ABSTRACT
Professors are leaders. Even outside of administrative positions, professors are called on to envision a desired future, plan the strategy to achieve it, and motivate individuals and groups to work cooperatively toward shared objectives, all of which require leadership skills. This chapter focuses on leadership skills relevant to all academics, including emotional intelligence, meeting facilitation, consensus building, and staff supervision. It looks at positional leadership, including the decision to enter academic administration and the skills necessary to succeed in administrative positions. The chapter offers a profile of the career of a successful woman in academic leadership. Strong facilitation is crucial to meeting success. Delegation also keeps the time commitment reasonable. A downside of having real decision-making power is that we will need to make decisions that some people are unhappy about.
