Leadership and Ethics in Higher Education 159learning impose on the academics their own values, methods of
operation, time-lines, and accountability, without taking account of, and
understanding the value and priority of academic performance, or
making room for it or giving support to enable academics to perform
according to their core duties. Often unstated, there is resentment that
the administrators assume a hierarchy of authority and impose
expectations that cannot be met.
My only plea is for an understanding and acceptance that higher
education institutions have become as big as the business conglomerates
that are referred to. It is also correct to accept that a badly managed
institution will put at risk not just the academic project, but also the
livelihoods of many staff including academic staff. Higher education
institutions therefore must meet the demands for accountability, a
prudent management of resources and a crafty management of human
capital, ensure financial efficiencies and nurture the academic reputation
of the institution. As long as government remains the main funder of
higher education institutions this requirement of accountability for the
public purse must remain. Besides government, higher education
institutions have other stakeholders or interest groups to bear in mind.
These include the donors, benefactors and alumni of the institution. In
my experience what helps to bridge this gap is by making sure that
management is transparent in what it does, consults exhaustively, places
before the community all the options and acts in a manner that is
consistent with reported undertakings. In other words it is about building
relationships of trust within the institution.
Management experts tell us the obvious, that successful managers
must possess three overarching qualities: basic knowledge and
information, skills and attributes, and meta-qualities. The so-called
“meta-qualities” are perhaps vital. They include, among others, as the
book by Mike Pedler, John Burgoyne and Tom Boydell, A Manager’s
Guide to Self-Development (1986) puts it, a manager as critical learner