DOCUMENT RESUME - ERIC · commitment, courage, and fairness by average exec Limes can usually...

ED 215 609

AUTHORTITLE

INSTITUTION

REPORT NOPUB DATENOTE

AVAILABLE FROM

DOCUMENT RESUME

HE 014 957

Argyris, Chris; Cyert, Richard M.Leadership in the '80s: Essays on HigherEducation.Harvard Univ., Cambridge, Mass. Inst. for EducationalManagement.ISBN-0-934222-01-080

96p.; Comments by Stephen K. Bailey and Gene I.Haeroff.Institute for Educational Management, 337 GutmanLibrary, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138($5.95).

EDRS PRICE MF01 Plus Postage. PC Not Available from EDRS.DESCRIPTORS *College Administration; College Environment;

Educational Policy; Financial Problems; Futures (ofSociety); *Higher Education; *LeadershipResponsibility; Learning Theories; Models;Organizational Theories; *Professional Education;Research Needs; *Retrenchment

IDENTIFIERS Institutiorial Survival

ABSTRACTTwo essays and two commentaries on leadership in

higher education in the 1980s are presented. In "EducationAdministrators and Professionals," Chris Argyris considers thedecline of public confidence in institutions and professionals byelaborating the concepts of single-loop (detecting and correctingerror without altering underlying values or policies) and double-loop(detection /correction accompanied by changed values or policies)learning. He proposes ways by which academic leaders may unfreeze thepredisposition for the status quo that exists in single-loop learningin order to make way for double-loop detection and correction oferror that involves the changing of underlying values and policies.In "Managing Universities in the 1980s," Richard M. Cyert focuses onthe major problem facing academic administrators. He suggests that itis difficult for faculty to concentrate on maintaining excellencebecause of the struggle for institutional survival. Uncertainty willprevail with regard to how institutions will reduce their scales ofoperation, and university presidents will be involved to a greaterdegree than in the past with conflict resolution at a level ofindividual problems. Cyert offers strategies indicating howadministrators may best manage the complex deescalation problemsfacing them. In "Leadership: An Attempt to Look at the Future," GeneI. Maeroff summarizes the essays and analyzes discussion byparticipants in the 1979 Symposium on Leadership, which was sponsoredby the Institute for Edlicational Management. A preface by Stephen K.

-,)Bailey assesses the challenges to educational leadership in the pastSeveral decades and poses an optimistic argument for the 1980s.(SW)

Le-N

-1

(N)Leaders' hip in the '80scz,

"PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THISMATERIAL IN MICROFICHE ONLYHAS BEEN GRANTED BY

TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCESINFORMATION CENTER (ERIC)."

U.S. DEPARTMENTOF EDUCATION

NATICNAL INSTITUTEOF EDUCATION

EDUCATIONAL RESOURCESINFORMATION

CENTER (ERIC)

fl-l"is document has beenreproduced as

treceived from the

person or organization

onginating it

0 Minor changeshave been made to improve

reproduction query

Points of view or opinionsstated in this &cu

ment do not necessarily represent°Rico NIE

position or policy

Leadership in the '80s:ESSAYS ON HIGHER EDUCATION

bv

Chris Argyris

andRichard M. Cyert

with Comments by

Stephen K. Bailey and Gene I. Maeroff

IRMINSTITUTE FOR EDUCATIONAL MANAGEMENT

Harvard Univei sayCambridge, Massachusetts

o

Copyright © 1980 by:The President and Fellows of Harvard College

Institute for Educational ManagementHarvard University

International Standard Book Number: 0 934222-01-0Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 80-80425

Published by:Institute for Educational Management

Harvard UniversityCambridge, Massachusetts 02138

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Preface vii

Introduction xv

Educating Administratorsand Professionals 1

Managing Universitiesin the 1980s 39Leadership: An Attempt toLook at the Future 67

Preface

Stephen K. Bailey

Once upon a time there may have been a golden age forcollege and university presidentsan age when perquisites,trustee confidence, f iculty deference, student respect, in-stitutional autonomy, and general public support for highereducation combined to fill academic leaders with an Olym-pian status and with a sense of manifest influence and des-tiny. Sonic would identify the first half of the twentiethcentury as such an age when, in the words of Harlan Cleve-land, the "exhilaration exceeded the exhaustion." But noone would make such claims for the past fifteen yezrsorfor the next ten. College and university presidents are pres-ently and prospectively a beleaguered lot. Most of theirinstitutions are faced with shrinking enrollments anushrinking resources in an inflation-ridden economy. Besetmore and more by monitoring and regulatory impulsesfrom near and distant governing and coordinating authori-

vii

PREFACE

ties, sapped by the contentiousness and litigiousness of fac-ulty and students, battered by conflicting inside and outsidepressures on such intractable Issues as equity in athletics anddivestment in South Africa, worn down by internal adver-sary proceedings that diminish a distantly rememberedsense of collegiality, depressed by the bone weariness at-tendant on relentless conflict resolution, college and uni-versity presidents struggle to keep their noses above water,let alone their souls on.top.

There are surely a few who find psychic satisfaction innibbling down the inches of paper in their in-baskets, dis-covering ways to soften the impact of budgetary decre-ments. or humoring colleagues down from highs of anger.But for every resilient and ebullient administrator theremust be a hundred filled with self-doubt and with a vagueand corrosive bewilderment. The fact is that for many it isnot very much fun anymore. They continue from a sense ofduty, from a reluctance to lost status, from an often merit-less hope that things will somehow become easier. But theireyes become less luminous, reminding all of us that fewsadnesses of the world exceed the act of witnessing clearlenses of vision being scratched into opaqueness by theabrasions of contentious minutiae.

The next decade of administrators will be challengedtime and again by Charles Eliot's reminder that the primerequisite of their success will be "their willingness to givepain."

This, then, is the rather lugubrious cyclorama againstwhich the following essays are staged. The two formal es-says are complementary. The lucid summary by GeneMaeroff suggests the richness of the discourse prompted bythe essays themselves. There is an emerging central theme.

VIII

PREFACE

quick fixes will not work, salvation is achieved, partly bygrace, but mostly by the hard work of pondering fundamen-tal questions and positing anew the essential values of theacademy. Such values transcend questions of curriculumand structure. They are as applicable to two-year publicinstitutions as they ate to major research universities. Theyare encapsulated in two phrases. "disciplined thought" and"the civilized treatment of others."

"Disciplined thought" is the hallmark of higher learn-ing. It implies a respect for evidence, for the canons of logic,for sensitivity to the nuances of language, for loosely heldand remediable hypotheses, for proven skills. It is theenemy of grade inflation, of verbal slobbery, of undis-criminating judgments. When colleges and um% ersitiesforget their ultimate roots in disciplined thought, they be-come worse than meretricious. They set loos a powerfuland sinister cynicism that erodes and corrodes the envelop-ing society. President Cyert is particularly worried that thecompetition for students in the proximate years ahead willInduce the higher academy to substitute easy certificationfor proven merit. The long-range consequences. a worldfilled with academic "Kentucky Colonels."

Colleges and universities take pr.de in their role ofpreserving and enhancing "civilized values." But those of uswho have spent our lives in academic settings know that theacademy can he cruel, arbitrary, unfeeling, and manipula-tive. As budgets get tighter, as enrollments decline, as newclaims for social justice [by minorities, women, the handi-capped, and the elderly] press relentlessly an adminis-trators, faculty, and staff, neurotic manifestations of fearscan only exacerbate interpersonal cussedness. Unless a con-scious search is made for what Professor Awns calls

DC

PREFACE

double-loop learning, college and university exec uric es v dlattempt to finesse the growing fears cc ith the tricks and fixesof manipulative management. Predictably, this will onlyheighten the cynicism and deepen the trauma. In times ofcrisis, when a Hobbesian war of "all against all- is pending,great leadership by act and by example reaches for radicalunities. In such circumstances, the civilized treatment ofothers does not imply to mg to please everyone. It meansbuilding trust by sharing dilemmas and by allow mg "multi-ple.' but not -infinite- inputs to decisions. Above as itmeans searching for what Edmund Burke once called -thepermanent forces.' in the communitythe golden values tow Inch people at their most high-minded might commit theirloyalties and their energies.

Does what has been described by Christ pher I.aschand others as a "narcissistic culture- imply that only fairlyheroic types can lead the way in the -civilized treatment ofothers-' Nothing in the papers and in the panel disc ussionwould lead to this conclusion. College and university presi-dents are chosen fur the), potential for leadership. But greatleadership need not be Churchilhan. A conveyed sense ofcommitment, courage, and fairness by average exec Limescan usually compensate mightily for an absence of c harisma.And in twilight crises of uncertainty, charisma itself can becounterproductive. Ever since Ichabod Crane, there hasbeen something famtic sinister or ridiculous about academ-ics On horseback.

If 1 have and quarrel with the essays and the ensuingdiscussion, it stems from a doubt that the future w ill be aslugubrious as assumed. It is true that the authors andpanelists found reasons for guarded optimism But thesetend to be overshadowed by gloom R may be legitimate to

r

use my prefatory prerogames to accent the positive. I donot wish to discount the dangers We in this nation haveground out a lot of history in the past five or six dec adesmuch of it sullen (wars, depressions, assignations, prof-hgacies, inflations. metastatic technology) We are nowcaught up in an ebbncle of the great wave of faith in educa-tion and knowledge that hit its peak in the mid- I 960s. But ifwe were then too buoyant. too sure. too optimistic. we arenow too discouraged, too doubtful, too pessimistic. Weshould take pride and comfort in what has been learned mthe past several years. Furthermore, the-e are new greenshoots coming out of every nook and cranny. If xc wouldonly take pains to look carefully.

What of lasting value have we learned from the experi-ences of the past several decades!

First of all, we have learned that distant events haveproximate effects. American presidents do not chasearound to Vienna and Tokyo and Mexico City for the fun ofit They go to thos.: exotic places because that is where tLeimportant action isaction that will mightily effect thehealth and well-being of Americans in every state and ham-let Snmlarly, college and university administrators haveincreased their links to state capitals and to Washington athousand-fold in the past twenty years. They have learnedthat what happens on campus is rthghtily affected by ahundred distant influences. court decisions, federal regula-tions. reporting requirements of scae coordinating commit-tees, NLRB rulings, state and federal tax laws, public ref-erenda They have,. learned that the protection of localoptions and autonomies is directly related to influencinginfluennals in distant settings

This recognition of interrelatedness is the first cause

PREFACE

for optimism. Leaders of the academy are far less likely to becaught by Starwar surprises emanting from other politicaland administrative galaxies than they were a few years agoIf distant early-warning radar screens and political laserbeams need further perfecting, at least there is a new andheartening recognition of the issue.

Second, with all of the tawdry complexity of modernbureaucratic life in education, some remarkable things havehappened in the past three decadesdevelopments in themoral climate of our nation that only the least generousamong us could rue. The fact is that the hard shell of caneand class that had existed since colonial times in large partsof our nation has cracked beyond repair in the past quarter-century. However far we still have to go, minorities, wom-en, the young, the old, the handicapped are finally beingbrought, in Winston c..hurchill's great words, -under theprotective umbrella of the Constitution.- This extraordi-nary happeningthe explosive extension of the concept offairness in our societyis fraught with unpredictable, un-comfortable, sometimes bizzare consequences It affrontsthe comfortable, often-hidden, class system that in earlierda, ensured that some people were more equal thanothers. But the recent transformation of expectations is asubstantial moral triumph. It changes the definition of edu-cation from -sorting- to 'universal opportunity.- That thein-baskets of collegiate executives are loaded with clinicalproblems related to the implementation of the new equitiesshould be viewed as a kind of midwifery. In the context ofconsiderable pain, blood, and anguish, college and univer-sity administrators are helping a new worlda newfreedomto be born.

This seems to me a second cause for optimismeven

xii

1;

PREFACE

though the struggle will be sufficiently attenuated to dull onoccasion the administrator's sense of immediate accom-plishment.

Third, I cannot help but feel that we are coming to theend of a decade of educational slobbery. Standards are onceagain becoming respectable. The fakes are being spot-lighted on "Sixty Minutes" and in books and journals.Whatever the perversities of decremental budgetsfevtreal bucks next year than thisthey can be used to separatethe frivolous from the serious.

1 refer here not iust to the back-to-basicsmovementbasics defined in terms of the (radio, aalthree-Rs. There are, in fact, some very worrisome aspects tothis movement. Unless we are careful, we may turn outgraduates who have been trained to recognize words,memorize facts, manipulate numbers, and write a simpledeclarativP sentence but who are incapable of a level ofthought, feeling, and aLtion needed for personal and socialsurvival in the twenty-first century. The new concern withstandards should infuse and infect all learning and allcourses at all levelsin the arts and literature, in health andconsumerism, in history and social studies, in science andlanguage, in professional and technical training. I see withininstitutions of higher education, within state and federalauthorities, and within private accrediting associations anew concern about he commitment to and the maintenanceof academic standards.

There is a final point. I see a new emphasis on the needto equip college and university leaders with managementskills necessary to the responsible fulfillment of their casks.This volume commemorates the tenth anniversary of theInstitute for Educational Management at Harvard. The

PREFAC:

thousand or so higher-education administrators who haveenrolled in the summer Institute have contributed to thecurriculum as they have learned from it. In graduate schoolsacross the nation. a new sophistication is being brought tothe process of educating future college and university ad-ministrators. In addition to stressing traditional manage-ment toolsquantitative and qualitativenew preserviceand inservice curricula for college and university adminis-trators are emphasizing the political and legal environmentof higher education, organizational behavior, collectivebargaining, and the purposes and effects of education. Thegraduates of these courses and programs should be farbetter educated than their predecessors in the leadershipskills needed to guide -a modern institution of higher educa-tion.

These, then, are reasons for considerable optimism asone views the future of college and university administra-tion. This volume of essays and commentary rightly empha-sizes the coming dangers and complexities. Reasons forhope are alluded to in what follows. They are simply under-scored in this preface.

Stvphen K. Bailey. Ph D . 15 the Director of Programs in Administration,Planning, and Social Polic) at Han ard's Graduate School of Education Theau thor of se: era/ books and artit les. Professor Bailed is particularly knou n for hisprize-u inning stud). Congress %fakes A Law. and for his most re.ent book.The Purposes of Education

X 1 V

iJ

Introduction

The evidence of demographic analysis is incontestable:enrollments for institutions of higher learning will decreasemarkedly in the 1980s. The Most dramatic consequence ofprojected declines will be the contraction of finances ofcolleges and universities. Undoubtedly, the fiscal diminu-tion will post the most central challenge to educationaladministrators in the decade ahead, demanding from them asynthesis of leadership and managerial behaviors that willaddress the evolutionary needs of the academy.

In the spring of 1979, the Institute for EducationalManagement conducted a Symp, slum on Leadership bywhich it hoped to discover guidelines for its role in develo,ing and enhancing the leadership skills of administrators forthe 1980s. Two papers were .rresent, 1 to generate discus-sion by the panelists of such guidelines, and both are in-cluded in this volume. "Educating Administrators and Pro-fessionals" by Chris Argyris and "Managing Universities inthe 1980s by Richard M. Cyert have been prefaced byStephen K. Bailey. Professor Bailey has written a preface in

xv

INTRODUCTION

which he assesses the challenges to educational leadershipin the past several decades, against which he poses an op-timistic argument for the '80s,

Chris Argyris's essay, "Education Administrators andProfessionals," goes to the heart of the decline of publicconfidence in institutions and professionals by elaboratingthe concepts of single- and double-loop learning. He pro-poses ways by which academic leaders may unfreeze thepredisposition for the status quo that exists in single-looplearning in order to make way for double-loop detectionand correction of error that involves the changing of under-lying values and policies.

Richard M. Cyert's essay, "Managing Universities inthe 1980s," focuses the major problem facing academicadministrators in the following question, "How can theattention of faculties be kept focused on maintaining excel-lence in the face of forces pulling the attention to survival?"Uncertainty will prevail with regard to how institutions willreduce their scales of operation, and university presidentswill be involved to a greater degree than in the past withconflict resolution at a level of individual problems. Cyertoffers a host of strategies indicating how administrators maybest manage the complex deescalation problems facingthem.

"Leadership: An Attempt to Look at the Future" byGene I. Maeroff, summarizes the essays and offers an analy-sis of the discussion by the symposium participants.

As Professor Bailey notes in his preface, the essays arecomplementary presenting as they do both the theoreti-cal side of the issue of leadership (Argyris) and the practi-cally applied strategies of financial management (Cyert).Together, they offer a keen-sighted perspective on the

xvi

15

INTRODUCTION

central challenge to higher education in the decade about tounfold. It would be difficult to imagine a college or univer-sity administrator who was not assisted by the th4ikingexpounded in these four responses to the difficulties ofacademic "leadership in the 1980s."

xvii

1 0

I

Educating Administratorsand Professionals

by Chris Argyris

I begin with some puzzling facts. As the sophisticationof managerial technology and competence increases, pollsinform, us that (1) the public's confidence in the ability ofprivate and public organizations to perform effectively de-creases (Argyris, 1973) and (2) the confidence of the publicin professionals who provide services and manage institu-tions has steadily decreased. In many cases, including edu-cation, it is at an all-time low (National Opinion ResearchCorporation, 1978).

Since the technical knowledge used by these differentprofessionals is so disparate, it appears unlikely that it canbe the cause of the deteriorating confidence. We must lookelsewhere for what is common to these professions thatcould cause these trends.

1

17

eMIMISs=11,

LEADERSHIP IN THE '805

Common to administrators and all other professionalsis that they require valid information to use their technicalskills, that they must get this information from others, andfrequently the people from whom they must get the infor-mation are also the people they must manage (either toproduce a product or a service). Professionals have thedifficult task of combining learning through others withcontrolling or managing these same others. This is a difficulttask because the conditions required for learning may be, aswe shall see, at odds with the conditions required for con-trolling or managing others.

To compound the problem, the new managerial tech-nology appears to be most effective for detecting and cor-recting the more routine everyday errors. It ;s poorly suitedto detect and correct the more fundamental errors inpolicies and assumptions and paradoxes, like the one justcited. To compound the problem even further, I ' ope toshow that we acculturate people, at a very early age, with"theories of action" that are, at best, effective for correctingroutine error and, at worst, counterproductive for ignoringthe more fundamental errors. To compound the alreadyover compounded, these people will necessarily createlearning systems in organizations that sanction and rein-force the above so that framing the problem as changingthese factors will appear to be, to any rational person,irrational and impractical.

These self-sealing processes, I also hope to show, arereinforced by present educational programs in most profes-sional schools and by the research being conducted to in-form professional practice and education.

2

EDUCATING ADMINISTRATORS AND PROFESSIONALS

Single- and double-loop learning

Learning is defined as detecting error (mismatch) orcorrecting it (match). Individuals can learn but so too cangroups or organizations. The latter learn through individ-uals acting as agents of the group or organization.

I should like to highlight two types of learning. Single -loop learning is any detecting and correction of error thatdoes not alter the underlying values or policies of the or-ganization (or, for that matter, any unity). Changing classschedules or changing curriculi can be single-loop learningif the underlying governing values of the university's educa-tion purposes are not altered. Double-loop learning is anydetection and correction of error that involves the changingof underlying values and policies. Single-loop learning fo-cuses on changing the routines; double-loop learning fo-cuses on changing the values and policies from which theroutines are designed.

Returning :o the puzzle with which I begar, it will bemy task in this paper to suggest that most sophisticatedmanagement technology is aimed at single-loop learning.The causes of citizen loss of confidence, however, are re-lated more to double-loop issuessome of which makeeven single-loop learning unlikely.

I am not taking the position that single-loop learning isunimportant. The reason for creating organizations is todecompose problems into single-loop activities. Unless theroutines are performed well, the organization will not beable to achieve even its most primitive obligations. All of usin academia have seen examples of bright scholars whoorganize to deal with double-loop if sues only to have their

1

3

7=1

LEADERSHIP IN THE '80s

organizations deteriorate because they could not solve sim-ple single-loop problems.

My position, therefore, is that single-loop is necessarybut not sufficient for several reasons. First, conditions maychange and the original governing values and policies are nolonger applicable. Single-loop learning will not hell, us tosolve such problems.

Individuals are socialized io be single-loop learn-ers and to create organizations with the samelearning limitations.

Second, I hope to show that human beings also use atechnology to design and execute their actions. This indi-vidual managerial technology is learned through accultura-tion. Research to d?..:z that the managerial technol-ogy most frequently held by individuals limits them tosingle-loop learning and acts to blind them to this possibil-ity. One consequence is that organizations are populatedwith single-loop learners who then create organizationalconditions that reinforce and sanction this limitation.

It is correct, therefore, to describe the Pentagon Pa-pers, the Firestone Tire fiasco, the Swine Flu program, thenear financial collapse of large cities, and the failure ofalternative schools as examples of poor organizationaldouble-loop learning. It is incorrect, however, to place theblame primarily on organizations. They could not havedone much better (even with the sophisticated information

EDUCATING ADMINISTRATORS ANT) PROFESSIONALS

science technology ) because they are populated by humanbeings who, for the most part, do not know how to double-loop learnnot to say how to create organizations thatdouble-loop learn.

For example, five schools were studied whose teachersand students were volunte.2rs whose curricula were largely,if not completely, under their control, and who had ade-quate financial support. Yet they all failed. When one exam-ines the reasons for the failure, they lie in the ince, personal,group, and intergroup dynamics that they created. Theteachers and students were single-loop learners trying toestablish schools that require double-loop skills (Argyris,1974). Another example is, 1 believe, the rise and demise offaculty and student participation in university governance.According to recent evaluations, such participation has notbeen effective (Baldridge et al, 1978). If our knowledge;..bout individual information processing, about the organi-zational learning systems, and about real time constraints isvalid, then mechanisms such as university senates shouldhave difficulty in dealing with double-loop issues. At best,they may be used for dealing with single-loop issues. As weshall see, if individuals and organizations have trouble indouble-loop learning, one way to deal with the problem is todecompose the double-loop issues to singly -loop ones. But,the reason they were created was because of factors such aslow trust, organizational games, unilaterally made decisionsthat were uninfluenceable. These are double-loop issuesthat are not decomposable to single-loop issues.

2 _2.

5


Learning in order to understand, and learning inorder to take action

Is this not an overly pessimistic view? Have not univer-sities and professional schools been concerned withdouble-loop learning for years? Does not the core of manycurricula include questioning thevalues and policies of the society and of the respectiveprofessional discipline?

The answer is yes to both questions. But such an an-swer does not deal with the problem that I am raising. Whyis this so?

Learning has been described as a circular process ofdiscovery (of a problem), invention (of a solution), production(of the solution), and evaluation (of the production) whichmay lead to new discoveries. Most professional schools payattention to the entire cycle when they are teaching knowl-edge for single-loop learning. For example, accounting istaught so that students learn to discover the conditionswhen LIFO and FIFO are valid and to apply the properaccounting procedure under the proper conditions. Stu-dents are taught decision analysis in ways that they can usefor the solving of actual problems

The knowledge and skills, however taught, that arerelated to double-loop learning, rarely include the entirecycle of learning. Inquiry into errors in the underlyingpolicies and practices of organizations is taught in profes-sional schools primarily at the level of discovery and, infewer cases, at the level of invention. Little is taught aboutproducing double-loop knowledge into action. For example,much is taught about such leadership skills as creating con-

underlying governing

6

EDUCATING ADMIOISTRATORS AND PROFESSIONALS

ditions for inquiry and trust, minimizing conformity, andreducing counterproductive bureaucratic games, but rarelydo' the students learn how to produce these skills underon-line conditions.

One very important consequence is that the studentsare left with a considerable gap between knowledge aboutthe problem and the competence to produce a viable solu-tion in an action context. This means that, at best, we havestudents who may understand the problem but do not knowwhat to do about it. This is not a tragedy because adminis-trators are often faced with gaps between knowledge andaction. But few students are taught the skills of gap filling,especially for double-loop problems. There are thereforetwo levels of double-loop skills that are needed. The first isdetection and correction of double-loop errors. The secondis gap filling when one does not know how to accomplishthe first.

To complicate mattm, in some fields there is a thirdproblem. The knowledge produced may vary more signifi-cantly if the discovery and invention are for the sake ofdiscovery and invention than if they' are for the sake ofproduction. We frame different discoveries and differentinventions when the purpose is to produce a solution in theeveryday world than when the purpose is only to under-stand or to discover the everyday world. For example, Alli-son (1971) attempted to discover what happened in thedecision-making processes during the Cuban Missile Crisis.Once Allison developed an adequate description, heshowed that the three models of decision making and or-ganization in good currency at that time provided valid butincomplete pictures of reality. Allison argued that all threewere needed. He also invented suggestions for how to

7


prevent some of the decision-making problems in the fu-ture.

There is almost nothing presented, however, abouthow to produce these inv-. ntions in real life. If this step istaken, important contradictions embedded in the advicemay begin to surface. For example, the Cyert and Marchmodel (Allison's Level II) states that in most organizationscoalitions exist that are continually at war with each other.These intergroup conflicts lead to such consequences asquasi-resolution of conflict and highly limited search (Cyertand March, 1963). Allison presented evidence to illustratethese features (Level III). Cyert and March and Allison,however, appear to accept these as given, as highly unlikelythat anything will ever be done to change these features.This view is correct and it is self-sealing. It is correct in thesense that researchers using different theories documentthese features of organizational life. It 's self-sealing be-cause intergroup warfare and low trust not only create andreinforce quasi-resolution of conflict and limited search,they usually make it undiscussable. It is difficult to correctfactors that are not discussable.

ffaldridge's (1971) diagnosis of power and conflict in alarge city university is detailed and thorough. But the inven-tions of how to overrome the problems are not only brief,they are abstract. Thus Baldridge recommends that univer-sity presidents should be seen as statesmen rather than asbureaucrats. He concludes that, One of the most impor-tant practical implications emerging from this study is theimportance of maintaining the decision network." How todo this) The answer is better communication, the develop-ment of a large back -up staff of experts, and the involve-ment of all significant interest groups and structural divi-sions in policies that affect them (pp. 206-207).


Bist how does one produce better communication and

generate genuine involvement? This advice has been givenfor decades, but few leaders are able to produce it.

Moreover, the advice can reinforce old problems of theuniversity and create new ones. For example, we now have

ample evidence that a large back-up staff of experts cancreate new and deeper divisions within an organizar' n. Iwould also predict chat there are situations where the

back-up staff of experts can create new and deeper divisionswithin an organization. I would also predict that there aresituations where the back-up staffs are comparable in size

and competence yet the resolution of conflict differs signifi-

candy. We also have evidence that providing people with an

opportunity to participate 'n decisions that involve themmay be counterproductive and may not even be appreciatedby the people we are trying to involve (Baldridge et al,

1978).A counterresponse is :hat such factors as quasi-resolu-

tion of conflict and limited search are due to the finiteinformation capacities of individuals and not the Level Illfactors that I describe. This response is not counter to theargument. For example, Simon (1969) indicates that theindividual's finite information-processing capacities can beextended by the use of external memories. Other individ-

uals and groups can serve this purpose. But in order to doSo, they must have a relationship with the individual that is

one of trying to be of genuine help and to provide validinformation. Moreover, theories-in-use and learning sys-tems can determine which conflicts among competing co-alitions will be and will not be explored thoroughly.

9

25

LEADERSHIP IN THE 230s

Espoused theory and theory-in-use

There is another problem net faced up to adequately inmost professional education. It sy be described as thedifference between the theories people espouse and thosethey actually use in an action context.

Recent research by Donald Schon and myself suggeststhat people have theories of action, in their heads about howto design and implement intended consequences. Initially,we thought that if we understood people's theories of actionwe should be able to predict their actions (actions are behav-iors with meanings). This hypothesis assumed chat if peoplehad theories about how and what actions to design, theywould use them and that people could not design actionsthat were not derivable from their theories.

These assumptions turned out to be correct, but forreasons that were much more complicated than we hadoriginally imagined. First, w.: inferred individuals' theoriesof action by interviewing them. But we found that when weobserved. them, they did not behave according to thetheories that they had described. So we kept the originalidea that people have theories of action in their heads butdropped ch.:. idea that they could describe them accurately.We called the theoiles of action that they reported theirespoused theories.

Next we took the observations and tape recordingsthat we made and inferred the theory that the actors musthave used (if there was a connection between maps inpeoples' heads and their actions). W, :ailed that theorytheir theory-in-use. We found that with the theory-in-usewe could make accurate predictions (or more accurately,

10


our predictions were not disconfirmed) about present andfuture actions, that many of our predictions were counter tothose made by the actions, that our predictions came outright even when the actors knew about them and did notwish them to be confirmed (Argyris, 1976a, 1976b).

We concluded that we had a powerful concept, but onethat required some bewildering assumptions about humanbeings. We were not simply saying that people did notbehave according to their espoused theories. We were say-ing that people had theories in their heads that informedtheir actions, about which they were unaware, and overwhich they therefore had little consciouscontrol. If they didnot have control over their theories-in-use, then in whatsense were they in control over the design and execution oftheir actions?

Another consistent finding was that although peoplewould give us the "wrong" in-use theory, they readilyagreed with our formulation of their theory-in-use. Whysuch blindness and quick agreement? After all, the theory-in-use was inferred from the relatively directly observablebehavior such as tape recordings of conversations. They hadaccess to their directly observable behavior."I' The blindness and yet quick agreement to which we are

referring is a puzzling finding. We are only just beginning tounderstand it. We know from others' research that humanbeings are finite information-processing systems and thattheir immediate or on-line span of attention may be limited(Miller, 1956; Simon, 1969). People learn complex actionsby decomposing them and going through much practice and...iterative learning. Once the actions become skilled, theybecome second nature or tacit. Indeed, the only way theactions can be skillfully performed is to do them without

11

27


thinking. But to do them without thinking makes it highlyunlikely that there will be conscious awareness of what oneis doing or saying. However, once the actions have ht nproduced, then the individuals may reflect on them.

Model I theories-in-use

We are also learning about the way we pay attention todifferent factors when we are in an action mode and whenwe are in an inquiry mode. It appears that most people holdtheories-in-use that make it highly unlikely they will seek tocombine action with inquiry. How do we arrive at theseconclusions?

Most people hold a theory-in-use that we call Model I(see Exhibit I). One central proposition in that theory is,"Advocate your position as clearly as you can, and couple itwith unilaterally controlling others in order to win." An-other is, "Unilaterally and covertly censor information inorder to save others and your own face." A third is,"Minimize the creation of situations that may produce feel-ings, especially negative ones."

If we behave this way toward others, then they mayfeel, for example, persuaded, coerced, or manipulated. Butgiven the second proposition of Model I, the one action thatwe are unlikely to take is to make our feelings of coercionand manipulation discussable. We, too, will then go intoaction with our response, which also will be to advocate andtry to win. This, in turn, will have the negative conse-

12

23


Exhibit ITheOrles of action

Gov*rwq wuktb4.0o, Acton sb-tp,ey Dan Consequences on actor Consequences on Enenneness

actin WO" and ns ASS0o4141 144711.9

IV V

1000011

1 Acr.tve Mt popoSrs I Derr and...49. I Alta Se.. as 1 San Sea,,a

as I per.. rem 00v40.00 m sO mat actor Ceen,,,ii r. coned ovc- !wonre4vanl 10 74

2 Ma o4.14 .....g 4.0 2 O., and coned lass 2 Dafenswe ~persona+ 2 Sn9te Ws, ,.....nci De0eased

nuswoo:001....2ancl soap rOatc.Shils

3 Movnwe .44.trp 3 (hvalroahr Orolm 3 Deans,. rams 31'114 +two A

ntv.amt *env selleneOnerS NW Cn

4 BS lawns' and 4 Onastr airy VO4e01 4 Low Nee0Orn Cg mace

rnournat annOWs4Sly omen horn bwng Nol Inteenal Convndlenerti sndOSI, Wong

WOO u

I Val.:I./vote*, t an.r Huavan I Acta seenas I Testade vocesses

o/ enCOW44,s 44,4,4 nunaluiry Oete.S.4.03044CantS Can beco,..pn 5 1111:1 ape.,,CO?or ()moms, civutan

2 Free ant" Woonoci 2 Task 4 conuoied 2 ht.n.noy 001005,.4 2 DovN 000 learrung increased

cht>c WO/ esterponcnai relat.onsand grow arw.cs

3 Severna" corstrnen1 3 PCOCIon OI 500 s 3 Leaning or.geo 3 P00uer+1 +est..; of

to ohs thoc* and a ,43,4 en1erpni4 4.0 ram, t.404S pul:441y

constaM rnondonng 0,01700 toward vOwtr,

Og UV 050Kr+71bco

54.10Val 0,0.40.04of Men

NgnIr..00m0l Glaceeliernal cornrndmoniand rd. 100.09

Noe (.00.11....a.Crw1 Apr. an, 00ru4 Sec. ,Ivo/v ...C. San sr r0.00 easy 1974 I

quences on the others that they had on us when they werebehaving in a Model I fashion.

Hence professional schools may espouse administra-

tive leadership that encourages organizational double-looplearning. However, it is our prediction that the students are

Reprinted by permission of the Harvard Business Review. Exhib-

it(s) from "Double Loop Learning in Organizations" by ChrisArgyris (September-October 1977). Copyright © 1977 by thePresident add Fellows of Harvard College; all rights reserved.

13

29

LEADERSHIP IN THE 'Ns

not capable of creating such conditions and that they areunaware that this is the case. Moreover, once they becomeaware, the insight does not lead to the acquisition of theskills for double-loop learning.

Professional schools are going to have to face the factthat unfreezing Model I theories-in-use that are learnedthrough acculturation (it appears that twelve-year old chil-dren are competent with Model I) requires at least as mucheffort and attention as is required to teach the more com-plicated quantitative managerial technology. I am also say-ing that unless administrators learn these new skills, theywill rarely create organizations that double-loop learn.

Organizational Learning Systems

I stated above that people can only design actions thatare consonant with their theories-in-use. Organizations,however, are initially designed from rational models abouthow to decompose problems into manageable tasks andthen to coordinate these tasks in order to achieve the in-tended consequences. These are the designs that lead tovarious shapes of pyramidal structures. Pyramidalstructures are essentially theories of job specialization andcoordination through hierarchical control. They contain animplicit theory of learning which is that if people observeerrors, they will either correct them or report them toothers to correct them.

There are at leapt two difficulties with this theory of

14

,-,0 U

i


learning. First, it is intimately related to the theory ofhierarchical control. Hence, people may fear detectingerror if it could mean their job. Second, in the case ofdouble-loop learning, they have fears that go beyond jobsurvival. They have doubts about their ability to surfaceproblems that might be threatening without creating inter-personal rejection and hostility.

Some administrators may wish that this were not thecase. Some may even plead with their people that they becandid. A few may even try to create greater freedom to becandid by redesigning the theory of control. These steps,noble as they are, will be limited in effectiveness becausepeople do not have the skills to deal with the probablypersonal negative consequences on self and others.

Moreover, people create in all organizations a systemof norms, rules, procedures, and policies about the detec-tion and the correction of error. These "learning systems"appear so far to be consonant with the constraints of ModelI (see Exhibit II). Model 0,-I learning systems tend to makedeviants out of employees who blow the whistle onthreatening issues or who wish to surface organizationalgames that are undiscussable. At this point, individuals needno longer look at their personal responsibility for inhibitingdouble-loop learning (due to their Model I theory-in-use).The individuals can point to the organizational learningsystem embedded in a theory of unilateral hierarchical con-trol as the "culprits."

Finally, a society full of organizations with 0-1 learningsystems will necessarily have a limited capacity to regulatethem. Regulating agencies, according to this perspective,have all the problems of organizational learning describedabove. Yet they are supposed to monitor other organiza-

15

31


WONwoeaiot tilok38 31111.1111W3 IrAbll ata.rcaon bed comcban

31111111111111117 3.33c.3oo 13La

V

Fos.10.31,3LLSS

F..etra boob a1.3.4.63

Amt.. 13:471.3. 4.33.7

Nedbac. kcoIA

16

32

Reprinted by permissionof the Harvard BusinessReview. Exhibit(s) from"Double Loop Learningin Organizations" byChris Argyris (Septem-ber-October 1977).Copyright © 1977 bythe President and Fel-lows of Harvard College;all rights reserved.


tions. If this is the case, then we may predict that regulatingthe regulated organizations will tend (1) to create interor-ganizational relationships that are consistent with their re-spective 0-I learning systems, (2) to be blind to their re-spective inabilities to double-loop learn and hence (3) tostrive, in the long run, to translate or reduce double-loopproblems into single -loop problems.

It is my position that neither the double-loop-problemswithin or among organizations will be corrected unless theprofessionals are educated to detect and coi sect double-loop errors and to create organizational learning systemsthat encourage such learning. Unfortunately, there is adearth of information on how to diagnose organizations'capacities for double-loop learning. Theie is even less onhow to enhance these abilities.

The role o',' research in producing knowledge re-lated to dt,uble-loop learning

Many of the organizational and administrative theoriesstemming 4-rom social psychology (1969, 1975), sociology(1972), behavioral theories of the firm (1973), and publicadministration (1976) appear to focus primarily on produc-ing advice that remains wit :gin Models I and 0-I. Hence it isnot relevant to double-loop learning.

This does not mean that scholars do not espousedouble-loop ideas. indeed, much of the research examinedin the searches above was designed to raise double-loop

17

3"J


issues. The advice that the researchers derived from theirtheories for the administrators, however, was primarilysingle-loop. For example, researchers who were interestedin building trust recommended actions that also encouragedmistrust. Researchers who were against unilateral man-ipulative governmental theories-in-use during the VietnamWar advised young people to use the same theories-in-usewhen they tried to overcome these injustices (Argyris,1975).

The cause for the single-loop or status quo feature ofsocial science is first due, I suggest, to a fundamental tenetembedded in the practice of social science research. If theobjective of social science is to describe the world as it is andif the world is basically Models I and 0 -I, then it shouldcome as no surprise that the results of such research remainwithin the constraints of Models I and 0-I (Argyris, 1979).For example, it is not surprising to read that researchersstudying leadership in universities say that they assume it ishighly unlikely that anyone will ever create a world oforgan;zations significantly different from the present one(Cohen and March, 1974). The difficulty with this state-ment, again, is not that it is false; it is that it is a self-fulfillingprophecy.

Under these conditions an innovative research con-tribution is one that (1) describes the world as it is and doesso more rigorously than previous attempts and (2) explainsmore than previously explained and (3) presents somecounterintuitive findings. Cohen and March (1974) havemade such an innovative contribution in their garbage-cantheory of decision making. The theory represents a moreelegant discovery.

But the difficulty with such research becomes apparentwhen we take seriously the consequences for action that

18


flow from it. The theory of administrative le ,dership ths.,March derives from their perspective is, to use his label, a"mini- Machiavellian" theory. The very title acknowledgesthat the action implications are Mode! I and have been forcenturies. Here is an interesting puzzle. Research that de-scribes the world differently and innovatively leads to ac-tion recommendations that are not new. I believe one ex-planation for the puzzle is that the new perspective is a newperspective of the same old world. As long as the perspec-tive is valid, it will remain within the constraints of thepresent world. Again, there is nothing wrong with this as adescription of reality. The question is related to what is ourresponsibility in conducting research that goes beyondthese propositions that maintain the status quo.

To compound the difficulties created by limiting zocialscience to being descriptive is the possibility that thetheory-in-use for carrying out rigorous research is con-gruent with Model I and leads to 0-I conditions. I haveindicated above that due to individual theories-in-use andlearning systems, there is a systematic blindness on the partof people related to double-loop issues and they are un-aware of the blindaess. If so, then studying the world as it iswith the use of methods that are consonant to that world, itbecomes highly unlikely that researchers will discover whattheir subjects are unaware of and how the societal learningsystems act to make sure this is the case.

There is a way to discover the factors that are largelyhidden from us. The method is based on realization that allthe actions that are counterproductive to double-loop learn-ing are skillful. Skillful actions are based, as we have seen,on tacit programs that produce automatic responses which,in this case, are reinforced by society.

The method required is to interrupt the skills by mak-

19

35


ing them unskillful. This means that we must place people inlearning environments that are different from the ones inwhich they presently exist. But this is not likely to occur ifthe goal of research and if the technoiogy of research com-bine to remain within the requirements of Models I and0-I.

Social scientists must develop, therefore, models ofalternative universes that do not presently exist. It is bycomparing the conditions o:the present universe with otherpossible universes that the predisposition for the status quowill be unfrozen. Unless researchers are able to surface andexplain what is now unsurfaceable, they will not be achiev-ing their present avowed purposenamely, to understandand explain the universe as accurately and as comprehen-sively as possible.

Research that remains within the status quo may havefar-reaching consequences for what is judged to be soundpractical advice. For example, Neustadt and Fineberg(1978) published a diagnosis of the decision-making pro-cesses around the Swine Flu Program. They have organizeda mass of data in an informative and systematic picture ofwhat happened at the upper levels of management.

They also dentify seven causal factors, six of whichmay be described as behavioral. They include (1) overcon-fidence by specialists in not fully validated theories aboutinfluenza and influenza epidemics, (2) actors advocatingideas based on personal agendas and acting as if this werenot the case, and (3) subordinates manipulating superiors toperform as the former believed was correct. These factt.rsare illustrative of people programmed with Model I andembedded in an 0-I learning system.

When the authors turn to recommending ways °foyer-

20


coming these problems, they suggest (1) requiring the ac-tors to trace out the relationships between deadlines andeach decision, (2) making explicit the assumptions underly-ing each decision, (3) developing awareness of tactics thatpolarize issues unnecessarily and inaccurately, and (4) forc-ing systematic and detailed airing of views on each question,one by one (pp. 87-89).

The relationship between the recommendations andthe causes implies an assumption that administrators cannotdeal directly with "overconfidence by specialists," "polariz-ing actions," "manipulating of superiors." This assumptionis a valid one in a Model I world: it also acts to reinforceself-se."21ing processes. The fundamental thrust of the rec-ommendations is to control or reduce error by tighteningup the logic used by the actors and by making it subject topublic inquiry. This thrust will work partially, and henceprogress will be made. But when the information to begiven is threatening, the actors will still find it necessary topolarize, oversell, and pressure. But now they will camou-flage these actions even more in order to reduce the likeli-hood that they will be confronted.

There is another even more diiturbing consequence. Ihave found few people whose camouflage works as well asthey think it does. The recipients of the overselling andcareful pressuring know what is going on. They may re-spond by (1) keeping their awareness secret, (2) discountingcovertly what the others are saying, (3) excluding the othersfrom certain meetings, or (4) unexplainably reducing theircontact with them. They simultaneously camouflage theirintentions. So we have a world increasingly "polluted" withgames an,1 zamouflages that are undiscussable, and theirundiscussability is undiscussable.

21

37

LEADERSHIP IN THE "7,0s

Perhaps the pollution has not reached the saturationpoint v-:tere the next game becomes the straw that breaksthe camel's back. But, as in the case with air pollution in ourcities, it is simply a matter of time.

I am recommending that professional schools take thelead in studying these pollution processes in order to reducethem. If we do not begin to take action, the ultimate loserwill be the citizenry (especially those in underprivilegedsituations) and the professionals. The citizen may lose be-cause it may be only corporations and governmentalbureaus that can use their internal lawyers to check on thelogic and assumptions of the external lawyers. As Bellowand Kettleson (1978) have shown, the poor may be able tosense that they are being pressured or manipulated, butthey neither have the expertise nor the interpersonal skillsto do much about it. As to the professionals, I believe it isthese pollution issues more than the technical competencethat are causing the decrease in confidence described at theoutset.

Theories of instruction embedded in professionaleducation: examples from experiential learningand the case method

So far I have tried to show how individual theories-in-use and systemic learning systems combine to makedouble-loop learning (at the individual or organizationallevels) highly unlikely. Most of the present rigorous re-

22

1) rL., U


search maintains its rigor by following a theory-in-use chatassures the production of knowledge to enhance single-loop learning and to reinforce the status quo.

It should not be surprising, therefore, if I conclude thatprofessional educationas it is practiced, not espousedreinforces the above loops against double-loop learning(again at the level of designing and implementing actions).

I believe it is self-evident that lectures and seminarscontrolled by faculty may espouse double-loop ideas be-cause the theory-in-use of the learning context is Model I. Ialso believe that most of the ideas taught in professionalschools intended to be implemented are single-loop ideas(e.g., LIFO or FIFO, management by objectives, decisiontheoryand PPBS).

There are two types of learning environments wheredouble-loop learning has been tried. The first is the casemethod, and the second is the various forms of experientiallearning such as T-groups.

Elsewhere, I have tried to show that experiential learn-ing, in general, and T-groups in particular, developed limitsfOr double-loop learning because they committed the samefundamental error as did those methods of learning basedon Model I. T-group staffs tended to act as if the way to dealwith the polarization against feelings was to polarize againstrationality and cognititin (Argyris, 1967; Back, 1972). Also,if most traditional education focused on discovery of ideas,T-groups focused on discovery of feelings. Both intendedthat the insights lead to a better world, i.e., a world thatmanifested less counterproductive forces to learning. Yetneither focused adequately on the skills necessary to pro-duce the double-loop learning if the world was to be rid ofsome of its counterproductive forces.

23


Model I theories of administration err in the neglect ofwhat hierarchies can do to people (e.g., by placing them independent, submissive situations and in many cases, per-forming nonchallenging tasks). Experiential theories of ad-ministration ignored the paradox that one reason "in-humane" hierarchies are created is the humane feature ofindividualsnamely, their finite information-processingcapacity.

The latter limitation has a profound impact on theprobabilities that participation will be effective. If peoplehave finite information-processing limits, then there will bea limit to huw much variance in information they can digestand act on. But if our view is correct, Models I and 0-I willcombine to raise the probability for error (especially relatedto double-loop issues) by several magnitudes.

This is not to say that participation and power equaliza-tion were not useful ideas. It is to say that their limits werenot systematically explored. Again, this is similar to theblinders exhibited by those who generate Model I technol-ogy. For example, program planning and budgeting was amuch-needed technology, but it had embedded in it limi-tations that were rarely acknowledged by its designers. Torelate this to our theoretical perspective, we have found thatModel I theories-in-use and those that are the opposite coModel I lead to different but equally counterproductivepaths to double-loop learning (Argyris, 1972, 1979).

Let us now turn to the case method. Recently, weobserved and tape recorded all the case sessions of a seniorexecutiv program (Argyris, 1979). The analysis of the taperecordings indicates that although faculty espoused a learn-ing environment where students participated highly andstudent-teacher dependence was kept at minimal levels, the

24

4J


ac, ual behavior observed was congruent with Models I and0-I. For example, students rarely participated as much asthe faculty. But when they did, their behavior was conso-nant with Model I. They advocated !heir positions with aview to winning, they unilaterally evaluated others, theyunilaterally made attributions about others that were rarelytested publicly. Moreover, they created an 0-I learningenvironment. Faculty and students competed as did thestudents with each other. Faculty kept their evaluations ofstudents' competence covert and the students did the samewith their evaluations of each other and the faculty. Theymade the latter evaluations public at the end of the programin the form ofanonymous responses in questionnaires.Intergroup rivalries occurred and games of "covering yourass" with the faculty and/or students were observed.Neither the rivalries nor the games were ever discussed aspart of the learning process.

The result was that the seminar environment became areplication of the conditions in the organizations fromwhich the executives came, some of the very conditions thatcaused the low organizational double-loop learning thatprompted the course to be held in the first place. Wheneverexecutives identified ideas learned in the seminar as impor-tant yet not introduceable in the back-home situations,these issues were rarely discussed. Moreover, we rarelyobserved the faculty assisting the executives in designingways to introduce the ideas that they were teaching in theback-home environment. Hence the case method led toconditions which reinforced the executives' views chat or-ganizations were not for double-loop learning (Argyris,1979).

By the way, these findings neither surprised nor

25


troubled the directors of several university and companyexecutive programs. All of them identified the purposes oftheir program to be (1) to introduce to the executives newideas "to unfreeze" or "blow away their cobwebs" and (2) toprovide the executives with an opportunity to meet and getto know other high-level executives in many different set-tings.

These objectives are not trivial. The question beingasked is how we may go beyond these objectives to helpexecutives (1) become aware of the differences among theirexpoused theories, their actions, and their theories -in -use,,(2) become aware of the kinds of learning systems theycreate in their organizar.otis7-(37to learn theories-in-usethat facilitate double-loop learning, and (4) to develop theskills to implement these new ideas.

The limitations of present conceptions of leader-ship and managerial technology

The first step is to define the skills and the theories-in-use with which to implement them. For example, Saario(1979) suggests that administrators be taught such skills as:

Peer skills: the ability to establish and maintain anetwork of contacts with equals.

Leaders'iip skills: the ability to dc. -1 with subordinatesand the complications of authority, power, and depen-dence.

Conflict resolution skills: the ability to mediate con-

26

4 9


flict, handle disturbances, and work under psychologicalstress.

Information-processing skills: the ability to buildnetworks, extract and validate information, and disseminateinformation effectively (p. 344).

Definitions such as these are not adequate for severalreasons. First, administrators must take action. Hence, theabilities to establish and maintain effective networks, todeal with the complications of authority, power, and de-pendence must be translated into action. Saario, I believe,would respond that this is obvious, that this connectionmust be made. What is not obvious, and we come to thesecond reason for the inadequacy, is that the gap betweenspecifying these abilities and producing them under on-lineconstraints is very wide, and the actors are rarely aware ofthis fact when they are under on-line constraints. Hence,third, most administrators will design and implement ac-tions consonant with Model 1, which means, as we haveseen, that the actions will be counterproductive to the corn-petences just cited. Fourth, the consequences combine tomake it highly likely that these lists can be used to maintainthe status quo. For example,. if one deals with coalitiongroups the way Lyndon Johnson did (a recommendationthat Saario makes) the result should be a reinforcement ofthe dysfunctional aspects that create many of the coalitionproblems in the first place. People programmed with ModelI theories-in-use have the skills "to build networks, extractand validate information, and disseminate information" forsingle-loop Issues but not for double-loop issues. Whenpeople are faced with double-loop problems and the Infor-mation available tends to be ambiguous, unclear, inconsis-

27


cent, or incongruent, the tendency will be to problem-solvein ways that will make the information more ambiguous,unclear, inconsistent, and incongruent.

The second step is to realize that most of the manage-rial technology involved has embedded in it theories oflearning and control that are congruent with Model I. Thetheory of learning embedded in the present managerialtechnology (such as decision analysis and management in-formation systems) is that if people are required to maketheir reasoning more explicit and public, the inconsisten-cies, incongruities, ambiguities will be surfaced for at leasttwo reasons. First, people will surface others' inconsisten-cies, incongruities, and ambiguities if someone else can beheld responsible for their doing so. They can maintain, "Idid not wish to gel. you in trouble, I had to do it." Second,people will surface their own inconsistencies, incongruities,and ambiguities to the extent that the managerial technol-ogy requires them to make their reasoning publicjhe firstbelief assumes that the predisposition created by theories-in-use and organizational learning systems can be bypassedor muted if the top (through their managerial technology)can be held responsible for surfacing the hitherto not sur-faceable and makii it discussable. The second belief as-sumes that people prefer to become aware of their inconsis-tencies and that such awareness will not have a negativeeffect on their future predispositions to discover error.Both of these assumptions are questionable, especially in aModel I world.

28

UCATING ADMINISTRATORSADMINISTRATORS AND PROFESSIONALS

Features of new learning environments foreducating administrators and other professionals

Understanding one's theory-in-use and organizationallearning system requires beginning with relatively directlyobservable data because these phenomena are inferredfrom peoples' actions, not simply from what they report.This means that somehow in our classrooms we will have tointroduce more relatively directly observable data than ispresently the case. This requirement is not too difficult tofulfill in the schools that use the case method. As we haveshown above, if people are given a chance to become in-volved in actual cases, they will expose their Model I behav-ior and soon create an 0-I learning system within the class-room. What is needed is a faculty member who is able tohelp students reflect on their actions produced during theclass.

Much research is needed before we know the mostefficient ways to accomplish this objective. One possiblemode is to have the students participate in a module thatfocuses hea on teaching a theory of action perspective.That module would overlap with a case study class, let ussay, on policy analysis, or strategic planning, or marketingstrategy. The latter sessions would be tape recorded. Thefaculty could drays, samples from the tapes to be aiscussed inthe theory of action module. It is possible to help studentssee how they are competing, evaluating, not listening, orplaying games. It is also possible to show that when they arehelped to role-play many of their recommendations for theaction to take in the case, they produce these recom-

29


mendations with competitiveness, unilateral evaluations,and win/lose dynamics. Thus it is possible to relate theanalyses of the case by the students and their recom-mendations for action to the internal dynamics of the class-room.

As the students become more competent in this one-line reflection and analysis, it can be tried in the "substan-tive" class. One important requirement for the success ofthis learning environment is the relationship between thetwo instructors. On the one hand 't is important for the"substantive" faculty members to be accepting of their pre,disposition to behave in ac, ordance with Model I. Theoperatic definition for accepting is that the instructorsare confrontable; that is, their actions toward the studentsare discussable. The "theory of action" instructor, on theother hand, has to be accepting of the limits placed on"process" by real time constraints and the requirements ofachieving organizational objectives.

It is conceivable that the school may even make aservic2 available to its students to tape-record their actionsin any course in which they are heavily involved: For exam-ple, a student may be responsible for beginning the discus-sion in a finance course, and he would like to reflect on hisbehavior. Or a small group may have to make a presentationin a larger session.

A different model is to create a learning environmentfor a group of executives who are strangers to each other orfor an executive and his immediate subordinates. The casesused in the class are developed by the executives. Some ofthe cases are written, while others are based on tape re-cordings sent to us by the executives of sessions that they ledin their organizations. In the case of the latter, we listened to

30


the tapes and transcribed a portion of them to be used as acase.

The results have been encouraging. The executivessoon desire to ntroduce the learning in the back-homesetting. This means that, in a class of ten, if five executiveswish to begin, the teaching possibilities become signifi-cantly enlarged. Instead of one learning environment, tenare now required. The logistics are difficult but not unsolv-able. One feature that helps is that the scheduling can bedone a year ahead of time. We have found that the organiza-tions are willing to commit financial resources to helpguarantee a faculty for two years or more. Moreover, manyclients have also been willing to make research oppor-tunities available including paying for most of the cost.Their interest in research i5 related to their need to assesshow well they are doing and to redesign the programs toreduce error and inefficiency (Argyris, 1976b).

A third type of learning environment is classes thatfocus on what I have called inner contradictions of man-agement. These classes may be more advanced and mayrequire exposure first to the learning environments justdescribed. The purpose of these programs is to explore thedeepest paradoxes that administrators face. For example,the people in decision theory and operations research havedeveloped various systematic and formal models for man-agerial decision making. These models vary widely, but forthe purposes of this discussion let us include them under thelabel of management information systems (MIS). The un-derlying assumption of this technology may bP described asfollows. Organizations contain many different "contexts ofaction" along the work flow. People close to the flow ofwork (teachers in a classroom and first -line supervisors in a

4i-..,

31


private or public organization) tend to manage their contextwith a personal MIS. The information used tends to besubjective, concrete, emotionally laden, nonaddicive toand noncomparable with ocher personal MIS.

It is not possible for the president or dean of a univer-sity, or the president or assistant secretary, to manage theirrespective organizations with such MIS. It is at this levelthat operations research and decision theorists have been ofhelp. They have developed MIS whose data may be de-scribed as abstract, impersonal, additive, trendable, andcomparable, and whose logic is explicit. This is the kind ofdata that administrators, who are distant from the context ofaction, can use to manage the organization.

What will happen if these features dominate the rea-soning processes at the top and hence dominate the majorproblem-solving and decision-making processes of organi-zations? It appears likely that end results maybe empha-sized over processes, and decisions can become distortedbecause the requirements of the information science tech-nology may require reasoning processes that are re-ductionism. This means that any discontinuous attributesare treated as simply involving "qualitative constraint" ordenying or overlooking the existence of the discontinuity,which, in turn, may misstate the underlying structure andagain, in turn, may anesthetize moral feeling (Tribe, 1972).

It also appears that the simultaneous use of distant andlocal information systems to administer organizations canlead managers at the local level or at the point where actionis taken to feel that their world is managed unjustly. Sincethis would be a double-loop issue, they would also feel thatthe issue of "structural-based" injustice is undiscussable(Argyris, 1978). Faculty, for example, do pot believe it isjust to evaluate their performance by the use of distant data.

32

45

1


. .,

But they also believe that they must be careful of how theyresist because they could be seen as troublemakers or dis-loyal. All these are threatening issues and require a climateof double-loop learninga climate that we suggest rarelyexists.

The result is a contradiction. If we decide to use ra-tional information to manage organizations, we can createthe conditions of irrationality and injustice which, in turn,may influence the validity of the information that may becollected in the first place.

A task of professional education of the future will be tohelp administrators to see that this contradiction cannot beeliminated. Distant information systems are needed, andirrationality and feelings of injustice are inevitable. The taskis aot only to redesign MIS or to re-educate people. Aflmin------____ _

istrators and followers will have to be educated in dealingwith paradoxes. If there is a requirement that is greatlyunderestimated in administrative education, it is this one.All too frequently, education is based on the assumptionthat dilemmas and r ,adoxes can be reduced or eliminated;the trick is to pick the 1,,ht horn of the dilemma. This is atrick. The real challenge is to face the paradox and learn howto manage it.

Summary and Conclusions

I should like to conclude by summarizing the positiontaken in this paper as follows: ,

(1) Professionals, be they admoistrators or individual

33

".


contributors such as lawyers, doctors, educators,and clergy,have technical expertise that they use to accomplish theirrespective purposes.

(2) In order to use this knowledge, they must first"know" it. What does "to know" mean? Professionals knowthe knowledge when they can use it (a) to discover prob-lems, (b) to invent a solution, (c) to produce the solution, (d)to evaluate how well they are doing, and (e) to perform a, b,c, and d in an on-line manner. To know is indeed verycomplex.

(3) We have found in our studies that professionals (allpeople, for that matter) are not particularly effective inon-line learning about double-loop issues.

They appear (a) to combine advocacy with unilateralcontrol, or (b) to use oscillating Model I, or (c) the oppositeto Model I (nondirective), or (d) oscillatin; between non-directive and unilaterally controlling.

(4) It is likely that the mistrust of and lack ofconfidencein professionals may be generated while the professionalsand their clients are interacting. In the case of the profes-sionals, they may unrealizingly act in ways that induce error.

For example, white, middle-class lawyers may behavein ways that lead black and disadvantaged clients to wonderif the lawyers understand blacks and, hence, if they are to betrusted. Subordinates may learn to conform to the require-ments of the superior and to design games to hide theconformity because the superior espouses that subordinatesshould take initiative and be wild ducks. They may alsocamouflage the games. Moreover, if the setting is threaten-ing, the subordinates may even camouflage the camouflage.Young parishioners may interpret attempts by clergy togive -hem insight into their emotional problems as evidencethat they do not understand them.

34

o 'i

EDUCATING ADMINISTRATORS AND PROFESS,ONALS

Subordinates or clients utilizing Model I and remainingwithin the requirements of 0-I learning systems will tend toassume that these kinds of problems are undiscussable. Ifthe superiors (or professionals) are unaware of these as-sumptions, then, indeed, the assumed undiscussability be-comes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

(5) One of the major tasks is to help professionals learnto use their technical knowledge and simultaneously reflectin an on-line mode on their practice. This means that theyshould learn the skills of taking action and encouraginginquiry into their action.

This is a difficult learning objective because mostpeople use Model I, which means that they try to learnthrough the use of a theory of unilateral control (a theorycounterproductive to double-loop learning) and to be un-aware of this fact.

(6) The unawareness is less related to unconsciousfactor.; and much more related to the facts that:

(a) People are skilled at unilateral control. Skilled actions are accomplished through programs that are tacit.Hence the unawareness of the consequences is a necessarycondition for producing the skill.

(b) Learning systems in most socol systems encouragepeople in the name of caring, decency, and being civilizednot to tell others when they are producing major errors thatthey appear to be unaware of.

(7) The major educational methods presently in usemay be adequate to teach technical single- and perhapsdouble-loop ideas at the espoused level. Students tend "toknow" double-loop ideas in the sense that they can use themto discover problems and, in some cases, to invent so-lutions. Few students are taught how to produce thesesolutions. The situation is even more bleak with respect to

35


interpersonal issues. Students may learn to discover andeven, in some cases, invent solutions, but these compe-tences are related primarily to the behavior of others.Rarely do students learn to discover, invent, and producedouble-loop learning when they are personally involved.And even more rarely do they learn to do it while they aresimultaneously trying to introd ice double-loop learningaround technical issues (such as financial analyses, cuttingbudg. -s, and reviving outmoded departments).

(8) Finally, much of the rigorous research being con-ducted that may have relevance to these issues is designedand implemented in ways that make it highly likely that theproducts will be most useful and powerful in maintainingthe status quo.

Theories-in-use, learning systems, modes of educa-tion, and research relevant to leadership and professionalpractice appear to dovetail in ways that make individualand organizational double-loop learning unlikely. At thesame time the very success of our society means that thenext class of issues that will dominate the scene will be theinner contradictions and paradoxes embedded in organiza-tions and professional practice These issues requiredouble-loop learning.

Chris Argym. Ph D . 1, the fame Brunt Conant Professor of Ed:nation andOrganizational Behat tor at Hartard Untremt, The author of tu enty-onrbook, and monograph,. imludinglricreastng Leadership Effectiveness, Pro-/mor Argjell ha, been a Jpe,zal ton,ultant to the S Department of Health.Fdmatton and trellare and to numerou, kuropean goternment, on problems ofrag um( detelopment and produ4 tit ill

36


Bibliography

Allison, Graham, Essence of Decision (New York: LittleBrown & Co., 1971).

Argyris, Chris, "Inner Contradictions of Rigorous Re-search," (Manuscript) 1979.

Argyris, Chris, "Theories of Action that Inhibit IndividualLearning," American Psychologist, Vol. 31, No. 9, Sep-tember 1976a.

Argyris, Chris, Increasing Leadership Effectiveness (NewYork: Wiley-Interscience, 1976b).

Argyris, Chris, "Dangers in Applying Results from Exper-imental Social Psychology," American Psychologist, Vol.30, No. 4, 1975, pp. 469-485.

Argyris, Chris, "Alternative Schools: A Behavioral Analy-sis," Teachers College Record, Vol. 75, No. 4, May 1974.

Argyris, Chris, "On Organizations of the Future" (NewYork: Russell Sage Foundation, 1973).

Argyris, Chris, Management and Organization De:elopment(New York: McGraw-Hill, 1971).

Argyris, Chris and Donald Schon, Organizational Learning(Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1978).

Argyris, Chris and Donald Schon, Theory in Practice (SanFrancisco, Calif.: Jossey-Bass, 1974).

Back, Kurt, Beyond Words: The Story of Sensitit ity Trainingand the Encounter Movement (New York. Russell SageFoundation, 1972).

Baldridge, J. Victor, David V. Curtis, George Ecker, andGary L. Riley, Policy Making and Effective Leadership(San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1978).

37

s;


Bellow, Gary and Jeanne Kettleson, "From Ethics to Poli-tics: Confronting Scarcity and Fairness in Public limn--est Practice,- Boston I inherit!). Law Review, Vol. 5=No. 3, May 1978.

Cohen, Michael D. and James G. March, Leadership andAmbiguity, The American College President (New York:McGraw-Hill, 1974).

C yen, Richard M. and James G. March, A Behat :or Theory ofthe Firm (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc.,1963).

Miller, George, "The Magical Number Seven, Plus orMinus Two: Some Limits on Our Capacity for Procc.s-sing Information," Psychological Rei rein, Vol. 6, No. 3,pp. 81-97, 1956.

National Opinion Research Center, University of Chicago,General Social Stine", July 1978.

Neustadt, Richard and Harvey V. Fineberg, The Swine FluAffair, U.S. Dept. of Health, Education and Welfare,1078.

r-

Saano, Terry Tinson, "Leadership and the Change Process:Preparing Educational Administrators,- in (eds.)Robert E. Herriott and Neal Gross, The D)nami ofPlanned Educational Change (McCutchan, 1979, pp.328-350).

Simon, Herbert A., The Silences of the A rttfu tal (Cambridge,Mass.: MIT Press, 1969).

Tribe, Laurence H., "Policy Science. Analysis or Ideology,"Phtlo.toph) and Public Affairs, Vol. 2, No. 1, 1972, pp.66-110.

Argyris, Chris, "Executive Programs and OrganizationalDevelopment,- mimeographed, Harvard University19'9.

38

J4

Managing Universities in the1980s

by Richard M. Cyert

Introduction)

The problems of managing universities in the 1980sare going to be, in part, a function of the type and location ofthe institution. The problems are going to be different forpubl.: and private institutions. Small, private liberal artscolleges in areas of declining populations are going to havedifferent problems from well-endowed universities withnational reputations. Unisex schools will have difficultiesthat will be distinct from coed schools. Schools in rurallocations will have to be managed differently from schoolsin urban areas. The distinctions could be further enumer-

39

55


aced, but the point is clear. Colleges and universities likeother organizations have different characteristics, and theeffect of changes in the environment will not be the ,samefor all institutions of higher learning.

Nevertheless, there are some problems that are generaland some forces that will affect all education institutions. Inparticular, those problems generated by demographicchanges will affect the whole society. The most overwhelm-ing influence on educational institutions in the 1980s is thereduction in the number of high school graduates in thecoming decade.

Decline in high school graduates

All people concerned with managing institutions ofhigher educat;on are aware of the fact that the pool ofstudents available for college will be declining markedly inthe 1980s. Table I shows the number of high school grad-uates from 1970 to 1986. Obviously, the figures for the1980s are projections. These projections are made with agreat deal of accuracy, however, since the children who willbe going to high school in the '80s are already born. Errorsin the figures are possible because the proportion of stu-dents that will graduate and the proportion that will go tocollege may be wrong.

It is hard to know the precise point at which the declin-ing pool will reach a level that will mean difficulties for mostschools The fact is that some schools have already reached a

40

0 u

Table 1

First-time Degree Credit Enrollment Trends to 1986

BirthYear

Births'H SGradYear

H.SGrads:

College # toFreshman College:Year

# toPub.4-yrCollege:

# toPvt4-yr.College:

# toPub2-yr.College:

# toPvt2-yrCollege:

x103 x103 x103 x103 x103 x10: x1031952 3,933 1970 2,896 1970 1,780 737 389 601 531953 3,989 1971 2,943 1971 1,766 719 376 620 501954 4,102 1972 3,006 1972 1,740 693 372 630 461955 4,128 1973 3,039 $973 1,757 706 370 637 451936 4,244 1974 3,077 1974 1,854 754 373 682 441957 4,532 1975 3,140 1975 1,910 777 386 697 501958 4,219 1976 3,135 1976 1,922 781 386 705 501959 4,313 1977 3,132 1977 1,933 785 387 711 501960 4,301 1978 3,143 1978 1,955 793 388 723 511961 4,317 1979 3,127 1979 1,954 793 385 725 511962 4,213 1980 3,080 1930 1,936 784 380 722 501963 4,142 1981 3,030 1981 1,911 775 373 714 491964 4,070 1982 2,941 198? 1,864 754 361 701 481965 3,801 1983 2,821 1983 1,787 723 345 673 461966 3,642 1984 :.m727 1984 1,732 699 331 657 451967 3,555 1985 2,679 1985 1,709 640 836 649 441968 3,535 1986 2,681 1986

1 U S BureaL of Census, Current Population Reports, Series P-23, No 49, Population of the United States,Trends and Prospers 1950-1990, (U. S Government Printing Office, Washington, D C , 1974)

2 U S Department of Health, Education and Welfare, Projestion of Educational Statistics to 1985-86, 1977Edition, (U S Government Printing Office, Washington, D C , 1977)

57

LEADERSHIP IN ..1-41' ROS

difficult stage, and some have had to close their doors,merely because the rate of increase decreased and thenumber of high school graduates stabilized. Clearly, someschools have been able to exist in the '70s only becausethere has been an increasing number of students availableforcollege. The critical stage will, in my opinion, be reachedin 1985. At that time there will be a 15% decline in the poolas compared with the number available in 1975. But fromnow on there will probably be an increasing number ofclosings of institutions of higher learning, and it is highlylikely that the rate of closings will be accelerated after 1985.It is obvious that those institutions whose revenues comeprimarily from tuition, 8Vi- or more, will be the firstschools in trouble.

Many areas, particularly those in the Northeast, will bedeclining in numbers of high school graduates at a ratehigher than the national average. Schools in those areas thathave a regional student body and whose revenues comeprimarily from tuition will get into difficulty most rapidly.

The economy

These demographic changes have implications for theeconomy chat, in turn, have implications for highereducation. From 1969 to 1976 the labor force has grown ata rate of 2.3f7 . As a result of this growth the country has hadhigh rates of unemployment even though the economy hasbeen creating about 2 million new jobs annually. Because of

12

MANAGING UNIVERSITIES IN THE 80s

the decline in the number of teenagers, the labor force isexpected to grow at only 1.1e; in the 1980s. This declinemeans that, even if the GNP grows at a slower rate, thenumber of new jobs created will be adequate to absorb thenew entrants and keep the unemployment rate at a lowlevel. In other words, the problem of the '80s will likely be ashortage of labor rather than unemployment.' The laborshortage may be alleviated by a changed immigration policyand i.iy elimination of the retirement age. Even with suchchanges it is highly likely that the maintenance of fullemployment in the economy w.II not be a major problem.The result of this tendency toward full employment mayhave some additional negative effects on enrollment. It islikely that high school graduates because of their relativescarcity will command higher salaries, and, unless the per-centage increase in salaries of college graduates is evengreater, the proportion of high school graduates going tocollege may be smaller than assumed in Table 1. A similarphenomenon may also reduce the number of college grad-uates electing graduate school.

The full-employment condition may also have an im-pact on inflation, which is a major problem for highereducation as it is for other sectors of the society. No anf. vsis

, of inflation satisfies everyone, but I believe there are rea-sons to be optimistic about its eventual containment. Myoptimism is based on the fact that government for sometime has followed a stop - and -go policy of controlling inflationEfforts have been made to slow down the rate of inflationthrough monetary and fiscal policy, but when these effortshave begun to bite and the rate of unemployment has in-creased, the policies have been reversed in favor of anexpansionary policy. If unemployment is not a major prob-

43

5 '


lem after 1982, there may be a reduction in expansionarypolicies and ultimately in inflation Thus inflation may notbe as great an influence on the management of the 'univer-sity in the 1980s as it is currently, at least in the latter half ofthe 1980s.

Another factor that must be borne in mind is the driveto curb state expenditures. The drive is taking, many formsfrom simple restrictions on the amounts that can be spent tomore sophisticated attempts to tie expenditure growth tosome measure of economic growth. Regardless of the formof the constraint it is clear thatstate expenditures for educa-tion are not going to keep pace with even a lower race ofinflation through the '80s. Both public and private institu-tions will be affected by this reduction in the real level ofstate expenditures.

The management problem in the '80s

Given the condition just described, we have a basis fordefining the problems that will be facing the managementsof universities in the 1980s. The major problem can be putquite simply, "How can the attention of faculties be keptfocused on maintaining excellence in the face of forcespulling the attention to survival?"

The management problem of the '80s will be a struggleto keep the faculty thinking and working on the importantproblems of education. Faculty members always have diffi-culty in submerging departmental and professional interestsin favor of the interests of the total university. These ten-

44

MANAGING UNIVERSITIES IN THE '80s

dencies will be exacerbated when universities are fightingfor their survival or, at best, struggling to preserve a pastexcellence.

Let us look in more detail at the way a university may befunctioning in the '80s, so that we can better appreciate theproblem. Because of the demographic changes universitieswill have a significant financial problem. Traditionally, fac-ulty members ignore the financial condition of the univer-sity as a whole on grounds that the problem "is one for

Y administrators to worry about." As the financial problembecomes more severe and impinges directly on faculty wel-fare, it becomes a faculty problem. This situation is the onemost likely to prevail in the '80s.

The financial problem will arise because many schoolswill fall short of the number of students needed to balancetheir budgets. As this phenomenon prevails, college anddepartment budgets will be affected. The budgets will beaffected because institutions will not be,able to compensatefor lower numbers by proportionately higher tuiticns orproportionally higher levels of state support. In addition, isis unlikely that there will be an increase in giving by individ-uals and corporations that will compensate for the reductionin numbers of students. The solution will require budgetcutting. As this action takes place, the emphasis on survivalwill become stronger in the minds of faculty members.Those faculty members without tenure will become evenmore concerned than usual about being able to achievetenure. Those faculty in departments that have not beenattracting students will become concerned about the survi-val of the department. If there is confidence about survival,then attention will be given to the size of the survi., mg unit.Similar concrns will be evinced at the level of the college.

.,

4_

45


The deans of the various colleges will begin to spend theirtime developing strategies to get a larger share of thesmaller quantity of resources in order to maintain the statusquo of their units.

As these attitudes develop, the level of internecineconflict will rise at an increasing rate Corhpetion ratherthan cooperation will characterize the behavior of facultyand administrators. Departments will contest departmentsand colleges will challenge colleges. Unfortunately, thenegative feelings raised by the conflicts will linger long pastthe time the conflicts take place. Academic conflicts have along decay time. The strategy under such circumstances isto look for ways to protect one's position. There is bound tobe, under such circumstances, a diminution in the amountof thought dedicated to improving the curriculum and toinitiating innovative methods of teaching.

This development has further negative consequencesfor the particular institution. If education is poorer at aparticular school than in the past or than at other schools incompetition with it, there will be negative implications forfuture entollment. This effect is an example of the viciouscycle phenomenon that organizations may encounter as theenvironment becomes less benign. Actions that are takenbecause of adversity result in other actions that make itdifficult for the organization to counter the adversity. Suchcycles arise in organizationsas the oi,ganization moves froman equilibrium at a high level of activity to one at a lowerlevel The problem is to control the movement and to stop itat the appropriate position of adjustment. This descriptionis another way of characterizing certain aspects of the prob-lem of managing universities in the '80s that is, the prob-lem of attaining a new equilibrium at a smaller scale ofoperation that is of the same quality as the la.ger scale.

46


The effects of a poorer economic position will havefurther deleterious implications for universties. Facultysalaries in the face of inflation and reduced revenue for theuniversity are unlikely to maintain their real value. In addi-tion to the negative impact on faculty morale, the decreasein real faculty salaries further diverts faculty attention fromthe problem of attaining excellence in the university. Thenatural reaction to a fall in income is to find a way to rebuildit. For faculty members with outside consulting oppor-tunities, the response will be to increase the amount of timedevoted to consulting. Other faculty not usually attracted toconsulting will make efforts to find income outside theacademy. For the university itself, there will be bad resultsfrom the increased consulting of faculty. More attention tononacademic interests means less attention to educationand researchand a reduced commitment to the university.It should be noted that consulting can also be beneficial to afaculty member's professional development. Exposure toproblems in the real world can often have a beneficial effecton a professor's teaching and research. Administrators willalso be forced to spend more time in outside activitiesdesigned to raise more money. The most visible target willprobably be government, both federal and state. Both pub-lic and private institutions will intensify their efforts to getmore government funds. In those states where a subsidyplan for private schools is in ,e..xistence, usually under theguise of compensation for costs incurred in educating stateresidents generally or some subset of them, the pressurewill be for a higher subsidy. Where one does not alreadyexist, pressure will be put on states to start one. Again thisactivity takes the time and attention of academic managersaway from developing and implementing new ways ofachieving greater excellence in education and research.

47

6


Economic hardship in academia will also have badlong-run effects, independent of the financial pressure im-posed on many insritu twits, for the academic profession. Inan economy where some firms a:.d industries are expandingand represent great potential for the future, a contractinghigher education area is not likely to attract the "best andthe brightest" from the generation entering the labormarket. In an economy waere the young are being offeredrelatively higher salaries because of the demographicchanges described above, the decreasing opportunities fortenure, the traditionally lower levels of academic salaries,and the inability of the academy to keep salaries increasingat the rate of inflation are bound to attract proportionallysmaller numbers of the most able labor market entrants.

The -t.1,,ction in the number of people being attractedto the academy occurs at two levels. Fewer PhDs will electto stay In academic life after they receive their degrees, andfewer students with bE,-helor degrees will enter graduateschool after their first df gree. The one exception may beterminal masters degree pi warns. Since the MBA andother terminal masters degree have I- , .one increasinglygood entry points for industr), these orograms may wellcontinue to expand in contrast to the gent'ial atmosphere ofcontraction of graduate educe Lion expected to prevail. The;eduction in the number of graduate students will havesome harmful effects. on research in science, particularlyphysics, chemtstri, and 1),3logy. Faculty members in thesedisciplines need graduate students to participate in researchprograms. Without graduate students a faculty membermust spend more time in less productive work and in turnwill become a less productive researcher. Here again this

'result has negative financial implications since future re-

48

--,


search contracts depend on past results. A reduction inresearch contracts leads to a reduction in the funds availableto pay for overhead costs. A smaller pool of graduate stu-dents leads to a smaller number of Potential academic lead-ers in the future. Thus for the longer run the educationindustry will be embarked on a vicious cycle. The financialproblems will result in fewer top-quality individuals goinginto education and, therefore, fewer top-quality people willbe available to try to solve the problems. The result is thatthe problems will tend to grow worse. The net result is asomewhat dismal picture for the future of higher education.

Many distractions exist for faculty in coming years, andit is clear that attention will not be uniquely attracted toexcellence. The same condition, however, exists for themanagers in the system. We have already described theaccelerated need for fund raising at the governmental level.Perhaps the greatest diversion, however, exists in the fieldof conflict resolution. Academic managers always spend agreat deal of time in conflict resolution, but there are twoaspects that are expected to be different in the future. First,there will b5 a significant increase in the number of conflictsarising. The expected reduction (inseal terms) of the totalpool of resources available will lead to conflicts within andamong departments. Second, these conflicts will be moredifficult to resolve. In an organization that is receiving anincreasing amount of resources, most corflicts can be re-solved by a judicious application of more resources. Evenwhen the conflict does not revolve around resources, set-tlement can be eased by utilizing more resources, fre-quently as a side payment for one of the p4i ties.' Since theseconflicts arise because of a diminution of resources, theyobviously cannot be settled by this method. The greater

49


difficulty of resolution will result in an increased numbet ofconflicts finding their way to the cop of the organization.Deans and department heads will send the problem up theorganizational hierarchy. Thus the president of the univer-sity will be involved to a greater degree than in the past withconflict resolution at a level of individual problems. That is'something that has not been the case historically in mostinmtutions of any size.

The elimination of uncertainty

I have painted a picture that is dismal to say the least. Apotential president who believes this portrait of the future isaccurate may well go back to being a professor. The otherway of looking at the situation is that it represents an ampleopportunity for the exercise of one's problem-solvingability and leadership qualities. In any event, it is importantthat we try to address the situation in a positive manner.Unless we can contribute to the solution of the problems,universities may not be either as plentiful or as effective inthe 21st century as in the 20th.

We have said that the greatest problem of universitymanagement in the '80s will be maintaining excellence.Jrhedanger we must avoid is to allow faculty members, moist ofwhom want to achieve greater excellence for themselvesand their university, to suffer frustration in their strivingand become willing to compromise their ambitions by set-tling for mediocrity. The problem at the most general level

50

It

0 (....)


is to keep the attention-focus of faculty on personal andinstitutional excellence when all the forces are pulling thefaculty member's attention to matters associated' with meresurvival. The question is, "What can be done by the presi-dent and administration ?"

The answer lies not in listing actions to take but ratherin recognizing the forces acting on the participants in theorganization and in attempting to build a differentenvironment. There is clearly no single action that can betaken that will achieve the solution nor is there any uniquepai;1 to a solution As a start it is useful to examine theelements that determine attention-focus. Clearly an indi-vidual's attention-focus is dependent on his motivation.Maslow has attempted to develop a hierarchy of motives forhuman beings.' Whether or not one is En complete accordwith Maslow's theory, there can be no disagreement on thegeneral position that survival is high in any ranking. Aperson will pay little attention to attaining excellence whilehis physical survival is still questionable. Similarl./, in thecircumstances we have described, survivaleconomicrather than physicalwill take precedence over the attain-ment of excellence. The question of survival arises in theminds of faculty because of the uncertainty generated in theorganization, primarily by the enrollment problem. It is theuncertainty that must somehow be attacked. The uncettainty may arise because the faculty does not know how theadministration intends to deal with the financial problemcreated. More specifically, the faculty does not know whichof them is likely to be affected by the actions that may betaken. Given the uncertainty of the methods that may beused for solving the problems, the faculty, staff, and stu-dents will begin to originate rumors, and these will have the

51

6 .


effect of compounding the uncertainty. The universitymanagement must deal with the uncertainty directly and asquickly as possible. In fact, the preferable situation is tohave a contingency plan developed and ready to be trans-lated into action. The plan should indicate in detail how theadministration intends to stabilize the situation when thereis a financial problem. The plan should be developed withfaculty participation, and the trustees should have the planexplained to them. Quick action and efforts to keep facultyInformed are the best deterrents to the expanding uncer-tainty.

Contingency plans

One difficulty with developing a contingency plan isthat those groups that will bear the brunt of budget cuts or areduction in rates of growth are notified in advance. Indi-rectly, the president is put in the position of indicating his orher priorities. Some of the sting is reduced by the fact thatfaculty participate, but, nevertheless, it is hard for thoseunits who are told they must take the most severe financialcuts in case of a problem. However, such a situation is farbetter than one in which al ad hoc, instant plan attempts tocut every unit proportionally.

Though generating difficulties, an advance plan isclearly better in reducing general uncertainty. The most..qTective procedure is to develop contingency plans as partof the regular 5 -to -10 year financial planning. This can be

52

MANAGING UNIVERSITIES .N THE '80s

done most easily by developing alternative plans based ondifferent sets of assumptions. One set should include apessimistic assumption about enrollment. The resultingbudget should be detailed enough to show how funds wouldbe allocated among colleges. Deans in turn should followthrough and indicate how they would make allocationsamong departments. The plans should get down to suchdetails as the desired faculty size under different enrollmentassumptions. The point is that concern with survival cannotbe eliminated by a pat on the back and reassuring words. It isclear that if enrollment falls, there are going to be someunits in the organization that will be hurt. The sooner theinformation is articulated, the less the shock will be whenthe action occurs. Bluntness, openness, and frank speakingmay be the best antidotes to uncertainty and the resultingdifficulties. While not eliminating concern with survival,advance contingency pla -is may reduce the undesirable fac-ulty behavior that results from contraction. In the finalanalysis, decisions must be made at a central level and, withadvance understanding on the part of the faculty of the kindof decisions that are likely to be made, can reduce thegeneral level of uncertainty.

Management actions for excellence

There are other ways in which the attentir n-focus ofthe faculty can be kept on the problem of excellence. Mostof these additional methods also involve central actions.

6J

53


One important type of action involves making additionalresources available for educational and research activity.These funds might be made available in the form of aninternal organization operated like a foundation. The foun-dation could entertain proposals for research on educationand other subjects. Generally, universities have ignored theneed for doing rigorous research on education.4 By makingfunds available that might be used for summer salaries orresearch assistance to faculty who make proposals for thedevelopment and implementation of educational ideas, theadministration can capture faculty attention and time forwork on education. It is useful to have the funds allocatedby an internal committee of faculty members as well. TheIdea of the internal foundation is, of course, to keep thefaculty thinking about excellence in education and research.It may seem inconsistent to propose establishing a newactivity that uses money to counteract attitudes developingbecause of a shortage of funds. However, it is important tothink in these terms even if the money has to be taken fromdepartmental budgets and, thereby, further aggravates theindividual departmental situation. Action must be takencentrally to stimulate the faculty to focus on the basic ob-jectives of the university, and an internal fund for researchon education demonstrates the administration's commit-ment to traditional goals.

In circumstances of the kind we are discussing, it isimportant for the president and other members of the cen-tral administration to use every opportunity, formal andInformal, to talk about excellence in education and re-search These talks should not be designed as manipulativeacts in any sense But it is only natural when an organizationis experiencing financial distress that the president's foci.s

54


will be on the financial problem also. He should be carefulto avoid centering nis discussions with the faculty on fi-

nances because that will merely accelerate the faculty's con-cern and will be counterproductive. Thus by writings,speeches, and actions the president and central administra-tion, including the deans and department heads, can helpcontribute to a concentration on excellence rather thansurvival. As part of this approach it would be useful to have aconcentrated effort, involving faculty, to investigate educa-tional questions and curricula. The aim of such activities isto keep the basic objectives of the organization in front ofall the participants. All of these approaches, and many morethat could be generated, are designed to counteract thetendency of the faculty to concentrate attention on survivalquestions rather than questions, of excellence, once finan-cial difficulties beset the institution. Clearly, these ap-proaches will be more effective as th-e-managemenris-able-toreduce the general level of uncertainty or to isolate it. As wehave seen, however, that is not a simple natter.

Strategic considerations

There are other approaches to the problems of the '80sevolving from the reduction in the available pool of stu-dents. One is for the president to recognize that the univer-sity will be smaller in the '80s. The tendency of each presi-dent is quite the opposite. Each president believes thatthere will be fewer students available for higher education,

'/:p:

55


but that his or her school will maintain its enrollment. Ifthere is a recognition that enrollment will drop, then it maybe possible to calculate the new equilibrium position andmove to it gradually rather than abruptly.

The concept of a smaller scale of operations and anequilibrium position of a lower level of operation is hard tocomprehend initially because we are conditioned to think interms of growth. Most universities can be viewed to someextent as modules, and it may be possible to restructure theuniversity, including closing certain buildings, to operate ona smaller scale. It is not possible to reduce all the fixed costsso there will be some minimum size below which an organi-zation cannot operate. It is not obvious where this size is,and it certainly will be different for different institutions.

There are a number of ways to calculate the new equi-librium and, in fact, there are computer models in existencethat can be helpful. It is not necessary to reinvent the wheelcompletely. Since the driving force in the contemplacchange is the enrollment, the best approach is to start winan estimate of the enrollment that can be maintained as theavailable pool of students decreases. Fortunately, the avail-able numbers of high school graduates that will be presentin the '80s have been experienced in the past. From Table 1,column 4, the reader can verify that 1980 and 1974 aresimilar as are 1981 and 1973 and 1982 and 1971. Furtherpairings can be made by going back to the sixties. By utiliz-ing share of market data or some other technique, it shouldbe possible to get an estimated enrollment for each year ofthe '80s I do not mean to say that each year will be similar toa year in the past, but the past data does give a starting point.Clearly, there are variables in the picture that are difficult topredict, such as the proportion of men and women deciding

56

4-


to go on to college. Once the enrollment has been ter-mined, the size of faculty necessary to teach that size stu-dent body can be calculated by using historical faculty-student ratios. Obviously, this formulation is a simplifiedversion of the problem, but it should be clear that a newequilibrium can be calculated. The point is that the univer-sity can be rescaled to a smaller size with all of the interrela-tionships among the units taken into account.

There is clearly a strong element of the sta.us quoassumed, but that can be dealt with ,s the basis for changedevelops. The universit, then has a target to shrink towardand can start immediately. The first steps, and the mostdifficult ones, have to be taken with faculty. Knowing thesize faculty needed by 1985, it is possible to estimate thenumber of tenured faculty that will be appropriate, andactions can be taken to move toward that number. Obvi-ously, it is not pleasant to be restrictive before one has to doFo, but it is usually better to have evolutionary rather thanradical change.

There is one correction that should be noted. Theconcept of a new equilibrium implies some stability, but aglance at fable I indicates that the number of high schoolgraduates continues to diminish each year. Thus univer-sities may experience a moving equilibrium.This continuedreduction in the pool of students may mean that any equilib-rium is valid for only a few years, and then a new positionmust be specified. That situation is possible, but it is alsolikely that the enrollment may stabilize for the survivingprivate schools. As capacity is reduced in the private sector,there will be more students available for the remainingschools. Therefore, the situation may not be as bleak as itmight seem.

57


There are other approaches that can be taken once afuture decline in students is recognized. The most popularremedy suggested by many people is to shift age groups. Ifthe 17-to-21 age group is decreasing in size, the advice toschools is to shift to the older groups where there are morepeople. Some schools have taken this advice already. Forthose schools who can do so, nothing is wrong in servicingan olde group. Many schools, however, cannot make thisshift easily. In particular, universities having an emphasis onprofessional education may have difficulties in making atransition to older students. Where the older student isprepared to adapt to the existing curriculum, there is noproblem. if the university has to develop special courseswith less technical content, there will clearly be difficulties.My view is that the older student will not be a solution formost universities.

In research universities, one strategic change a presidentmay make is to reduce the teaching faculty and to increasethe research faculty. There is some evidence already devel-oping that there may be more research funds available incertain areas at the same time that the supply of students isdecreasing. Thus it may be possible to shift some tenuredfaculty away from teaching to full-time research and also toincrease the number of nontenured faculty doing full-timeresearch. Such shifts are predicated on the assumption thatoutside research funds can be found to finance the research.These shifts make sense for research universities that be-lieve their enrollments will decrease. Basically, they arebecoming somewhat more like research institutes and alittle less like universities. The shift violates the principlethat most research universities establishnamely, that allfaculty should both teach and do research. On the whole,

58


this kind of strategic shift makes sense if the outside fundingexists. It is always possible to make the shift back as studentsbecome more plentiful. It is a healthy form of adaptationbecause it enables the university to remain viable andcontribute to society without violating its basic objectives.

Other management problems of the '80s

Part of the strategy of maintaining an emphasis onexcellence requires attention to the problem of faculty de-velopment. Programs for sabbaticals need to be maintained.The automatic sabbatical for each faculty member afterseven years of service is a luxury that may not be maintain-able for many schools in a period of financial stringency.This loss may not be as great as it may seem as long as aprogram of sabbaticals based on the merit of the individualand the proposal is substituted Emphasis on merit againbrings faculty attention to the objective of excellence inpersonal and institutional achievement. Where funds can-not be allocated in sufficient amounts to finance the meritsabbatical, it is possible through utilizing different teachingloads and the trading of teaching to enable the program toexist The better the faculty, of course, the more likely theindividual is to receive outside financing for the leave

Perhaps the second most serious problem of the '80s ismaintaining the integrity of the university while urviving.Since enrollments are going to be the most important vari-able affecting the university, there will always be tempta-

59

t j

LFADERSHIP IN THE 30s

[tons to adopt actions chat are designed to save the waver-sity, but many of these actions will only demean it. As anexample, let us look at the following quote from a collegethav was suffering and called in consultants for advice. Oneconsultant suggested that the institution "should proceed asthough it were starting an entirely new college study thepotential market to determine what students and their par-ents want, redesign the college to meet those wants, andrecruit for a freshman class in 1981."

This college was on the verge of closing and was farbelow the size necessary to maintain its viability. The con-sultant was trying desperately to find measures that mightresuscitate it But it is important to recognize the differencebetween prostitution and adaptation. There are some ac-tions no organization (or individual) should take merely tosurvive III education, it is crucial that educators remain incommand of the curriculum and programs of study. To turna liberal arty college into a vocational school because asurvey shows that is the desire of potential students iswrong One year later the fad may be in another directionand, following the same principle, the school should againbecome something new. As educa ,rs we must be responsi-ble for maintaining standards and a professional approach.Catering to whims shows a lack of integrity. Conserving thepast for tradit;0;1's sake shows a lack of adaptability. Goodeducational programs cannot be designed on the basis ofsurvey data. Useful knowledge about the way in whichpotential students view an institution may be gained fromsurveys and used to improve the written material describingthe institution Educators must be sensitive to the needs ofstudents, but the educators must make the decisions affect-ing education on educational criteria, not survey data

60


There are other threats to the integrity of the univer-sity. The heavy emphasis on jobs among students has ledinstitutions to advertise to employers and students in theways that make the educational institution appear to benothing more than a commercial factory.

Pressure on faculty members to get research grantsleads in some cases to the acceptance of research that shouldnot be done in a university. The pressure from money has inthe past and will in the future lead universities in directionsthat threaten the concept of a university as an educationalinstitution.

In order to I -tp the university from being driven totaking questionable actions, the president must have a clearset of objectives for the university. These objectives mustbe develops d in conjunction with the deans and departmentheads and must be understood by the faculty. These ob-jectives can serve as criteria to guide decisions on newactivities. The objectives can serve as a picture of the kind oforganization the un:-.,,.,rsity wants to be. The members of theuniversity comm linty must understand the nature of theuniversity as it is currently and the kind of institution it istrying to become.

Governmental relations will clearly be an ever -enlarging problem. Private schools will undoubtedly havean increasing interaction with state governments and, ofcourse, the public institutions, by their nature, must have.The institutions in both sectors will have to work togetherto develop some orderly ways to shrink capacity. We haveseen that there must be a reduction in capacity, but at thistime it is likely that the shrinkage will take place primarily inthe private sector. Some criteria need to be developed sothat the educational system as a whole will be of higher

7 .."..,

r

61


quality after the shrinkage than before. Relations with thefederal government will inevitably increase also. The in-creases will come because of increased aid to education andbecause of increased regulation. The increase in aid willdevelop because of the plight of an increasing number ofschools and the inability or unwillingness of state gov-ernments to involve themselves more deeply in higher edu-cation. There is no question that the "Proposition 13" syn-drome will persist in many different forms at the state level.The increase in regulation from the federal government islikely because of the increased aid and because of the manyregulations on the hooks that have not yet been applied tohigher education. Given time and enough bureaucrats, gov-ernment will undoubtedly apply the regulations. The atten-tion we are paying to the problem ofgovernment regulationnow will probably have a good effect and reduce the rate ofincrease, but regulation will not go away.

The problem of continuing to attract bright, youngpeople to the academy is a serious problem for the '80s. Wehave discussed a number of reasons why the supply willdecrease but have not presented any solutions. It is obviousthat the only way academia can attract the young is throughincreasing the job opportunities available for them.Through an organization like NSF it is possible to havesome effect 0.1 demand. A number of schemes such as newresearch institutes can help increase opportunities, butsome things can be done by individual institutions as well.Perhaps the most significant action can be taken in the areaof part-time faculty. With a financial squeeze there is anatural tendency to move to part-time people in manyfields. They are cheaper teachers on a per-course basis.However, we need to look hard at this practice and attempt

62

MANAGING UNIVERSITI:a IN THE 80s

to consolidate some of the funds allocated to part-timepeople. These funds might then be used to hire more youngpeople. We must find ways to increase the demand, oruniversities will suffer in the long run.

Leadership versus Management

Up to this point we have stressed the concept of man-agement in this essay. It is clear that management is ofcrucial importance if universities are to make a smoothertransition to the 1980s.

However, there are significant differences betweenmanagement and leadership, and both qualities will be nec-essary if presidents are to be effective in the 1980s. Man-agement is the art of allocating resources within the organi-zation in a manner designed to reach the goals of the organi-zation. Management techniques concentrate on developingthe most effective and efficient usage of resources withinthe organization, including human resources.

It is possible to be an effective manager without beingan effective leader. A manager may balance the budget butmake little or no progress in improving the organization sothat it is capable of achieving greater objectives.

Leadership is the art of stimulating the human re-sources within the organization to concentrate on total or-ganizational goals rather than on individual or subgroupgoals. Participants in every organization tend to form sub-groups with ind: ;iduals having similar goals to their own.

63


These goals are often in conflict with the goals of the totalorganization. The art of leadership is to convince the partic-ipants to modify their goals so that they conform with thoseof the total organization and to put their efforts into helpingthe total organization achieve its goals.

Occasionally, a manager can do some of this by virtueof the authority given to him by his organizational role. Ingeneral, however, leadership requires more than the au-thority given by the organisational ro.e. The leader mustarticulate a set of goals for the total organization that cap-ture the imagination of the participants and Induce them toforsake their personal and subgroup goals to enlist in thecause of the total organization. Leadership requires themanager to take in:tiative, to be articulate, and to be con-vincing. Leadership is being proactive rather than reactive.Laders mobilize the human resources of the organization,managers the nonhuman.

Conclusion

We have described some of the characteristics of the'80s and have atttempted to demonstrate how these charac-teristics will affect universities. In general, we have painteda gioomy picture. Universities will be faced with lowerenrollments, which will lead to financial problems. We didt.,, dwell on the fact that there is little hope that privategiving will increase enough to compensate. There can besome hope that if inflation abates, as predicted, that se-

64

MANAGING UNIVFRSITIFS IN MI- 80s

curities markets might improve and enable endowmentincomes to increase But when all variables are taken intoaccount, it is still true that universities will be strugglingfinancially. The danger is that the condition will divertfaculty members from concentrating on excellence in edu-cation and research. For a variety of reasons it is reasonableto expect strong tendencies in that direction. We then wentthrough a number of actions that might be taken now andwhen the crisis occurs to alleviate or eliminate some of theproblems.

All of the proposed solutions, however, were charac-terized by one common element They all require strongleadership from the president Management in the '80smust be more centralized than has traditionally been thecase. In the '80s, presidents must again become educatioralleaders in their institutions Even fund-raising activities mayhave to take a back seat to the necessity of having thepresident function as an intellectual leader. In their actionsand in their utterances, the presidents must embody thesearch of excellence that they want and need :n facultymembers. No longer can the president be strictly an outsideperson. The demands of the inside are going to overwhelmthe demands of the outside The president will need to writemore and speak more to the faculty in large and smallgroups. Only through such intense activity can the univer-sity remain a viable institution in the society. If the battle forexcellence is forsaken for survival, universities will notsurvive Without the president at the head of the line, thefaculty will not follow The demands on the president willbe greater than the heavy ones imposed in the '60s and Os.It will clearly be a cum. tor presidents who car. lead and act,and the prize is the continued life and progress of theuniversity itself.

65

LEADERSHIP IN THE 'Ns**

' Notes

(I) See A. R. Weber, "The Changing Labor MarketEnvironment," Carnegie-Mellon University, 1978. To bepublished by Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc. as part of theKey Issues series at New York University.

(2) Cf. R. M. Cyert and J. G. March, A Behavioral Theory ofthe Firm (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc.,1963).

(3) Abraham Maslow, Motivation and Personality (NewYork: Harper & Row, 1954).

(4) See Bat-Sheva Eylon and F. Reif, "Effects of InternalKnowledge Organization Task Performance," paper pre-sented at the annual meeting of the American EducationalResearch Association, April 1979.

Rs..bard M. Cyert. Ph D . is the Protein:: of Carnegie-Mellon Un emay.Thereezpont of both of Ford and Guggenheim Foundation Fellouthip r. Cyr( IIthe author of Managemcnt of Non-Profit Organizations: With Emphasison UniversAtits and of numerous armlet on buiinest management and organi-zational the6

66

Leadership: An Attempt toLook At the Future

by Gene I. Maeroff

The outlines of the scenario are gradually takingshape..

A declining number of high school graduates.- A shuitage of Li-1,w.

A drive to curb public expenditures.Richard M. Cyert filled in the details in a paper un-

veiled one rainy morning last spring in downtown Boston.What he described was something less foreboding than thethreat posed by the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, butit was nonetheless unnerving to anyone concerned with thefuture of higher education. Mr. Cyert's vision of the 1980sincludes glimpses of faculties wondering how to preserveexcellence when survival itself is in question, institutions

67

8 "

LEADERSHIP IN THE 80s,

-2=OMMEMINIMMINT1MIIMININI

struggling to enroll enough students to balance their bud-gets, departments fighting departments and colleges battlingcolleges, professors turning increasingly to outside pursuitsto supplement salaries that are losing ground in real buyingpower, and, ultimately, fewer top-quality people makingtheir careers in what appears to them to be an enterprise indecline.

Enter the Institute for Educational Management. Whatrole will there be during the next decade for a programdesigned_to_helpsemor4e-vel college and university admin-istrators develop and enhance their skills in effective lead-ership and management? This Ls the question that 14 menand 1 woman gatheree around a table at the Harvard Clvbto try to answer. They were brought togethe- by [EM toconduct a Symposium en Leadership that zould provideInstitute with guidance in shaping its future. What the par-ticipants had in common were their professional back-ground in higher education and a history of having thoughtabout the state of the field.

The oasis for .e day's discussion was a pair of papersthat Chris Argyris and Mr Cyert had been invited to pre-pare The deliberations that began over Juice and muffinsthat morning will turn out to be wasted, of course, in theevent that two or three thousand Winston Churchill-typesshould be available to run the nation's institutions of highereducation during the 1980s. That unlikely eventualityaside, some rather unusual qualities will have to be culti-vated in the people who occupy the posts.

More than anything else, the conversation revolvedaround the Issue of management vs. leadership Should thetwo qualities be given equal weight? Which will be moreimportant? Can they be combined in a cingle individual? "Inthe 1960s and the 1970s," Dean Currie said, "lots of man-

68

LEADERSHIP AN ATTEMPT TO LOOK AT THE FUTURE

agement was needed. Values and assumptions remainedconstant, but institutions had to grow. The 1980s will re-quire challenges to values and assumptions, and that willrequire leadership."

The debate was pursued in a spirit of collegiality. Therewere no barbs or sharp exchanges. Despite the manyprophecies about higher education in the next decade, un-certainty still prevails, and it was as though everyone wasacknowledging that this was a Joint venture into the un-known. Yet the passion of exploration was missing. Thecoffee was consumed and the quips were exchanged, butseldom did strong feelings show themselves Ultimately,the sense of the symposium, reached by default rather thanby declaration, was that it would be a mistake for IEM tolean too heavily in either direction, that the challenge of the1980s will require both management and leadership.

It took hours of probing and testing before the partici.pants converged on this idea. ''I feel uncomfortable with thedistinction that's being made between leadership and man-agement," Willard Enteman said at one point, abruptlyyanking the participants out of the dichotomy into whichthey had been descending. It was a definitive statement ofthe sort heard all too Infrequently through the day. Often,the conversation remained unfocused and there was littleeffort by the participants to hold each other accountable.

Nolen Ellison, the only participant pr)viding the sym-posium. with the community college perspective, remindedthe others that many of the two-year institutions are onlynow reaching the level of maturity that the four-year institu-tions attained years ago. Thus, while some educators mayfeel that the era of management has passed, thos, in thetwo-year sector may not agree.

Joe Nyquist, never one to avoid a co troversy, seized

69

LFADFRSHIP IN 1 HE 80s

on what he called "a glaring contradiction" in Mr. Cyert'spresentation. "You calk about needing tough managers andyet in the closing comments you talk about the need forintellectual leaders." Such challenges were scarce, however,and if the participants felt a sense of excitement over thetopic, they never really showed it. The grayness of the day,as perceived from the 38th floor of an office tower thatpoked into the rain-filled clouds, seemed to pervade themeeting.

It was clear, though, that the participants felt that theemergence of leadership in the colleges and universities ofthe 1980s will be tied to the ability to make tough decisions.There will be a need for men and women who can swingsupport to unpopular causes. Much to their credit, thesymposium participants shunned the overworked word re-trenchment, but the message was there all the same.

Not just any administrator will be able to raise delicatequestions about the tenure ,,stem. Not just any adminis-trator will be able to get depa:tments to reduce their courseofferings. Not just any administrator will be able to turndown proposals to dilute academic programs when thoseproposals are sure-fire methods of producing desperately-."--1 tuition dollars. Leat !mobil), in other words, will be

the sine qua non of change.The question of how you bring about change in an

organization is particularly relevant for the 1980s becausewe are going to have to have changes, and some of thosechanges may be radical," observed Mr. Cyert. He mighthave added that some of chose changes will be ones thatnobody wants but that everybody realizes are essential.

Even in light of the readily demonstrated need forchange, Frank Newman and others foresaw difficulties.

70


"There is a process in American life," Mr. Newman ob-served, "that contains a powerful sense of antileadership.Just wait for any president to mention tenure, for instance,and they are off to draw blood. A lot of a president's time isspent managing the antileadership problem. This phenom-enon is not peculiar to higher education."

Stephen K. Bailey, whose patient style provided thefulcrum on which he balanced the various points of view asmoderator of the symposium, amplified Mr. Newman'sremarks. "Today," he said, "there often is no sense thatanyone is in charge. There was once some degree of hierar-chic power and whether you liked the person at the top ofthe hierarchy or not, you didn't take him on."

The leadership vacuum was what some participants hadin mind. Perhaps higher education could use a few peoplelike Fred Shero, individuals who can place themselvesfirmly in control and turn around a situation in short order.Mr. Shero is a hockey genius who made a loser into awinnerin a single season as coach of the New York Rangers. He hasthe ability to spot weaknesses, implement changes, moti-vate his followers, and keep morale from disintegrating. Thetask facing top administrators at colleges and universitiesduring the coming decade will be similar.

Surely, as competition among institutions of highereducation grows more fierce, there will be a need for lead-

ers who are willing to pinpoint and denounce practices thatare not in the public interest. If the higher education profes-sion itself does not produce these crusaders, then they willcome from some other sector of society. This is an issue that

was introduced at the symposium and surely one that shouldbe on the agenda of IEM, but the participants presented nonew ideas about how IEM could address such concerns.

s 6.,

;

71


"The university is one of the most resistant organiza-tions to change," Paul Ylvisaker said. When people arehired into academic life, they are hired on the basis of whatthey can contribute as individuals. They are chosen forperformance and for loyalty to a guild, and tneir loyalties arenot confined to the institution. This is the constituency withwhich an administration must deal in trying to get the or-ganization to change

What emerged in the minds of the participants as amain obstacle to leadership is an atmosphere in which manyissues simply are not discussed Apparently, tne market-place of free ideas is not all that open. While this may also betrue in many other fields, there is the possibility that highereducation may have more than its share of hidden agendas.How is a leader to lead if he cannot face the issues head-on,if be is not permitted to raise certain questions?

Kenneth Ashworth told of the situation at the publiclysupported institutions of Texas, where, he said, "there is adefinite need for the presidents to find the right agenda. Butthere are a lot of nondiscussable issues. Information isuseful and they don't want to share it." Mr. Ashworth evenhad trouble arranging a conference at which the presidentswere to talk openly with governing boar. members aboutthe implications of declining enrollments. The governingboard membe. s had never been given the full story. Thepresidents did not want to open this can of worms in front ofthe governing board members. Perhaps the presidentsthought that enrollments would stop declining if only theydidn't talk about what was happening.

In such a setting, not lust any process will break downthe wall of conspiracy and lead to meaningful and substan-tial change. Mr. Argyris's paper spoke of "double-loop


learning," a rather arcane concept, as the means of lifting thecurtain on the nondiscussable. The theory was examinedgingerly by the participants,, few of them apparently willingto admit that the idea was difficult to grasp. Mr. Cyert,however, confessed, "1 had trouble understanding what youmeant, Chris." Mr. Enteman, Mr. Currie, and one or twoothers entered the fray, but most felt more comfortablelistening to Mr. Argyris trying to explain the obtuseness ofthe paper.

"People have theories in their heads that are counter-p.oductive to what I call double-loop learning," he said."You have to keep looking at underlying assumptions. Thegames that people have played for the last 20 years are notgoing to be possible in the administration of higher educa-tion in the future."

Double-loop learning, it seems, is a process that issupposed to get the hidden agenda onto the table where itcan be set.. an I discussed. It is a matter of getting people toacknowledge their motives. Otherwise, according to Mr.Argyris, decisions are made for reasons other than thosestated, and the result is single-loop learning. Mr. Argyriscited the example of the mathematics department at a fa-mous university, where the appointment of a professor wasopposed by the faculty on the ground that "he would not fitin." As it turned out, the issue actually revolved around anondiscussable dispute over whether the department

ild swing toward pure or applied mathematics. But theunuerlying controversy was not acknowledged.

Going on to another example that he thought wouldelaborate on his point, Mr. Argyris spoke of the recentcritical report that Derek Bok, Harvard's president, wroteof the Business School. "There are many faculty members at

73

LEADEASH IP IN THE 80s

the Business School who could have written that report, butthey would have died rather than do it," Mr. Argyris as-serted. Again, the nondiscussable stood in the way ofdouble-loop learning.

Another Harvard report, the proposal for revampingthe core curriculum, was discussed by the participants as aposs)ble example of double-loop learning. But they couldnot agree on whether it was double-loop or single-loopbecause they were uncertain about the amount of opennessthat characterized the development of the report. Mr.Enteman suspected that there was something Machiavellianabout Dean Henry Rosovsky's role, rendering the processsingle-loop, rather than double-loop. In other words, theaction was taken, but all of the chips may not have been onthe table.

The matter of candor was a recurring the me of the day'sdeliberations The relationship between candor and leader-ship seemed to intrigue the participants, and given moretime, they might have delved more deeply into the issue. Asis was, Mr. Nyquist predicted that moral leadership will bein short supply during the 1980s. -We will need people," hesaid, "with the ability to manage decline gracefully and withsome dignity and with constructive candor "The discussionmight easily have moved toward an examination of theimpact of candor on leader: up in an era in which it will beincumbent on some presidents to admit that their institu-tions and their constituents would be better served by clos-ing down the most troubled schools. Such a discussionnever developed, however.

Richard Bork broached the pragmatic, asking whetherIEM would be doing top administrators a favor by teachingthem to be candid and then sending them back to their

7,1

LEADERSHIP AN ATI-EMPT TO LOOK AT THE FUTURE

campuses to practice what they have learned, only to seethem "get shot down."

"Nothing in my paper says go ahead and be a damnedfool," said Mr. Argyns, whose double-loop concept is os-tensibly built on honesty. Obviously, the topic could haveused more airing.

The discussion of double-loop learning so dominatedthe morning session of the symposium that Mr. Baileyfound it necessary to put a time limit on the topic. Whatsometimes seemed to be missing was a recognition by theparticipants that they were brought together to help set afoundation for IEM's future Interesting as the conversationmay have been, there was a disappoit,ting failure to link upthe issues with 1EM's program. A lunch of cantelope andsalad, served in the meeting room to allow the deliberationsto continue, appeared to give the participants the break theyneed. d to begin zeroing in on the needs of IEM. Consider-able apathy developed for the notion of at least leavingIEM with a sort of framework that the Institute could give toadministrators as a guide to the decision-making process.

This need was underlined by Frederic Jacobs, whopointed out that half of IEM's participants have been fromcolleges with enrollments of fewer than 2,000. "Many ofthem work in severe isolation," he said. "They are verymuch by themselves and go back to their campuses and haveno one with whore to share their new assumptions."

How to keep in touch with IEM's graduates and how tocarry the message of IEM to a wider audience were di'crucial questions for which only the beginnings of ansv, , ,

were provided Consideration was given to the possibility ofa journal modeled after the Hart and Buzzness Ret ieu , a

series of cassettes that educators could 11. ten to at their own

9 .,,

75


convenience, more short seminars in Cambridge, and roadshows across the country.

But this observer felt as the how- of adjournment wasapproaching that the assembled expertise had not been usedto its full potential. Much of what was propounded couldhave been formulated just as easilyand at less expense toIEMby the Institute's own staff over a few bottles ofHeineken in a Harvard Square tavern. Perhaps the sym-posium might have been structured different', to engendermore insightful thinking. Or maybe people with a differentperspective are needed to think creatively about the 1980s.Or it could have been that a sunny day would have beenmore productive than an overcast one.

The conclusions were scanty. IEM's role for the 1980sis still under consideration and Richard Chait emphasizedthat he would welcome a candid consideration of the pos-sibilities. "Do you see any evidence that IEM does any goodat all?" he asked earnestly of the symposium. "Maybepeople should come to IEM for credentials or maybe theyshould come for six weeks of vacation or maybe for theopportunity to find a new position. Maybe there is verylittle we can teach them. Maybe we are running it for thewrong peopie. Maybe we ihouid be running it for keyfaculty, members of the legislature, the media, and keystudents."

Thus, IEM is entering its second decade with the kindof openness that would make the Institute a welcome can-didate for double-loop learning. One wonders in reflectionhow Mr. Argyris would have rated the symposium as adouble-loop exercise. By the time that the symposium ad-journed, the skies above Boston had cleared and the goldendome of the State House, obscured by mist most of the day,

76

"vti


was now visible in all its glory. It could not be immediatelyde.ermined whether the symbolism was lost on the partici-pants, who had repaired to other environs of the HarvardClub for liquid refreshment.

Gene Maeroff is the National edthational ,orreipondent for the New YorkTimes He uritei on nationnide deielopment, in elementary and reiondar)It hods. as tee!! as on those in colleget and unnersities

77

ISMSymposium on Leadership

PARTICIPANTS

Chris ArgyrisCoe. Int Professor of Education and

Organizational BehaviorHarvard Graduate School of Education

Kenneth AshworthCommissioner, Coordinating Board

lexas College and University System

Stephen K. BaileyProfessor of Education and Social PolicyHarvard Graduate School of Education

(Formerly, Vice PresidenrAmerican Council on Education)

Richard (YorkChancellor

Vermont State Colleges

Richard ChaiiEducational Chairman

Institute for Educational ManagementHarvard Graduate School of Education

Dean CurrieAssistant Dean for Educational Affairs

Harvard Graduate School ofBusiness Administration

Richard CyertPresident

Carnegie-Mellon University

Nolen EllisonChancellor .

Cuyahoga Community College DistrictCentral Office (Cleveland, Ohio)

Willard EntemanPresident

Bowdoin College

Frederic JacobsAdministrative Director

Institute for Educational ManagementAssistant Dean for Programs

in Professional EducationHarvard Graduate School of Educatik a

Gene I. MaeroffNational Education Correspondent

The Neu York T Imes

Frank NewmanPresident

University of Rhode Island

Ewald NyquistVice Pr,.si,G.rtPace University

(Formerly, Commissioner of Education,State of New York)

lilenda WilsonSenior Associate Dean

Harvard Graduate School of Education

Paul YlvisakerDean

Havard Graduate School of Education

79

95

Institute forEducational Management

The Institute for Educational Management otters anopportunity for senior level college and university adminis-trators to develop and enhance their skills in effective lead-ership and management. Founded in 1970, IEM is offeredjointly by the Harvard Graduate Schools of Business Ad-ministration and Education.

The Institute presents a 6-week comprehensive pro-gram of intensive training. IEM offers its program as abroadening experience dealing with problems such as fi-nancial management, labor relations, government regula-tions, use of management information systems, and in-creasei litigation. Since 1970, more than 1000 college anduniversity administrators from nearly 500 institutions haveattended IEM. Participants are drawn nationally from allsectors of postsecondary education.

IEM is designed for senior level administrators at post-secondary institutions, the Institute seeks to serve primarilythose individuals whose current responsibilities and au-thority affect institutional policy.

337 Gutman LibraryAppian WayCambridge, MA 02138

80

9LI"END OF DOCUMENI"

Date post:	26-May-2020
Category:	Documents
Upload:	others
View:	2 times
Download:	0 times

DOCUMENT RESUME - ERIC · commitment, courage, and fairness by average exec Limes can usually...

Documents