Teaching Non-Leadership Faculty to Utilize Leadership Concepts in Their Courses

• In Event: Symposium | Enabling Non-Leadership Faculty to Teach Leadership Concepts to Address Complex Contextual Problems

Short Description

The National Research Council challenged institutions of higher education to integrate leadership throughout the curriculum and called for higher education departments to plan how each discipline would incorporate leadership theory and competencies into their classes. Additionally, research supports both the development of leadership competencies and contextual expertise to address complex problems. This session focuses on the use of Bolman and Deal’s (2017) four frame model as a lens to reframe the way non-leadership faculty view leadership and have the ability to integrate leadership concepts into their courses.

Detailed Abstract

Higher education institutions have been identified and challenged with developing graduates’ competencies, both in technical and “soft” skill areas. Technical skills are those largely associated with core content knowledge of the major, of which faculty have been trained and developed during the course of their careers. “Soft” skills areas, identified by Crawford et al., 2011, include experiences, team skills, communication skills, leadership skills, decision making/problem solving skills, self-management skills, and professionalism skills. In 2009, National Research Council (NRC) challenged institutions of higher education to integrate soft skills throughout the curriculum and called for departments and colleges to explicitly plan how soft skills would be incorporated. Additionally, a number of studies have consistently ranked leadership at the top of lists as necessary for workforce success upon graduation (Crawford, Lang, Fink, Dalton & Fielitz, 2011; Stewart, Wall, & Marciniec, 2016; The Conference Board, 2006). In 2011, the APLU published a study examining perceptions of needed 21st century work skills by colleges of agricultural and life science graduates. Within that document, leadership and teamwork skills were highlighted as two of the six needed skill areas identified.

Furthermore, complex and adaptive challenges threaten human wellbeing and sustainability and leaders at every level are needed to address the challenges associated with an ever-growing worldwide population, including food and water scarcity and overpopulation. Disciplines like agriculture and life sciences are uniquely positioned to graduate the next generation of leaders to address these sustainability concerns. As Kellerman (2015) points out, there is a critical need to develop leaders with “contextual expertise” to address the numerous complex problems that can be found throughout the disciplinary landscape. It is important to educate students with a strong grasp of disciplinary knowledge or “contextual expertise” and leadership competencies if we are to address our current suitability issues and complex problems.

However, complicating this charge is the fact that faculty are not generally knowledgeable about leadership in general (Jenkins & Owen, 2015). Leadership competencies are not typically included in the faculty development process, especially from an instructional standpoint. This leaves a significant gap between what faculty are expected to do and are prepared to do. The vast array of disciplinary backgrounds of those teaching leadership, may or may not have adequately prepared individuals with direct content and pedagogical knowledge essential to leadership education and development (Jenkins et al., 2015). One way to address this educational need is to teach non-leadership faculty housed within departments of agriculture and life sciences about leadership to incorporate into their courses.

Utilizing Theory to Address Practical Sustainable Leadership Application


Reframing or exploring leadership from multiple viewpoints has been an effective way to address leadership education over the past three decades (Gallos, 1993). The presenter of the session will share with participants how to utilize Bolman and Deal’s (2017) four-frame model as a lens to reframe the way participants view leadership challenges and address current and emerging sustainability issues. By utilizing this four-frame model participants will have an opportunity to expand their mindset, be perspicacious and address complex leadership challenges. Additionally, the four-frame model uses a multidisciplinary approach to establish an expanded leadership mindset by drawing on work from structural theory, human resource theory, political theory, and symbolic theory.

In Bolman and Deal’s four-frame theory, the first frame, Structural Frame, emphasizes goals, specialized roles, and formalized relationships, paying particular attention to the division of labor, rules, policies, procedures and hierarchies that are currently established in the environment. The second frame, the Human Resource Frame, focuses on individual needs, feelings, prejudices, and competencies of those who are working within the environment. Next, the Political Frame views “organizations as coalitions composed of individuals and groups with enduring differences who live in a world of scarce resources” (Bolman & Deal, 2017, p. 209). Finally, the Symbolic Frame recognizes the impact of culture as a catalyst to unite people and ultimately helps the leader accomplish their goals (Bolman & Deal, 2017). Utilizing this reframing tool as a conceptual framework provides an opportunity for participants to purposefully expand their leadership mindset and bring this leadership learning back into the classroom.

The challenge this session seeks to address is non-leadership faculty preparedness to teach specific leadership skills to graduate students within their discipline. By creating professional development opportunities for faculty, the non-leadership faculty will be better prepared to integrate leadership skill areas into their courses. In this session we will discuss a grant funded project that engaged faculty in colleges of agricultural and life sciences, with the intention of providing leadership development training so they could then use this knowledge to train students in their discipline. The session will address the population of non-leadership faculty from the different universities that were selected for the project, the learning management platform used to deliver course content, and how Bolman and Deal’s four frames were utilized to reframe the way these faculty perceived and teach contextualized leadership.

Participant

• Matthew Sowcik, University of Florida
  Presenter