The crises facing American higher education are well-known. Political and social pressures are grinding down opportunities for students and faculty to learn and teach without fear or favor. Enrollment and financial pressures are threatening the continued existence of many of our institutions. The casualization of faculty labor has changed the academic vocation across higher education and reduced the prospects for a satisfying professional life for many of our colleagues. No institution, program, or syllabus is insulated from pressures that threaten to disrupt American higher education. There is no shortage of external threats, yet we are more interested in looking inward.
We both are or have been full professors and have served as department chairs or program directors. One of us most recently was a Chief Academic Officer; the other directed a university-wide Center for Learning and Teaching. Our experience informs our perspectives in the essay but also compels us to recognize that we cannot speak for our colleagues across the rich and varied spectrum of faculty and administration. However, we believe that amidst the many areas of concern for higher education, one issue that has been overlooked is the struggle within the professoriate to sustain a trajectory of meaning-filled work after tenure and promotion. Perhaps because of the significance of these professional milestones, and the challenges of attaining them, a great deal of attention is given to adequately preparing tenure-track faculty for success in the tenure and promotion process. It is our contention that it is long past time for academic leaders to regard what comes after: the growth and engagement of mid-career faculty must be seen as a “must-have” in order to preempt the risk of faculty burnout, address issues of equity, and foster future leadership that will support the vitality of mid-career faculty.
Thinking intentionally about the Mid-Career Cohort
Mid-career faculty represent a crucial constituency–and perhaps the most powerful change agent—in the ecosystem of most academic programs. Savvy academic leaders recognize that fact just as faculty colleagues who have successfully completed the tenure and promotion process (or in some cases secured a recurring fixed-term appointment) are receiving an endorsement from their institution and a commitment to their future based on both their performance and promise. By choosing to stay, these faculty have left open the possibility of redefining their own commitment to the institution they serve. It is at this stage in the professional life cycle of most faculty that the “independent contractor” model holds the least sway. Tenure solidifies a long-term commitment between the faculty member and the institution, mitigating against the more individualistic approach to one’s career that some of us regard as having been injurious to the development of academic communities and the health of the profession of college teaching and scholarship. With mid-career faculty, a provost or dean can offer the opportunity to redefine the conditions of academic work in ways that align with the mission of the institution and the needs of its students.
However, data and reportage amplify the challenges in reframing how we support mid-career colleagues. National surveys confirm rising dissatisfaction among faculty post-tenure. If these sources of dissatisfaction resist easy labels, surely Rebecca Pope-Ruark’s observations (September 2022) come within a hair’s breadth of hitting the target. Relentless demands for productivity and efficiency and a kind of tyrannical competitiveness and self-judgment have eclipsed many of the conventional and aspirational virtues of an academic career. We are likewise haunted by the bereaved lament of Paul Musgrave (June 2022), who mourned the fracturing relationships between students and faculty and their institutions. Discontent is our new normal.
The factors that drive this discontent, many of which began to emerge in earnest before the COVID-19 pandemic, merit extended reflections of their own. On this score, we are indebted to the work of Kevin McClure (May 2022), who has spurred us to see, among other things, that faculty dissatisfaction is systemic in its sources and far-reaching in its impact. Or as Pope-Ruark puts it, burnout is not a worker problem but a workplace problem. Yet we want to be clear: As the tenured and tenure track share of the professoriate has shrunk to less than thirty-five percent of all appointments, the need for institutions to link long-term full-time faculty to improved mission and student outcomes has never been more urgent.
What we see as the way through is predicated on acknowledging the transformative power of genuine learning, a set of tangible commitments that foregrounds the curiosity and intellectual vitality of faculty and the erstwhile professional compassion of administrators who must balance competing demands and sometimes tense timelines. A prime example would be so-called “meaningless service.” As full-time faculty numbers have dwindled, fewer are left to meet essentially the same service obligations. Mid-career faculty are well-positioned as a cohort to moderate their own engagement in these activities, especially without the incentive that earning tenure implicitly provided. Many consultants and colleagues advise them to use their relative job security to tell their leaders “I prefer not to” when invited to serve. Rather than accept no for an answer, a more proactive approach for an academic leader would be to challenge and empower these mid-career faculty to change the rules, to identify and propose the elimination of redundant or meaningless service obligations through the processes afforded to faculty to do so.
As a respectful complement to McClure’s critique and Pope-Ruark’s meditation, we offer four strategies that could help transform the academic cultures on your campus. These approaches, on the one hand, are familiar. On the other hand, our experiences, coupled with anecdotes and insights from a diverse network of faculty leaders spur us to believe that doubling-down on these so-called “basics” will result in a new model of collaboration whereby real culture change becomes contagious.
Building a Culture of Engaged Thriving: How We Work Together Matters
Before we introduce our four “tools” to approach mid-career development, a few caveats: The principle of subsidiarity suggests that the most efficient solutions to problems come from those closest to the level of the problem’s occurrence. Enlist mid-career faculty to design pilot initiatives to address the needs of mid-career faculty. And, in doing so, forswear from the outset the damaging clichés about faculty that all they will ask for is more money and time for research; be prepared to be surprised (Beauboeuf et al, 2017).
Having already achieved the primary objective assigned to probationary faculty, many mid-career faculty find themselves in search of a new career trajectory and new professional goals. During this time of reorientation, faculty should be authorized and encouraged to approach their work in a sustainable way, one that is consistent with the sort of balance necessary to maintain a long and productive career.
Deans and provosts should attempt to identify new initiatives and projects that further both the professional ends of individual faculty and the vision of the academic program in which they serve, and, where possible, support the good work and promising ideas that faculty have already shown a willingness to pursue. This is much more efficient than trying to convince or incentivize faculty to take on projects for which they have little inclination.
Foster an academic community in which culturally-aware mentorship and coaching is appropriate and encouraged at every stage in the faculty career. Encourage and empower mid-career faculty to seek out models who align with their own professional aspirations and gain the advice and insight they need to grow into those roles, even as some of them serve as mentors to new and recently-hired faculty (Rockquemore 2012).
Four Useful Tools for Developing Faculty at Mid-Career
Helpful research and sound advice on improving the situation and contribution of mid-career faculty is available; there is no need to start from scratch. We hope the tools (really, leadership practices) below will energize you to think anew about collaborating with your greatest resource: mid-career faculty.
- Get real: How much do you as an academic leader really know about your faculty? Beyond what you may infer and perhaps catch through the rumor mill, what concrete things can you say about your faculty colleagues’ efforts to sustain meaningful working lives? Surveys and listening sessions can seem tedious, yet the insights they reveal are significant. Do the homework.
- Get vulnerable: We’re not asking academic leaders to share a couch and Kleenex with faculty colleagues. When we imagine vulnerability, we distinctly mean this: How might academic leaders set down the relentless pressure to fix every problem and appease competing–and ofttimes contentious–constituent groups and sit with the discomfort of really trying to listen to and understand the concerns and struggles of their mid-career faculty? Such a stance, we contend, must mean that academic leaders may not know how best to respond to the concerns and questions raised. Embrace the discomfort that follows from not knowing what the quick fix is and ask, instead, what kinds of processes and relational commitments will ensure you strive to do the next right thing, together?
- Get together: Academic leaders cannot change the culture of faculty work by themselves, and no mandates codified in handbooks will suffice. Because faculty committees account for representation from the various career stages imperfectly if at all, consider establishing ad hoc cohorts of faculty at various career phases to advise informally on initiatives and priorities that may impact their satisfaction and professional well-being. Collaborating together should mean, above all else, trusting that easy outcomes are most likely trite outcomes. Focus on asking the best questions, and giving everyone the space and time to voice provisional answers. Listen. Repeat.
- Get clear: You have cultivated the space and time to collaborate with faculty, collaborations rooted in realistic assessments of faculty’s working lives and marked by a vulnerability on the part of your leadership. The work hasn’t been easy, but you have earned the most coveted prize: shared trust. Write down those things that matter most to revitalizing, supporting, and caring for your faculty’s long-term professional growth. Set deadlines and hold each other accountable. And give one another the gifts of courage and grace: this work won’t be easy, because insisting that a work-culture’s tired ways are exactly that and must be reimagined, never is. Stay brave. Stay compassionate.
A Final Word of Advice
Throughout this process, academic leaders should maintain as a design goal the creation of opportunistic asymmetries, by which a very minimal procedural or process requirement or investment of time–a single listening meeting, a one-page interest form that precedes a full application, a gift certificate for a mentor lunch that requires no receipt submissions or additional paperwork–creates a substantial and outsized benefit for the faculty involved. Yet be advised: these “opportunistic asymmetries” are not mere gestures. In recognizing the shared humanity and decency among your colleagues and striving to see clearly the distinct challenges and opportunities in-and-around mid-career faculty work, you ensure that your institution’s commitment to supporting faculty excellence will evolve as things change.
Sources
Tamara Beauboeuf, Jan E. Thomas, and Karla A. Erickson, “Our Fixation on Midcareer Malaise,” Chronicle of Higher Education (15 March 2017).
Kevin R. McClure, “Don’t Blame the Pandemic for Worker Discontent,” Chronicle of Higher Education (27 May 2022).
Paul Musgrave, “The Season of Our Professional Discontent,” Chronicle of Higher Education (9 June 2022).
Rebecca Pope-Ruark “You’re Burned Out. Now What?” Chronicle of Higher Education (19 September 2022).
Kerry Ann Rockquemore, “Post Tenure Pathways,” Inside Higher Ed (25 June 2012).
