ABSTRACT
University presidents encounter increasing and unprecedentedchallenges in their work. Issues such as diversity, fundraising, budgeting, fraternities, athletics, personnel, and sexual assault-to name some of the most obvious and recent-crowd their days, evenings, and weekends. Calls for accountability and efficiency in educational management and a persisting national discourse of doubt and skepticism about the value of college education3-including the concerns of legislators, government agencies, parents, about educational and vocational outcomes, and the unease of some commentators about universities’ responses to and management of recent student unrest or uncertainty about schools’ redressing problematic symbols and figures in their past4-add additional complexity to the position. All this underscores Jonathan Cole’s observation that universities are inherently multilingual. Trustees, faculty, staff, students,
parents, community leaders, devotees of athletics, alumni, and legislators all have discrete concerns and interests. As those voices multiply and grow stronger, Derek Bok suggests, the president’s power is perhaps weaker than ever before. Unlike corporate CEOs, university presidents rarely, if ever, can simply and directly impose their will on an institution. Their leadership requires the voluntary consent of the university’s stakeholders. In addition, institutional pressures have intensified. A 2000 American Council on Education (ACE) survey of how university presidents use their time showed that “academic affairs ranked last in a set of six familiar types of activity.”5 A more recent ACE report suggests that “The most important institutional activities for presidents are budgeting, and finan - cial management, strategic planning, board relations, and personnel.”6
