The essential guide to the hardest job in higher ed.
A deanship in higher education is an exciting but complex job combining
technical administration and academic leadership. On one hand, the dean
is an institutional leader, standing up for the faculty, staff, and
students. On the other, the dean is a middle manager, managing
personnel, curriculum, and budgets and trying to live up to the
expectations of the governing board, president, and provost. But what is
it really like to be a dean?
In How to Be a Dean, George Justice illuminates both of these
leadership roles, which interact and even conflict with each other while
deans do their best to help faculty members and students. Providing
tested advice, Justice takes readers from the job search through the
daily work of the dean and, ultimately, to the larger questions of
leadership, excellence, and integrity the role provokes. He also
explores the roles of "different" deanships in the broader context of
academic leadership.
Based on the author's experience as a dean at two large research
universities, How to Be a Dean is clear, engaging, and opinionated.
Current deans will use this book to reflect on the work they do in
productive ways. Faculty members considering administrative work will
find in this book some idea about the day-to-day work required of their
institutional leaders. And finally, readers who are simply curious about
what deans do will find pointed analysis about what works and what
doesn't.
