DOCUMENT RESUME ED 307 013 JC 890 265 AUTHOR Roueche, John E.; And Others TITLE Shared Vision: Transformational Leadership in American Community Colleges. INSTITUTION American Association of Community and Junior Colleges, Washington, D.C. REPORT NO ISBN-0-87117-190-2 PUB DATE Apr 89 NOTE 337p. AVAILABLE FROM American Association for Community and Junior Colleges, One DuPont Circle, NW, Suite 410, Washington, DC 20036 ($28.50; $21.00 for AACJC Members). PUB TYPE Books (010) -- Reports - Research/Technical (143) -- Tests /Evaluation Instruments (160) EDRS PRICE MF01 Plus Postage. PC Not Available f '-om EDRS. DESCRIPTORS Change Agents; *College Administrati,m; *College Presidents; Community Colleges; Leadership; *Leadership Qualities; Motivation Techniques; National Surveys; Organizational Change; Questionnaires; Teacher Administrator Relationship; Two Year Colleges ABSTRACT Based on a study of 256 exemplary community college presidents, this book examines the attributes of outstanding leaders and their ability to orchestrate organizational change. Chapter 1 provides the background for the study, emphasizes the importance of leadership, and identifies attributes common to transformational leaders; that is, leaders who work with their followers so that each raises the other to higher levels of motivation and morality. Chapter 2 summarizes leadership theory and offers a discussion of transformational leadership and its place in a rapidly changing society. After chapter 3 reviews the study methodology, chapters 4 and 5 present findings on the demographic and leadership characteristics of the presidents selected for in-depth study. Chapters 6 through 10 discuss key elements of transformational leadership, including shared vision, teamwork and collaborative decision making, institutional climate and the relationship between the institution and the individuals within it, motivation as a means of achieving followers' acceptance of the shared vision, and peysonal values, integrity, and commitment to learning. Chapter 11 examines women in community college leadership roles. Finally, chapter 12 presents a summary of the research, a discussion of the problems faced by minority leaders, and a review of study implications. The survey instruments and an 85-item bibliography are appended. (ALB) Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. BEST COPY AVAILABLE i SHARED ' VISION TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP IN AMERICAN COMMUNITY COLLEGES JOHN E. ROUECHE GEORGE A. BAKER HI AND ROBERT R. ROSE "PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS U S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION MATERIAL IN MICROFICHE ONLY Office of Educational Research and improvement HAS BEEN GRANTED BY EDUCATIONALC REENSTOEURR ICERESICI NFORMATION J. Gollattscheck lisTMosw deodc furomme ntht eh apse brseoenn orre porogdauncizeadti oans originating it C MinOr changes have been made to improve reproduction dullItv ITNOF OTHREM AETDIUOCNA CTEIONNTAELR R (ERSOICU).R" CES OmPEOeRIn ntI tdpSo & snyitoeiotw nn O eorcr eopspos nlaiciOryilnyS r eSptar0te1d1 IOn ntht iOS ndioCciua-l 2 In the coming decades, American community col- leges will face some of their greatest challenges as they cope with fewer resources, shrinking en- rollments, changing demographics, and a world that demands increasing job skills from graduates. The community colleges that will succeed in this chang- ing landscape will be those headed by transformational leaders men and women with the ability to influence the values, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors of faculty and staff by working with and through them to accom- plish the college's mission and purpose. This landmark study identifies those community college presidents who are able to transform their per- sonal vision of their college's future into a vision shared by faculty and staff Authors Roueche, Baker, and Rose examine the practices of 256 transformational presi- dents to find out bow they orchestrate change in the college to respond to changes in the community. Through exhaustive interviews with 50 of these presi- dentsthe "blue chippers"and their leadership teams, the authors investigate the framework of values that these leaders bring to their institutions as they in- fluence, motivate, and empower others toward greater performance. Against a backrosmd of traditional leadership theory, Shand Vision: Dunsfonisationol Leadership in Aneri can Coratunigy Colleges discusses the unique contribu- tions of transformational leadership. The book indudes a look at the role of teamwork and collaborative deci- sion malting, the relar Aship between the institution and the individuals 1.- at motivation, and personal values, with emphasis on integrity and commitment to learning. The special contributions of minority and women leaders are also examined. Helping community colleges to meet the chal- lenges of the 1990s and beyond requires a process of changing people by influencing their values, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors. In this book, there are valuable lessons to be learned from those leaders who can trans- form their concept of what the future should be into a commitment believed in and carried out by their faculty and staffa shared vision. The Community College Press American Association of Community and Junior Colleges National Center for Higher Education One Dupont Circle, N.W., Suite 410 Washington, D.C. 20036 (202) 293.7050 Copyright April 1989 Printed in the U.S.A. Published by The Community College Press, a division of the American Association of Community and Junior Colleges. No part of this book can be duplicated without written permission by the publishers. ISBN 0.87117-190-2 CONTENTS PREFACE V 1. LEADERSHIP IN THE COMMUNITY COLLEGE 1 Community Colleges and the Future 5 The Situation 5 The Challenge 10 Transformational Leaders 11 The New Study 12 2. LEADERSHIP 15 Leadership: What Does It Mean? 18 Leadership: A Historical Perspective 19 Leaders and Their Environments 22 Transactional Leadership 24 Transformational Leadership 25 Leadership: Here and Now 31 3. APPROACH TO THE STUDY 37 Rationale 39 Phase I: Selection Process ........ .... . ... 451 Phase II: Selection Process Phase III: An In-depth Analysis 54 4. THE DEMOGRAPHICS OF THE COMMUNITY COLLEGE TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERS 57 Other Studies 60 The Current Study 63 Personal Data 64 7 gi ii/SHARED VISION Background and Experience 66 Degrees 69 Time Utilization 70 Time Spent With Others 71 Constituent Groups 72 Roles Played by College Leaders 73 Comparisons with the Vaughan Study 74 5. RESEARCH FINDINGS 77 The Development of the Theoretical Framework 80 Report of the Findings 85 6. VISION FOR EXCELLENCE 107 Future Orientation 112 The Mission 115 Shaping the Future 117 Influencing the Vision of Others 120 Planning and Action 124 RiskTaking 128 Commitment to Access and Student Success 130 7. LEADING: THE PROCESS OF EMPOWERMENT 137 Delegating and Empowering 142 A Bias for Action 144 Strength Through Tasking and Consideration 148 Shared Decisionmaking 150 The Influence of Others 152 ProblemSolving Through Collaboration 153 Building the Effective Communications Network 157 Empowerment Through Visibility 159 Energy for Action 161 8. LEADER AND FOLLOWER COHESION 165 Understanding Campus Ethos 169 Rewarding Others 172 Respecting the Individual 174 StudentCenteredness 177 Seeking and Valuing Others 180 r CONTENTS / in 9. MOTIVATION FOR EMPOWERMENT 187 Stages of Motivation 189 Motivating Toward Commitment and Action 194 The Expectations Process 199 A Context for Creative Skills 202 Developing Followers 204 Peak Performance 206 10. LEADERS AND THEIR VALUES 211 A Commitment to Learning 216 A Commitment to Quality Education 220 A Commitment to Ethical Behavior 224 Openness and Trust 227 Consistent Judgment 229 Humor as Influence 231 Leadership Through Example 232 11. WOMEN IN LEADERSHIP ROLES 235 Vision 241 Influence Orientation 246 People Orientation 249 Values 253 Multifactor College Leadership Questionnaire . . 256 12. CONCLUSION 265 Shared Vision 268 Leadership Concerns: Minorities and Women 273 Implications 287 Visions for the Future 289 REFERENCES 291 APPENDICES 299 COLLEGE AND PROPER NAME INDEX 339 .-1 i PREFACE Although leadership and leaders are critical and vital to our society, as concepts they remain elusiveneither well understood nor appropriately delineated. Leadership is not a phenomenon asso- ciated only with power, prerogatives, and prestige, nor is it defined by management tasks of planning, organizing, staffing, directing, and evaluating. Leadership is much more. Parnell writes: NOTHING is more important for an effective leader than to clar- ify the mission of the organization that he or she represents. The Good Book says, "Without a vision, the people will perish." Com- municating vision is a fundamental task of leadership. Mission clarification and goal setting, therefore, are priority tasks for an effective leader. We live best by living on our hopes rather than on our fears; by looking to the future, not the past. A leader sets the tone, the motivation, and the positive attitudes about the fu- ture of an organization or the group that he or she is leading and articulates these clearly as part of the mission and goals of the organization (1988, p. 1). V vi/SHARED VISION Clearly, there is a tremendous need for leadership and an expand- ing opportunity for leaders to makc a difference to their institutions. The AACJC Futures Commission states that in the building of the com- munity, stronger presidential leadership is required. Community col- lege presidents must be not only effective day-to-day administrators, but also leaders inspired by and able to convey a larger educational mission (1988). Leaders in the community colleges of America will al- ways face new educational and external challenges. Their preparation and their understanding of the values and qualities of effective leader- ship will empower them and their followers to face those challenges with dynamic and resourceful skills. In this study of selected leaders of American public community colleges, we were challenged by the idea that leadership was neither an inherited trait nor a product of the "great man" theory. In the teach- ings of the great philosophers, such as Lao-Tsu and Plato, we found confirmation of our idea that leadership can be learned. From the mod- em theorists we learned that contemporary studies of leadership focus on the qualities and behaviors of the leaders. We emphasized the in- terrelationships among the leader, the followers, and the institutions. From our research data we developed a group of themes and behavioral attributes common to transformational leaders; we then employed these themes and attributes to study a number of selected leaders in Ameri- can community colleges in depth. We knew that sthdying all 1,220 presidents of junior and community colleges in America would be impossible. Our research design reflected this reality and set our direction: we looked for leaders who demonstrated the transformational characteristics defined by Burns (1978), Bass (1985a), and Tichy and Devanna (1986). Accordingly, we invited all AACJC mem- ber colleges to nominate Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) in their state or region who demonstrated the ability to influence the values, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors of faculty and staff by working with and through them to accomplish the college's mission and purpose. From that original population, 296 community college CEOs were identified and asked to respond to the first phase of our data gather. ing; 256 presidents responded. The information from these CEOs provided us with first-hand experiential data of leadership qualities. We then asked each of the 256 to identify two outstanding CEOs with whom they had worked. This nominating process and our decision process yielded 50 presidents (from 30 states) who were interviewed in depth by our research team. Ideally, we would have interviewed all 256 nominees, but time and resources dictated a more feasible research protocol. PREFACE / vn In order to examine the concept of leadership, we studied a group of except.onal leaders. All research efforts have limitations, and we ac- knowledge ours; given the task we set for ourselvesto identify and study transformational presidentswe have succeeded in focusing this study on successful and exemplary leaders in American community colleges. We believe that CEOs are not necessarily the only group to choose who best meets the criteria of transformational leader, and many will argue that institutional members would have provided better informa- tion. We chose to ask CEOs, and we are satisfied with that decision. In addition, we eliminated from the study those who chose not to re- spond to our request for information or were unable to do so because they were unavailable. In retrospect, we are sure that there exist many CEOs who are transformational leaders who were not intervewed. We believe that although others could have been recognized, additional data would not have altered the outcomes of this study. We stress, though, that the absence of a particular CEO's name from the discussion of leadership in this book in no way implies that he or she is not an outstanding college leader. By identifying the behaviors o( these exemplary leaders, we have begun a process of identifying leadership skills for both present and future CEOs. Shared Vi.,ion: Transformational Leadership in the Community College identifies the qualities and attributes of transformational leaders. We have dispelled the idea that leadership is an innate trait or person- ality variable. Leadership is not inherent. It can be developed, taught, and learned; and Shared Vision points the way. The community college as an open-door institution will always require unique leadership which is innovative and motivational, but excellent leadership will never "just happen." Excellent leaders are those who have been trained and are mod vated to be leaders. Obviously, there are both professional and cogni tive dimensions of leadership. Just as we earn degrees and attend educa- tional institutions to become physicians and lawyers and computer scientists, so should we be educated to lead. Leadership preparation is a fundamental obligation of graduate schools in association with the AACJC, the Presidents' Academy, and other state and regional agen- cies; new leadership training programs must be initiated to prepare new generatio- s of community college leaders. Moreover, present ex- ecutive leaders and administrators can profit from ongoing leadership training and development. Self-assessment and evaluation should be a top priority for existing leaders; professional development can and should be continuous and self-renewing. The goal of leaders is to moti- vate and inspire others to fulfill the community college mission of open