty,” Stokes says.
To be successful, presidents will need to
17 the successful president of tomorrow
SKILL 2 CASE STUDY
JAMES V. KOCH, OLD DOMINION UNIVERSITY

Taking Risks
J
ames V. Koch, who led Old Dominion
University from 1990 to 2001, has been
studying the risk-taking behavior of cor-
porate CEOs and college presidents for
years. He has written books about entrepre-
neurial presidents.
He’s also taken more than a few risks of
his own.
At Old Dominion, he created courses on
video at a time when “distance learning
did not have the cachet that it does now.”
Faculty members protested, fearing a dilu-
tion of academic quality, but the program
proved popular. By the time he left Old
Dominion, it was among the top 10 institu-
tions in distance learning.
Koch also invested in signature pro-
grams, on the theory “that if we attained
fame and fortune in those disciplines, it
would rub off on the entire institution” and

LAURA SEGALL
James V. Koch, the former president of Old Dominion U. (left), advises leaders not to become too
attached to their big bets..
burnish its reputation. After he hired phys-
icists from a nearby federal lab to teach,
the physics program shot up in the nation-
al rankings.
But not every gamble was an unqualified
success. While the physics program “be-
came big-time,” the spending didn’t have
the extended halo effect that Koch had
hoped for. A similar investment in aero-
nautical engineering produced patents and
recognition but didn’t boost the institution
as a whole, he says.
“Some risks pay off handsomely, some
just a little, and some not at all,” he says.
And all too often, leaders can't stay
objective. “Too many would-be innovators
take their innovations personally. They put
their names on something, and they don’t
want to give it up.”
These days, Koch serves as a consultant
to colleges, evaluating their presidents.
Many are too risk-averse, he believes,
afraid to take chances that could alienate
a core constituency. He blames this timidi-
ty on the presidential search process.
“There are a lot of constituencies out
there, many of which have virtual vetoes
over the selection process,” he says. So
“we end up with the least-common-denom-
inator leaders, which is to say, people who
don’t offend anyone.”
Koch, an economist by training, believes
that college presidents should imitate
corporations like Caterpillar — a company
he’s written a book about — and set aside
a certain percentage of revenue for exper-
iments.
“It takes real courage to do that,” he
says. But “you’re investing in the future.”
t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion
LAURA SEGALL
Michael Crow, president of Arizona State U.,
says innovative projects don’t always work out.
“Cut your losses and move on,” he says.
take a deliberate approach to innovation —
identifying options, weighing risks, and estab-
lishing priorities — even when the situation
calls for urgency, Stokes says.
They’ll need to take some risks, says James
V. Koch, a former president of Old Domin-
ion University and author of several books on
entrepreneurial leadership. Koch has studied
college presidents and found that the most suc-
cessful ones tend to be “intelligent risk-takers”
— leaders who collect lots of data and consult
widely but ultimately make their own deci-
sions. Of course, the “abject failures were also
risk-takers,” Koch says.
The difference: Successful presidents ac-
knowledge failures and move on; unsuccessful
ones “refuse to give up on people, programs,
and initiatives that haven’t worked out.”
“Not everything you try is going to work,
and you have to be big enough to admit that,”
he says.
Just ask Arizona State University President
Michael Crow, one of the biggest risk-takers
— and biggest success stories — in the modern
presidency. He says that of every 100 things he’s
tried, 20 haven’t worked out. “Cut your losses
and move on,” he advises. “Just move forward.”
19 the successful president of tomorrow
 SKILL 3

Building
Relationships
T
o achieve their goals, presidents need to marshal
support from a diverse and often competing array of
stakeholders — trustees, faculty and staff members,
parents, students and alumni.
Often, this requires presidents to serve as transla-
tors, helping different groups understand each other,
says Harvard’s McLaughlin. Sometimes that translation
will be literal — explaining “enterprise risk management”
to faculty unversed in board jargon, for example. Anoth-
er time, it may be more cultural — helping trustees from
corporate backgrounds understand shared governance, for
example.
“The president has to be multilingual, to speak the lan-
guage of different constituencies,” McLaughlin says. “If
you look at their calendars, they’re moving not just among
different appointments, but among different worlds.”
Of course, even the most effective translators won’t be
able to please everyone, all the time. What you do to satis-
fy one constituency will inevitably dissatisfy another, says
Teresa A. Sullivan, a former president of the University of
Virginia.
“You’re always looking for an optimizing solution” —
the best available under the circumstances that everyone
can live with, she says.
When starting a new job, presidents should focus first
on building relationships with their boards, says Susan
Resneck Pierce, a former president of the University of
Puget Sound who is now a consultant to colleges. After
all, trustees have the power to hire and fire presidents, and
without them, you can’t get your budget approved.
“They’re the most important constituency,” she says.
Thirty years ago, it wasn’t that hard for presidents to
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the successful president of tomorrow 20 t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion

 TAKEAWAYS

Prepare to be a
translator among
various constituencies.

Focus foremost on
relations with trustees.

Meet students and

faculty members on
their turf.
maintain a collegial relationship with their Beilock became president of Barnard College,
college’s trustees. Trustees viewed appoint- in 2017, she met with 150 faculty members in
ments as an honor, an opportunity to net- their own offices. “Letting people know they
work or socialize, or a way to give back to have a voice is important,” she says.
their alma mater. Pierce suggests that incoming presidents
“They didn’t feel the same sense of respon- ask two questions of their faculty: “What do
sibility as today, when higher education is un- I need to know to be effective?” And “What
der attack, when the financial model is being do I need to do to help you be effective?”
questioned, when there are potential crises at Listening to faculty is even more import-
every turn,” says McLaughlin.
Today’s trustee tends to be much
more attentive than their predeces-
sors. They take their oversight role
seriously, and are comfortable criti-
“The president has to be
cizing the enterprises they oversee.
This shift, coupled with a rise in
trustee activism, has led to tensions
multilingual, to speak the
between boards and presidents on
some campuses.
language of different
Still, a slim majority of presidents
say their boards are their most sup-
portive external constituency, ac-
constituencies.”
cording to the survey by ACE.
Faculty are another story. Pres-
idents told ACE a faculty had the least un- ant when pursuing change. When Marcy
derstanding of institutional challenges, after set about creating her university’s signature
students. They chose “faculty resistance to program, “the Dominican Experience,” she
change” as their second-biggest frustration, borrowed an idea from the foundation world.
after “never enough money.” She assigned faculty a list of readings on best
To get off on the right foot, new presidents practices, then invited them to weigh in, in
should take time to meet with faculty one small groups.
on one, early in their presidency. After Sian “These were listening sessions, so I didn’t

t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion 21 the successful president of tomorrow

 speak,” she says. “I wanted to hear how do we
do this and how do we do it right?” The result:
more buy-in into the president’s vision.
Students present different challenges. Gen-
eration Z is the most diverse in modern Ameri-
can history, and its members expect their pres-
idents to be attentive to inclusion across race,
income, sexual orientation, and gender identi-
ty. They want colleges to meet their basic needs
while they’re enrolled, and to prepare them for
a job when they graduate. When they see their
leaders falling short, they aren’t afraid to let
them know — be it through Twitter, a protest,
or an old-fashioned sit-in.
Many presidents today feel unprepared to
meet these new needs and expectations. In a
recent roundtable conducted by the American
Council on Education, presidents said they
were struggling to serve their increasingly di-
verse, increasingly disadvantaged populations.
Connecting with Generation Z requires em-
pathy and a commitment to equity, but also clar-
ity about what is — and is not — the college’s re- RAMIN RAHIMIAN
sponsibility. Presidents need to create programs For Mary Marcy, president of Dominican U. in
to support students, while making clear that California, listening sessions with faculty were
they won’t capitulate to unreasonable demands. key to making changes on campus.
They should also build relationships with
students before a crisis erupts, says Stephen Joel thority figure you don’t know,” Trachtenberg
Trachtenberg, a former president of George says. “You can never go wrong building up an
Washington University. Spend a night in the inventory of good will and having people see
residence halls; invite student leaders to lunch; you as a human being.”
brave the crowded cafeteria and sit down with “The whole trick is to get ahead of problems,”
random groups of students, as he used to. he says. “You want to be talking to students be-
“It’s very easy to have animus towards an au- fore they’re sitting in in your office.”

Ways to Improve Board/President Relations

A positive relationship with the governing board’s chair is crucial to a successful presi-
dency. The Chronicle in 2016 asked 42 college presidents and board chairs what would it
take to improve relations. A few important issues stood out.
Presidents asked for “more patience” from the chair. But board chairs said they wanted
n  

more urgency from the president on trustees’ priorities.

Presidents wanted to meet more often but to have fewer discussions about finances.
n  

Chairs wanted more “accurate” financial reporting.

Chairs called for more meetings but also for more social time with presidents.
n  

Presidents sought clearly defined expectations and for trustees to keep them informed
n  

about how the presidents are doing.

the successful president of tomorrow 22 t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion

 Lessons From Leaders
Treat Faculty Members as
Peers
On her first day on the job,
Patricia McGuire, president
of Trinity Washington Uni-
versity, walked into a faculty
meeting and gave what she
thought was a rousing “Fol-
low me, everybody” speech.
The college was in a financial
and enrollment crisis, and
she thought she had the
solution.
But when she finished,
nobody cheered. Then, word-
lessly, the faculty members
stood up and left the room.
Stunned, McGuire turned
to the dean sitting next to
her and asked, “What just
happened?” “She said, ‘Do
not ever speak to the faculty
that way again. You do not
give speeches — you engage
them in the dialogue.’”
McGuire learned that she’d
have more success with
“leadership by motivation
and encouragement” than
with a top-down approach.
“The old ‘command and
control’ thing, it just doesn’t
work” in higher education,
she says. “It’s not a military
organization.”
t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion
Take the Blame
Back in the 1990s, when
Daniele Struppa, now presi-
dent of Chapman University,
was dean of a poorly funded
and stodgy College of Arts
and Sciences, he proposed
that it take over two new
units. The president, he
says, encouraged him to
present the plans to his
follow deans. But when the
plan ignited a turf war, Strup-
pa felt unsupported by the
administration. The resulting
conflict, he says, “could have
destroyed my career.”
The incident taught Strup-
pa two important lessons:
First, that “people work bet-
ter in a collaborative environ-
ment than a Darwinian one.”
Presidents should encourage
faculty and staff members to
cooperate and compromise,
not tell them to “fight it out.”
Second, that the president
has got to be the face of de-
feat, if it comes. “I don’t want
people who report to me to
bear the heat,” he says. “It
is demoralizing to the institu-
tion and doesn’t incentivize
innovative thinking.”
23
Respect Local Politics
When Gail Mellow, pres-
ident of LaGuardia Com-
munity College, of the City
University of New York, led a
small community college in
New Jersey and was work-
ing on its master plan, she
made the mistake of publicly
praising some big-name
architectural firms in Phila-
delphia and New York. Her
enthusiasm, she said, “was
seen as implicitly damning
local firms.”
“It was a painful couple
weeks,” she recalled, but
it showed her the perils of
local politics.
“We’re trained as academ-
ics to do research, to make
decisions based on the facts
on the ground,” she says.
“I’ve learned the hard way
that it’s important to under-
stand where the political
lines are being drawn. Poli-
tics is a blood sport.”
the successful president of tomorrow
 SKILL 4

Careful
Communicating
W
ith multiple constituencies to answer to, pres-
idents have always needed strong communica-
tion skills. But in this time of intense political
discord, eroding public trust, and social-media
firestorms, communicating has never been more
critical — or more perilous.
If you stay silent following acts of violence or unrest on
other campuses, you may be seen as cowardly or indiffer-
ent. But issue a statement on one campus shooting, and
you’ll be pressured to respond every time one occurs.
Ignore complaints about the cost and value of education,
and you may be viewed as complacent or unwilling to en-
gage the public. But act too defensive, and you may be seen
as out of touch or unable to handle criticism.
Even liking a post by a thought leader risks alienating
trustees and alumni who disagree with that leader’s per-
spective.
For public-college presidents in particular, “one wrongly
worded phrase, one poorly constructed, unfiltered, unvet-
ted comment can be your undoing,” says Thom Chesney,
president of Brookhaven College, a community college in
Dallas.
He urges presidents to consider whether what they’re
saying brings value to a debate, and whether they’re pre-
pared to see their words scattered across social media.
“It used to be, ‘Am I OK with Mom and Dad reading
this in The Dallas Morning News?” he says. “It’s bigger than
that now.”
Erin Hennessy, vice president at TVP Communica-
tions, a media-relations company, recommends that pres-
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the successful president of tomorrow 24 t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion

 TAKEAWAYS

Before speaking out,

weigh whether your
voice adds value to a
public debate.

Decide whether a
national issue directly
affects your campus.

idents be “as transparent as possible” when tension is too high,” he says. “People should
responding to public skepticism. “Shed light know that your political position is irrelevant
on what we do and why we do it,” she says, to your decisions.”
and use data to show what your college con- The duty of the president, says John Sex-
tributes. ton, a former president of New York Univer-
But don’t feel compelled to comment on sity, is to be “a moral authority,” to ensure
everything affecting higher ed — be selec- that conversations on campus and between
tive when using your voice on matters
taking place outside your campus.
“Students are feeling anxious and
upset about events in the world, and
they’re pushing presidents to respond
“Choose very carefully where
to all of them,” Hennessy says. “Once
presidents set a precedent and own you want to take a position,
things, they’re going to be expected to
own them forever.”
Commenting on everything can di-
so it will have the resonance
lute the impact of presidential commu-
nications, says Chesney. you want.”
“Choose very carefully where you
want to take a position, so it will have
the resonance you want,” he advises. the college and the outside world are “robust,
Whether you opt to weigh in on politi- thorough, and civil.”
cal or policy debates is a matter of personal “It’s dangerous for a university president to
preference and institutional climate. Most take sides on issues,” he says.
presidents steer clear of politics, believing, as But Patricia McGuire, outspoken president
does Daniele Struppa, president of Chapman of Trinity Washington University, believes
University, that “you should hold your tongue that leaders have a duty to speak up when
most of the time.” core academic values like freedom of speech
“There are too many issues where the and freedom of thought are under siege. She

t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion 25 the successful president of tomorrow

To Tweet or Not to Tweet
F
or college presidents, social-media platforms like Facebook and Twitter present both possi-
bility and peril. Social media can be a way to engage with students and alumni. It can raise
a president’s profile.
But social media can be risky — comments may be misinterpreted, taken out of context, or
deliberately skewed.
So what’s a president to do? Here are tips on managing social media, from a communications
professional and from presidents who have taken the plunge.

Decide if you want to engage.
Some say it’s a must, but Erin Hennessy,
vice president of TVP Communications, be-
lieves it’s a choice. Not every college leader
needs to be on Facebook or Twitter. But if
you decide to go on social media, you have
to commit to it. You can’t post sporadically,
popping up with pictures of ribbon cuttings
and commencement, and staying silent for
long stretches in between.
For Santa Ono, one of the most prolific
presidential tweeters, social media offers “a
sense of the pulse and atmosphere around is-
sues.” It also makes him more approachable.
Students greet him at events, calling him by
his first name.
“A lot of students don’t feel the same kind
of distance or gap as they might with other
administrations,” says Ono, president of the
University of British Columbia and a former
president of the University of Cincinnati.
But Mary Marcy, president of Dominican
University of California, has stayed off social
media, concerned that it would consume too
much of her time, and believing that “frankly,
I’m not that interesting.”
“I don’t think everyone is wondering where
I’m having lunch,” she says.
Decide how to engage.
Before you jump in, answer some ques-
tions first: Which platforms will you use? How

JULIA SCHMALZ
Social media is an opportunity to better connect with students, says Santa Ono, president of the U.
of British Columbia.
 frequently will you post? How will you handle sees such advocacy as an extension of
comments, criticism, and pushback? Will you the educational mission of colleges.
respond or forward nearly every post to others “We are teachers first and foremost,
at the college, as Mr. Ono does, or delegate and we need to use our positions to be
that task to staff members? What about writ- teachers for the world,” she says.
ing posts? Will you let your staff ghostwrite, Hennessy suggests that presidents
or do you believe, as Marcy does, that posts consider whether a policy directly af-
must be in your own voice to be authentic? fects their students or their institution
Or will you take President Barack Obama’s before commenting on it. For example,
middle ground, signing only those posts you a president on a campus with a large
personally wrote? number of undocumented students
Hennessy recommends starting with a set of may want to speak out against ending
parameters that “are perhaps too restrictive” the Deferred Action for Childhood
and loosening them, if necessary, over time. “If Arrivals policy.
you start with ‘I’m going to engage with every-
body,’ there’s no way to rein that back in,” she
warns.
Ono suggests saving the challenging or
complicated conversations for media other
“We are teachers first
than Twitter. For discussions around topics
like sexual assault, mental health, or gender and foremost, and we
inequality, he uses Facebook Live or his regu-
lar podcast.
“There are certain things best done not in
need to use our
140 characters — or even 280,” he says.
positions to be
Be prepared to be challenged.
If you’re on social media, students and teachers for the world.”
other stakeholders will use the platforms to
pressure you in all sorts of ways.
When Ono was president of the Universi-
McGuire agrees but suggests a sec-
ty of Cincinnati, a group called The Irate 8
ond scenario as well: when a prominent
flooded his Twitter feed, demanding inclusion
graduate is untruthful or repeats racist
in university policy-making for black students
stereotypes. She has called out one of
in the wake of a shooting of an unarmed
her college’s most controversial alums,
black man by a university police officer
Trump aide Kellyanne Conway, for
during a traffic stop.
promoting the concept of “alternative
The tactic worked. Ono and his team began
facts” and demonizing immigrants.
meeting with the group’s leaders to discuss
McGuire wishes more of her peers
changes.
would be courageous and stop worry-
But not everyone will be as respectful as
ing about alienating donors or trustees.
the Irate 8 activists. As president, Hennessy
“There should be issues that you are
says, “you have to be comfortable with the
willing to lose your job over,” she says.
fact that you’re going to get called names
and cursed at,” potentially by people with no
connection to your college.
You may even get some threats. Ono has,
though he doesn’t like to discuss the specifics.
“There were one or two occasions where it
was quite scary, where security was provided
to me,” he says. “If you get a credible threat,
you need to talk to campus security.”

 the successful president of tomorrow

 SKILL 5

Managing
a Crisis
C
rises are nothing new for college campuses. Col-
leges have long faced racist incidents, free-speech
fights, and scandals of all sorts.
But such incidents today seem more frequent,
more unpredictable, and harder to contain. A con-
troversy that might once have been confined to a
campus can quickly become national news. And a protest
that might have remained peaceful is more likely to spiral
into violence.
Look at the University of California at Berkeley, where
a 2017 protest over a conservative speaker devolved into
riots. Or the University of Virginia, where, a few months
later, torch-bearing white supremacists clashed with coun-
terprotesters.
The escalation of tensions on college campuses is partly
a reflection of the country’s deepening political and so-
cial divisions. On campus and off, positions have hard-
ened, minds have closed, and there’s less patience for civil
discourse. The threshold for violence seems to have been
lowered.
In the era before social media, most campus crises rare-
ly spread beyond the college and the local press. When
a group of angry alums marched on Trinity College, in
Washington, carrying “Fire McGuire” signs in the 1990s,
the only witnesses were McGuire and passersby. Today
millions might see the signs.
The instantaneous nature of social media means that
presidents are pressured to respond quickly, often before
they even have all the facts.
“Everything happens so fast, you don’t really have the
opportunity to stake out a coherent position,” says Nich-
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the successful president of tomorrow 28 t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion


VALENCIA COLLEGE
In a crisis, correct misinformation, says
Sandy Shugart, president of Valenica College.
t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion
TAKEAWAYS
Develop plans for
various emergencies
before they hit.
Have a clear policy on
free speech and
campus speakers.
In a crisis, reaffirm a
college’s values.
olas Dirks, a former chancellor of Berkeley.
“These days,” he adds, “the president is held
responsible for things that go wrong even if
they have nothing to do with it.”
That means presidents need to be ready to
respond to crises before they happen, Dirks
says. They should talk with their marketing
and communications teams about how they
would respond in various scenarios.
83
And they should “have a set of actions you
could take if the scenario gets much worse
that you thought it would.” That plan should
%
specify when the president will communi-
cate, in what medium, to whom, and what,
broadly speaking, he or she would say.
Presidents should also develop a poli-
cy around free speech. That policy should
clearly distinguish between free speech and
harassment, and include a process for hosting
speakers and dealing with disruptions.
of trustees say they
In a crisis, the first step for a president
is to figure out what happened and correct believe that reputational
any misinformation, says Sandy Shugart, risk to the college is
president of Valencia College, which lost more important than it
seven students in 2016 in the shootings at was three years ago.
the Pulse Nightclub in Orlando, Fla. Then,
he says, reassure your campus by reaffirm- Source: 2017 survey by United Educators and the
Association of Governing Boards of Universities
ing your college’s values. and Colleges
In the case of the Pulse shootings, there
were feelings of grief mixed with fear. At
first it was unclear if the attack was a hate
29 the successful president of tomorrow
SKILL 5 CASE STUDY
TERESA SULLIVAN, UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA

EDUARDO MONTES-BRADLEY
Teresa Sullivan, president emeritus of U. of Virginia, was once dubbed the “unluckiest” college president for all the
problems she faced.

Emergency Response
T In a crisis, people worry
eresa Sullivan knows something about
campus crises. Her eight-year tenure
at the University of Virginia was among
the most turbulent in recent history,
marked by the murder of a second-year “something is going to
student, the beating of a black student
by white alcohol-enforcement agents, and
the publication — and retraction — of a
happen and they won’t
news article about a fraternity gang rape
on the campus. In 2017, white nationalists know about it. You just
marched through the campus, clashing vio-
lently with counterprotesters. can’t leave them in the dark.”
 Sullivan’s response to those crises
didn’t satisfy everyone. Critics found her
initial response to the rape article to be
too tepid; later, others felt she didn’t
come out forcefully enough to condemn
the marchers. Still, the president whom
Fortune magazine once dubbed “the
unluckiest in America” survived the chal-
lenges, learning lessons along the way.
Here are three of them.
Prepare
Some crises are impossible to predict.
But others you can get ready for — nat-
ural disasters, for example, or speaker
controversies. For these scenarios,
presidents should have a response and a
communications plan ready in advance. It
also helps to have clear policies around
free speech that the president can point
to in times of controversy, Sullivan says.
Communicate
Keeping the campus informed is criti-
cal, even if you don’t have any updates
to share, says Sullivan, who issued
regular bulletins during the protests in
Charlottesville.
In a crisis, people worry “something
is going to happen and they won’t know
about it,” she says. “You can’t just leave
them in the dark.”
Know When to Say No
Don’t feel pressured to respond to
every media request. The morning after
white supremacists marched through her
campus, Sullivan got called to be on ev-
ery talk show. She turned them all down,
because “I didn’t have anything extra to
tell them.”
Reporters “will push for an interview
when you yourself don’t know what’s
happening,” she says. “That’s a serious
problem, because you end up walking
stuff back.”
 31
crime or a terrorist incident. Gay and Lati-
no students and staff members, many of
whom had patronized the club, felt vulnera-
ble, and some Muslim students worried that
they would be blamed for the attacks. (The
gunman was Muslim.) Shugart responded
with a video urging students to honor those
who were lost while remembering that there
were “many kinds of victims,” and that they
all needed compassion and support.
“These days the president is
held responsible for things
that go wrong, even if they
have nothing to do with it.”
“What people fear is a loss of identity,” he
says. The video was meant “to remind every-
body that we’re still who we say we are, and
that we’ll behave true to character.”
To help your community cope with cri-
sis, offer direction, says Timothy Trainor,
president of Mount St. Mary’s University,
in Maryland, and a retired brigadier gener-
al. Trainor, who spent 33 years in the Army
and has helped the college recover from a
leadership controversy, says clear directions
give people a sense of purpose and helps
them see a way out of the crisis.
And don’t wait until the path forward be-
comes clear. Act on the actionable intelligence.
“You may not have the best answer, but
work with what you know at the time,” he
says. “People will work together to resolve
the issue.”
In his desk, Trainor keeps a 5x7 notecard
with this reminder written on it: “When
things go wrong, take ownership, be trans-
parent, and refrain from being defensive.”
the successful president of tomorrow
 SECTION 2

GETTY IMAGES

the successful president of tomorrow 32 t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion

 TAKEAWAYS

New Pathways The provost’s position

is no longer the spring-
board to the presidency
it once was.

to the Presidency
Deans, as well as
leaders in student
affairs, diversity, and
admissions, are increas-
ingly being tapped for
the top job.

A
Colleges need to
groom the next
generation of leaders.
s the skills needed for the job have
changed, so has the path to the presi-
dent’s office.
For years the conventional wis-
dom said provosts were the presi-
dents-in-waiting. Lately, though, few-
er provosts seem interested in the job.
The Chronicle collected information
over a 10-year period on 201 current
and former provosts who filled that
job on a permanent or interim basis
at the 60 institutions in the United
States that are members of the Association of American
Universities. Fifty-one of them went on to serve as pres-
idents, whether on a permanent or interim basis. Almost
as many (47) returned to being a faculty member.

t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion 33 the successful president of tomorrow

 At the same time, changes in the role of the
provost mean that the job may no longer be the
best preparation for the presidency, according
to a 2017 report by Deloitte’s Center for Higher
Education Excellence and Georgia Tech’s Cen-
ter for 21st Century Universities.
On many campuses today, the provost is giv-
en responsibility over academic affairs. But be-
ing an “academic and intellectual leader” was
ranked last by presidents in the Deloitte survey
among the skills they needed when they took
office. Far more important, the presidents said,
was being an effective strategist, storyteller, and
fund raiser.
Meanwhile, more deans are skipping the pro-
vost’s office and heading straight for the presi-
dential suite, particularly at small colleges, ac-
cording to the Deloitte report, which analyzed
presidential CVs. Nearly two-thirds of the pres-
idents who had bypassed the provost’s office led
institutions with fewer than 5,000 students, the
analysis found. only marginally. According to the American
Robin Mamlet, who works with colleges for
the executive-search firm Witt/Kiefer, says she’s
also seeing more chief diversity officers, direc-
tors of student affairs, and enrollment managers
considered for the presidency — a reflection of
their growing importance within the university.
“They are increasingly at the leadership table
as key university decisions are made,” she says,
“because their areas have become so vital to the
success of the institution.”
And while some search committees still insist
on a leader with scholarly bona fides, most gov-
erning boards are at least open to considering
candidates from outside academe, Mamlet says.
“For some trustees, there is a sense that high-
er ed is in a bit of a mess,” she says. “They feel
they have a responsibility to look both at those
within the structures that got us here and those
who bring knowledge of how things are done
elsewhere.”
More than half of college
presidents expect to leave
their posts in five years
or less.
That said, the share of presidents who come
from outside higher education has increased
Council on Education, in 2001 the share of non-
traditional presidents was 14.7 percent; in 2016,
it was 15.2 percent.
As more deans and senior administrators as-
cend to presidencies, colleges will need to find
a way to cross-train their prospective leaders,
broadening their skill sets beyond their areas of
expertise. A vice president for student success
may need training in fund raising, for example,
while a fund-raising chief may need instruction
in crisis management. Both would probably
benefit from a big-picture view of how the insti-
tution and the industry work.
Cultivating the next generation of leaders has
become increasingly important for colleges as

6 .5 6 2
the presidency has grayed. In 2017
the average president was 62 years
Years Years old, according to the ACE survey.
More than half planned to leave
their post in five years or less.
This looming wave of retire-
ments presents an opportunity to
diversify the presidency, which
remains disproportionately male
and white. Only three out of every
10 presidents are women, and few-
The average tenure of The average age of er than two in 10 are from racial
or ethnic minorities, according to
college presidents. college presidents. ACE.
Source: American College President Study, 2017,” by the American Council on Education and the TIAA Institute
Yet few colleges are investing in
presidential aspirants. Most offer

the successful president of tomorrow 34 t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion

What Search Committees Are Looking For
A
sk a presidential search
committee what it’s seeking
in a candidate, and you’ll
probably get a list of vague
attributes like “visionary leader-
ship” and “collaborative man-
agement,” says John Isaacson,
founder of Isaacson, Miller, an
executive-search firm.
So instead of asking his cli-
ents what they want, Isaacson
inquires about their business
model.
“Ask, ‘What is the hardest work
your president must do?,’ and
you get a different answer
for each institution,” he
says. “Then you say, ‘Who
has done some of this hard
work’” elsewhere?
In other words, institu-
tional context matters. As
Philip G. Rogers, senior vice
president of the American
Council on Education, puts
it, “Some institutions need
a change agent to reset
the deck. Others need an
innovator to spur transfor-
mation, a unifier to rebuild bonds
of trust, or even a financial expert
for a turnaround.”
“It’s about ensuring that the
right person intersects with the
right place at the right time,”
he says.
That said, there are some
qualities that nearly all search
committees are seeking —
“soft skills” like emotional
intelligence and cross-cultur-
al competence, says Robin
Mamlet, head of the education
practice at Witt/Kieffer, another
executive-search firm.
“They expect presidents to be
able to do tough things without
setting the place afire,” she says.
At the same time, many
committees want a candidate
with a track record of managing
change and a “vision of the way a
college can structure itself to be
financially sustainable for a long
haul,” Mamlet says. They should
recognize that “the strongest
institutions aren’t going it alone
anymore” and have a history of
partnering with other organiza-
tions and institutions.
Finally, search committees
want someone who respects
shared governance but can work
outside the system to bring about
“They expect presidents
to be able to do tough
things without setting
the place afire.”
change quickly, when neces-
sary. Many trustees come from
business backgrounds, and they
often find colleges’ slow pace of
change frustrating, Mamlet says.
While no committee or board
of trustees is going to hire a can-
didate “who has no appreciation
for what a university does,” in
this competitive higher-education
landscape “you can’t have a care-
ful culture-minder, either,” says
Jackie Zavitz, a partner at the
executive-search firm Heidrick &
Struggles.
“You have to have someone
who understands what it takes to
get ahead,” she says.
But finding a candidate who
combines the mind of an execu-
tive with the spirit of an academic
isn’t easy.
When Heidrick & Struggles
surveyed more than 300 senior
executives in education across
the country, it found that a
majority fit the profile of “fore-
casters,” bringing a business
mind-set to the job. Yet most of
the managers on those execu-
tives’ teams were mission-ori-
ented “harmonizers,” focused
on creating “positive and stable
environments.”
This mismatch in leadership
styles can create tensions
between presidents and
their teams and make it
harder for college leaders
to achieve their goals, the
firm concluded.
Part of the problem is
supply: Executives who
bridge the two styles are
rare. Of the more than
13,000 executives from all
business sectors that the
firm has studied, just over
5 percent were forecaster/
harmonizer hybrids. And only 23
of the executives were employed
in education.
“It’s a small subset of people
who are both credible and nur-
turing of the academic environ-
ment and also have the drive
and vision to push the institution
forward,” says Zavitz.
The solution, according to a
report by the firm, is for colleges
to either build business skills in
their “harmonizer” managers or
hire forecasters for junior po-
sitions and cultivate in them a
mission-driven mind-set.
“Someone who can run a large-
scale business and has the ac-
ademic bona fides,” says Zavitz.
“That’s the bull’s-eye.”
 little in the way of mentoring, coaching, or suc-
cession planning.
The lack of training leaves many new presidents This looming wave of
retirements presents an
feeling unprepared for key aspects of the job. In
a Gallup/Inside Higher Ed survey, a third of col-
lege leaders said they hadn’t been well prepared
to work with trustees or to handle public and me-
dia relations, and roughly half felt ill-equipped to opportunity to diversify the
presidency, which remains
handle fund raising and race relations.
In the absence of in-house support, more
aspiring and new presidents are turning to a
handful of outside programs and fellowships
for training. It’s a sign that both the job of the disproportionately male
and white.
presidency and the paths to the office are evolv-
ing — and will very likely continue to do so in
the years ahead.

Presidential Training
Several associations and colleges provide training programs for aspiring or new presidents. Here are five,
listed in chronological order from when they started.
American Council on Education
Established in 1965, the ACE Fel-
lows Program has trained more
than 2,000 college leaders, 80
percent of whom have gone on
to serve in top campus jobs, in-
cluding presidencies. Fellows are
nominated by presidents at their
home institutions and spend up
to a year apprenticed to leaders
at other colleges, while meeting
periodically with their cohort.
Although the program historically
attracted mostly academic lead-
ers, it now includes officials from
student affairs, advancement,
and other areas.
Council of Independent
Colleges
CIC’s two-day New Presidents
Program, created in 1989, focus-
es on the practical needs and
concerns of newly elected college
leaders. Sessions are led by
current and recently retired presi-
dents, who also serve as advis-
ers to participants. Nearly 1,000
presidents have gone through the
program.
Harvard University
More than 1,000 people have at-
tended the six-day Harvard Sem-
inar for New Presidents, which
seeks to acquaint new leaders
with the opportunities and haz-
ards they will face. The program,
created in 1990, also provides a
peer group that participants can
turn to when challenges arise.
Arizona State-Georgetown
University
Though nominally not a “pres-
idential” fellowship, the eight-
month-long program, known as
the Academy for Innovative High-
er Education Leadership, aims to
prepare senior academics and
administrators to lead organiza-
tional change. Through online
seminars, executive coaching,
and four sessions in Washington,
D.C., and Tempe, Ariz., fellows
learn how to apply principles of
“design thinking” to their work.
Created in 2014, the program
has trained 163 fellows to date.
Aspen Institute
A recent entrant to the field, the
Aspen Fellowship for Communi-
ty College Excellence is trying
to cultivate a diverse pool of
reform-minded risk takers at
community colleges. The group
meets in different parts of the
country over 10 months to get
career advice, build a case for
institutional change, and role-
play being college presidents.
The three-year-old program has
trained 117 fellows, 30 of whom
have become presidents.

the successful president of tomorrow 36 t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion

 A FINAL WORD
W
hen William McRaven,
a former military com-
mander who planned the
raid that killed Osama bin
Laden, was preparing to
leave the chancellorship
of the University of Texas
system in 2018, after just three years
on the job, he made a striking com-
ment: Leading a university or health
institution, he said, is “the toughest
job in the nation,” a “Herculean” task.
Apparently he’s not the only for-
mer college leader who thinks so. Ac-
cording to a survey by the American
Council on Education, the average
tenure for college leaders was 6.5 years
in 2016, down from 8.5 years a decade
before.
More than any of their predecessors,
today’s presidents are grappling with de-
clining enrollment, shifting demograph-
ics, and unprecedented levels of risk.
They’re struggling to distinguish their
colleges in a crowded market; stretching
to meet the needs of a diverse genera-
tion of students during a time of stag-
nant state support; and scrambling to re-
spond to a growing number of campus
crises. No wonder one of the top com-
plaints of presidents in the ACE survey
was never having enough time to think.
t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion
Those pressures aren’t likely to
abate anytime soon. If college lead-
ers can count on anything, it’s that
more change, and more challenges, lie
ahead.
While a few institutions may have
the resources and reputation to with-
stand these forces, most will need to
evolve to survive. That requires a lead-
er who is business-minded, adaptive,
nimble, and a careful communicator.
The president of the future will need
to be able to make difficult, data-driv-
en decisions, take calculated risks, and
sell stakeholders on a vision of change,
all while managing risk and convinc-
ing skeptics that college remains a
worthwhile investment.
But college leaders can’t do it alone.
“It takes a team to manage change,
to overcome obstacles and to execute
against a vision,” says Peter Stokes,
managing director of the Huron Con-
sulting Group. “The best leaders are
often the best at building teams.”
And one last bit of advice, from Su-
san Pierce, the former president and
college consultant. Don’t chase pop-
ularity.
“Presidents, in this fraught envi-
ronment, need to focus on being re-
spected, not loved,” she says.
37 the successful president of tomorrow
 Further Reading
“American College President Study, 2017,” the American Council on
Education and TIAA Institute, 2017.

Carlson, Scott, “Sustaining the College Business Model: How to

Shore Up Institutions Now and Reinvent Them for the Future,” The
Chronicle of Higher Education, 2018.

Fisher, James L., and James V. Koch, Born Not Made: The Entrepre-
neurial Personality, Praeger Publishers, 2008.

Gardner, Lee, “Preparing for Tough Conversations: How to Set the

Stage for Major Change on Your Campus,” The Chronicle of Higher
Education, 2019.

Maimon, Elaine P., “A Checklist for Transformative Leaders,” The

Chronicle of Higher Education, January 7, 2018.

Stripling, Jack, “The Making of a Higher-Ed Agitator,” The Chronicle

of Higher Education, April 24, 2015.

Wildavsky, Ben, Andrew P. Kelly, and Kevin Carey, eds., Reinventing

Higher Education: The Promise of Innovation, Harvard Education
Press, 2011.

Zemsky, Robert, Checklist for Change: Making American Higher Ed-

ucation a Sustainable Enterprise, Rutgers University Press, 2013.

the successful president of tomorrow 38 t h e ch ron icl e of h igh er e duc at ion

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