The focus of this paper is to promote the awareness of higher-education administration and faculty of the opportunities presented by developing and implementing lean operational models in their institutions. The paper provides a brief account of the author's observations of small liberal arts colleges that are operating in non-efficient models. It…

The new strategic paradigm of resource development described in this paper recognizes that there are a number of important resources, in addition to financial ones, that are important to support the mission and to achieve the vision of a nonprofit organization, such as a college or university. It acknowledges and utilizes board members, with…

Universities are engines of the knowledge-based economy, both as sites of knowledge production and exploitation. Over the past two decades a "Third Mission" for universities has been articulated, alongside teaching and research; and this third mission is understood as commercial engagement. While growing literatures on the entrepreneurial…

Historically Black colleges or universities (HBCUs) have long struggled to compete with traditionally White institutions (TWIs) when it comes to breakthrough research. Of the 908 U.S. institutions that received National Science Foundation research funding in fiscal year 2005, only 72 were historically Black, and they took in $294.2 million in…

An extensive literature on leadership theories and models concerns large organizations in industry and has been developed mostly by outside researchers with expertise in conducting large surveys on and interviews with "subjects" in leadership positions. Recently, such theories have been adopted or adapted to higher education in South…

Professions are occupational arrangements for dealing with human problems. Professional "people work" requires a certain interactive closeness; face-to-face communication is prominent in professional-client relations. This also seems the case in the educational system. But in education, organization provides the "raison d'etre" of this profession.…

Academic leaders face particular challenges when they assume formal leadership roles in higher education. For the most part, they have had little prior engagement with the political, economic and strategic context of their institution and limited leadership networks on which to draw. The University of Western Australia has trialled a number of…

Total Quality Management is a system for creating organizationwide participation in planning and implementing a continuous improvement process exceeding customer expectations. It is built on the assumption that 90 percent of problems are a result of process, not employees. Implementation at Oregon State University has nine phases. (MSE)

The term "mission creep" was originally coined nearly a hundred years ago to describe the gradual process by which a military mission's stated methods and goals change, and recently the term has been applied to incremental organizational changes. In this article, the term is used to describe what happens when a teaching-oriented college or…

Retired business executives are providing colleges and universities with expertise by consulting in such areas as image strengthening, board revitalization, reviewing program directions, forging business partnerships, improving multicampus institutions' communication and cooperation, systematizing computers, and examining the scope and direction…

Factors promoting excellence in a technical university and requirements for obtaining or maintaining it are examined, and the problems encountered by the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in achieving excellence in a decade of retrenchment are discussed. (MSE)

This is the first installment of a multipart practitioners' guide focused on strategic planning, organizational development, and legal issues. It features practical advice and powerful insights for implementing advancement programs that are organized, productive, and legal--and that generate top results. The author, an organizational development…

This paper provides information on the role of organizational development in the institutional planning process at Florida Junior College (FJC), using short statements on the functions and objectives of each of the major components within the planning process. First, an overview is provided of organizational development and its value in…

The institutional planning, budgeting, and monitoring system used by the National Technical Institute for the Deaf at Rochester Institute of Technology, which provides continuous development, evaluation, and modification operating in advance of rather than in reaction to potential administrative crisis, is described. (MSE)

Two general models for bringing about change--the structural model and the people model--are described. Team leadership and team building are seen as people-oriented approaches to change that also affect the structure of an organization. Both targets of change--people and structures--should be approached in tandem. (MLW)