Student Affairs Leadership

Defining the Role Through an Ecological Framework

Linda Kuk, James H. Banning

• Publisher: Stylus Publishing
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781620363348
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Student Life

Kuk and Banning offer readers a new lens for viewing leadership, one that goes beyond a focus on the behavior and values of leaders as individuals to examine how positional leaders interact with their environments to engage in leadership "in context". This book is addressed to aspiring and senior student affairs officers and offers a new "ecological" framework that recognizes that today's leaders are affected by factors they may not control, and work within an environment they cannot expect to mold solely through their execution of skills and strategies.Based on research supported through a grant from the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators (NASPA) Foundation, this book explores leadership as an interactive process within varied environmental contexts, and through an analysis of the transactional process between the leader, the organizational members and the various components of the organizations environment.It describes how leaders deploy differing competencies, skills and strategies in varied contexts, and how they choose to use past experiences, their training and personal characteristics to set priorities and navigate the cultural, social, physical, legal and political, resource, and ethical environments of their organizations.Several chapters conclude with an account of how the experiences of the SSAO participants in the research informed their practice of leadership and understanding of how leadership actually works.

PART ONE

INTRODUCTION TO THE ECOLOGY OF STUDENT AFFAIRS LEADERSHIP

Higher education is facing some of the most complex challenges it has ever seen, and its need for strong and innovative leadership is essential and compelling. Student affairs as an organizational unit within higher education has become a critical component of the higher education mission and leadership team (Ambler, 1993; Hirt, 2006; Sandeen, 1991). As this role has gained a stronger voice and increased visibility in the higher education arena, student affairs as a whole has become more complex and more central to the success of higher education institutions and to the welfare and success of students.

In this institutional role, student affairs is increasingly strapped with new and complex challenges, creating even greater demands for effective leadership. As society has changed, so have the challenges facing student affairs leadership. These challenges currently include reduced funding and greater demands on available resources, provision of varied and new services for a more diverse student population, student and family expectations for expanded and 24/7 availability of services, and new concerns for safety and security. In addition there are challenges of increasing involvement and collaboration with the academic mission to ensure student success as well as a heightened sense of urgency to enable student retention, minimize the time to graduation, and facilitate graduation and student satisfaction, all while keeping increased costs in check.

As we look to the future such challenges will become more complex, and new challenges will likely emerge. In this increasingly demanding and volatile environment student affairs leadership development is a critical concern, requiring greater attention to what is needed to enhance student affairs leadership effectiveness for the future. This book is intended to aid in advancing our understanding and practice of student affairs leadership.

Enhancing leadership effectiveness is greatly reliant on the research and application of research related to leadership development and practice. History has substantially documented that leaders are not born; rather, they are crafted from applied theory to practice through experience. Much of what we know about leadership and the application of leadership within student affairs has been adapted from corporate settings or from theoretical ideas that have been generally and broadly applied to the concept of student affairs leadership. While these ideas and applications have been helpful, they have been less than ideal in addressing the leadership development needs of student affairs leaders. Such works are useful, but they have to be translated to the context of higher education and student affairs. This translation can be misleading and, in some cases, erroneous within the student affairs environment in particular.

The area of contextual leadership research and practice is an important and emergent area for understanding and practicing leadership (Kezar, Carducci, & Contreras-McGavin, 2006; Stogdill, 1974). More recent research related to leadership in the context of organizations indicates that the context of leadership is a central component of effective leadership (Antonakis, Avolio, & Sivasubramaniam, 2003). It has also been demonstrated that the context of higher education is very different from the context of corporate and government organizations (Birnbaum, 1988; Kezar et al., 2006). This work is intended to help address some of this gap in our understanding of student affairs leadership in the context of student affairs organizations.

Most of the current higher education and student affairs leadership research and writing do not focus directly on the contextual nature of organizational leadership. Many recent texts focus on a singular, specific area of leadership, such as relational theory, social justice approaches to leadership, collaboration, or change. These works do not deal directly with the contextual nature of institutional leadership, especially from the microanalysis level of various environmental contexts. This work is intended to help address some of this gap in our understanding and practice of student affairs leadership in context. Through this exploration we hope to gain insights into how leadership actually works in various contexts.

While the idea of “leadership in context” is not really new, this work’s focus on a different way of viewing leadership in context is novel. It does not focus solely on the behavior and values of leaders as individuals, but rather on how positional leaders interact with their environments to engage in leadership. This is an exploratory work based on qualitative research that seeks to understand student affairs leadership practice in context and to take this understanding and apply it to enhancing leadership effectiveness. In the body of this book we take the findings from the exploration of the leadership-$$$$ environment interaction of 24 highly successful senior student affairs officers (SSAO) and apply them to guide others in understanding how leadership can be enhanced.

This work was intentionally designed to be distinct from other works by exploring leadership as viewed through a lens of ecological theory and applying this view to everyday leadership practice. (The ecological perspective is explored more fully in Chapter 2.) From this ecological perspective we view leadership as a transaction that involves leaders engaged with the members of the organization and the existing contextual environment. Each of the players within higher education organizations, including the positional leaders and other organizational members, has different roles, but all have an influence on how leadership is perceived and addressed within the ecological context of the organization. Leadership effectiveness emerges when the interactions between the players and the ecological context are in harmony as they interact with the leadership process.

We use the concept of ecology to frame our interest in leadership by focusing on SSAOs as positional leaders. We explore the influence of the varied environmental components as the SSAOs describe their engagement in leadership. These positional leaders’ interactions, viewed as the execution of leadership from the ecological perspective, are believed to depend on their personal characteristics engaged with the characteristics of both their institutional and divisional environments. Leadership has been heavily researched, but little is known about how leaders actually engage in daily interaction within the context of varied environmental factors.

This work is built on the findings of a comprehensive research study of 24 SSAOs and their experiences engaging leadership in their varied organizational roles (see Chapter 13). Through the SSAOs’ experiences we examine the contextual arena of leadership and the strategies and challenges these leaders face in navigating the environments that greatly impact their ability to be successful leaders. We utilized an ecological framework for organizing and understanding the contextual dimension of these leaders’ experiences and apply existing leadership literature and research to the student affairs context. This research study was supported by a grant from the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators (NASPA) Foundation.

This work is about the engagement in leadership as an interactive process within varied environmental contexts. It does not assume that leaders have control over the environment or can mold it through their execution of skills and strategies; rather, this work explores how leaders engage their environment through interactions with it. This also includes an analysis of the transactional process itself—in this case, a transactional process among the leader, the organizational members, and the various components of the organization’s environment.

It assumes that leadership in these varied environments may present different challenges and require different competencies and different skills and strategies depending on the context within and outside of the various environments. It explores how leaders choose to use their past experiences, their training, and their personal characteristics to set priorities and divide their energy to engage in their perceptions of leadership within their environmental transactions.

This work does not assume that senior positional leaders (here, SSAOs) are solely responsible for the successes or failures that occur within their responsibilities. It also does not assume that leaders have full control over perceptions of their effectiveness as leaders. It does, however, assume that perceptions within the organization may in fact be the reality for many in an organization. These perceptions can have considerable consequences for success of a senior positional leader. This work is based on the perceptions of the study’s SSAOs and their interactions with their leadership environment. It does not assess if these perceptions are accurate or in harmony with other organizational members’ perceived reality.

Descriptions and Format of the Chapters of This Book

Part One of this book opens with a description of the importance of context in understanding leadership. Chapter 1 presents a brief history of leadership theory and research as related to student affairs. It shows how and why this present exploration of leadership practice is built on previous leadership ideas and practices and discusses how leadership practice evolved into the present emphasis on “context.”

Chapter 2 presents the ecology approach to viewing leadership and the model that was used in the analysis of the various participants’ perspectives. Chapter 3 presents a general discussion of leadership viewed through the eyes and experiences of the SSAO participants in the study. It introduces the participants and describes their values and views of their general leadership engagement in their contextual environments.

Part Two (chapters 4 through 10) focuses on the specific areas of interaction in the organizational environment. The various chapters discuss the analysis of the participants’ experiences of engaging in leadership within each contextual area. The insights about leadership gained as crafted through the lens of subenvironments are discussed, including cultural, social, physical, legal and political, resource, and ethical environments. Each chapter addresses how the participants engaged in leadership within these various contexts and how these engagements formed the basis of their leadership within the organization. Specific components of each area of the environment and the interrelationship of the leaders and their contextual environment are also explored. At the end of each chapter the authors consider how the experiences of the SSAO participants inform the practice of leadership and how leadership actually works. Chapter 10 presents the interaction of SSAOs within the broader context of the organizational subenvironments, institutional types, and key personal attributes, as well as a summary of the ecological perspective of their leadership.

Part Three considers the future of student affairs leadership. Chapter 11 focuses on the ideas related to organizational readiness and ability to adapt to change, and the participating leaders’ interactions with the change process within their organizational context. It discusses the relationship the leaders have with leading and navigating change in their organizational context. Chapter 12 presents the study participants’ perceptions of current and future leadership issues within their organizational context. It includes how the participants view the future of leadership within student affairs. It goes on to present the voices of the researchers regarding their perceptions of elements of the discussion that appear to be missing from the voices of the SSAO participants. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the implications of the ecological model related to the future of student affairs leadership. Chapter 13 presents a summary of the specifics of the study, methodology, and analysis process that form the book’s foundation.

It is hoped that through this work the role of the SSAO as a leader in higher education can be better understood and that the engagement in leadership in this context can be portrayed in ways that provide guidance and insights for future practice. We hope that this work will serve to educate current and future leaders about the importance of understanding the contextual environment and how it impacts effective leadership.

This book is intended to provide guidance for current and aspiring higher education organizational leaders, specifically those who work in the context of student affairs. It is intended to be used in graduate preparation programs and other staff development programs aimed at organizational leadership development. It is anticipated that this work will add to the literature on leadership in student affairs organizations and present a new perspective on leadership not present in current leadership texts used by both graduate students and practitioners.

In summary, this book illuminates the voices of SSAOs for understanding the ecological framework for exploring and understanding leadership in context. Leadership behavior in this work is a function of leadership of persons and institutional characteristics in a dynamic reciprocal transactional relationship with the contextual environment within an organization. These contextual influences include the cultural environment, social environment, physical environment, legal and political environment, resource environment, and ethical environment. From our analysis and understanding of these transactional relationships emerges a portrait of the ecology of leadership that helps to demonstrate how strategic comprehension and engagement with the various environmental components of the organization can help achieve leadership success. We begin this exploration by briefly examining the history and development of leadership theory and research both generally and more specifically as they apply to student affairs leadership. This summary will set the stage for our exploration of student affairs leadership as viewed through an ecological lens and presentation of the implications of this understanding for the practice of effective leadership.

1

THE EVOLVING CONCEPT OF LEADERSHIP

The concept of leadership is one of the most extensively written about concepts in modern behavioral science, with numerous books and theories crafted about the subject. According to Roost (1991) there are over 100 definitions of leadership, and there are numerous surveys and meta-analyses of leadership research. The study and application of leadership go back hundreds of years, and yet today our understanding of leadership remains elusive and somewhat paradoxical. Some of this is due to the expanded and nebulous nature of our definitions of leadership.

The concept of leadership has taken on many forms. It has come to mean many different things, generally describing broad behaviors that influence the thoughts and actions of others. As a concept it occurs in many different contexts and throughout organizations, at all levels and in society generally. In recent times, it has taken on the connotation of being the good guy in the white hat riding in to save the day. Effective leadership has come to be associated with organizational success, as though the leader is solely responsible for an organization’s success or failure. Only more recently have researchers begun to explore the value of subordinate or followers’ roles in both leader and organizational success (Kellerman, 2010; Lipman-Blumen, 2005). Additional research has suggested that leaders, at times, can be problematic to both organizations and the people in them (Goldman, 2009; Kellerman, 2004; Lipman-Blumen, 2005). For example, a senior student affairs officer (SSAO) who takes credit for the work of his or her staff or seeks to blame someone when things do not go well can have a serious negative impact on student programs and staff morale.

According to common belief, anyone can be trained to be a leader. Leadership occurs at all levels and in all types of organizations. The focus has been on developing knowledge, skills, and competencies as well as refining and sensitizing certain traits to become a leader. It has been assumed that these knowledge, skills, and competencies can be easily transferred from one leadership situation to another (Kezar, et al., 2006; Woodward, Love, & Komives, 2000). An industry has emerged that focuses on selling these concepts of effective leadership through popular books and extensive leadership training activities. Student affairs leaders and their staff have adopted this generalization of leadership in the same way as the rest of U.S. society.

While there is no reason to take issue with these beliefs and practices in a general sense, this expansion and wholesale development of the concept of leadership have made it more difficult to really understand how leadership, as defined by this broad generic configuration of the term, actually works and how it may differ based on the context, the type of organization, or the organizational environments.

As authors, researchers, and former practitioners, we like to think about the present state and understanding about the concept of “leadership” as similar to the idea of studying the concept of “art.” If we asked you to tell us about the study of art, you would look at us with a puzzled look and ask, “What about the study of art do you want to know about?” For even the general public, art is viewed as a collective term for a very large body of behaviors, expressions, and end products. There are many forms of art, and the techniques and skills necessary to perform different types of art are vastly different. Different types of art occur in different contexts and result in very different end products. While artists in some areas of artistic expression may transfer their knowledge, skills, and creativity to other forms of artistic expression, there is no assumption that the knowledge and skills of one form of artistic expression are the same as any other. The knowledge, techniques, and competencies needed to be a successful musician are not the same as those of a dancer or a painter. The language and concepts used to describe the execution or expression of art in all of the various contexts and forms are vastly different, yet they all fall under the larger category of “art.” We understand the specific categories of artistic expression, and we also see them within the larger umbrella as art.

We believe, especially based on our research and experience as senior leaders, that we need to begin to think about the concept of leadership in much the same way. Is leadersh...