Divided Conversations: Identities, Leadership, and Change in Public Higher Education by Kristin G. Esterberg and John Wooding (review)

Kristin Esterberg and John Wooding’s Divided Conversations: Identities, Leadership, and Change in Public Higher Education provides a detailed, personal look at the challenges faced by public higher education institutions by reporting the individual experiences of 30 practicing presidents, provosts, deans, department chairs, and faculty. Faculty and administrators develop different worldviews that impact their ability to effectively communicate to bring about change. As Del Favero and Bray (2005) assert, “Differences in faculty and administrative cultures dictate their values and preferences. Specifically, faculty work is driven by self-interest while the efficiency focus of administrators demands that their work is system or institutionally focused” (p. 57).

As noted by Oliver and Hyun (2011), the culture of higher education fosters individuality. Many individuals choosing a career as an academic have become frustrated with teaching since it contributes little to upward mobility in contrast to research and publications. This stratification within academia leads to dissatisfaction and cynicism among faculty members, which also explains the fracture line running between most academic and administrative personnel. Today administrators are more likely than tenured professors to experience upward mobility and earn more money.

Divided conversations occur when faculty and administrators disagree on the structures of mobility, systems of reward, and organizational change in higher education. These divisions make authentic shared governance and campus change difficult to accomplish. The authors deliver insights into the divided campus conversations that have stymied transformation and innovation at public colleges and universities.

Their thorough look at this phenomenon addresses what they see as the real issues of how public institutions serve a public purpose. That purpose is to provide the institution’s community and state with an educated and informed populace at a time of global and technological fluidity, all the while facing substantial financial obstacles. The personal commentary in Divided Conversations corroborates this thesis.

The book is divided into six chapters. The first four chapters quote interviews with faculty members and administrators, focusing on their lived experiences to illuminate the dynamics between the two groups and how the differences may have developed.

In Chapter 5 the authors use participant commentaries as a transition into possible solutions and recommendations discussed in Chapter 6. Chapter 6 which calls for a community-organizing model to effect change, to develop more effective faculty-administrator relationships, to determine “the right balance of faculty and administrative work,” and to communicate “a shared sense of commitment to making the campus work” (p. 159).

Chapter 1 sets the stage for the purpose and goal of the book—how to ensure that public institutions serve a public purpose. It also provides background information on how public colleges and universities have evolved amid continual challenges that include commercialization, technological advancement and enhancement, accountability, public perception, expanded access, and the stratification of higher education. At the heart of the discussion is how these challenges impact the attitudes, morale, and decisions of faculty and administrators in different ways, thus leading to their divided conversations.

These conversations center on individual career building and how to best serve the needs of students and the campus. It becomes clear that faculty and administrators are not “speaking the same language,” largely because each group has different priorities:

For faculty, the forces that shape their careers and through which they gain recognition, legitimacy, and rewards are primarily outside the campus. . . . Administrators are beholden to other constituencies, alumni, legislatures, and the broader public. . . . These hierarchies are at odds with the culture of faculty. . . . Administrators’ efforts to speak for and respond to the demands of the whole campus, to react to demands from external constituencies, and to promote innovative change often contradict and threaten the values and goals of faculty. . . . The campus is the place where they take action and where their reputations are enhanced by their legacy

(p. 4; capitalization added).

This contrast in priorities impacts their ability of faculty and administrators...