Organizing Higher Education for Collaboration: A Guide for Campus Leaders (review)

Adrianna Kezar and Jamie Lester have prepared a splendid volume that reports on how colleges and universities might go about organizing themselves to enhance collaboration. The specific purposes of the book are "(1) to describe the benefits, necessity and barriers of collaborative work in higher education, (2) provoke a vision for what collaborative postsecondary institution looks like, and (3) guide educational leaders in efforts to redesign their campuses for collaborative work by presenting the results of a research study of campuses that have been successful in recreating their environments to support collaboration" (pp. xii–xiii). They are successful in achieving their purposes and this book promises to be an excellent reference as institutional leaders and faculty move in the direction of adopting collaborative practices as the authors suggest will occur in future administrative practice.

Their study is in the methodological tradition of such volumes as Involving Colleges (Kuh, Schuh, & Whitt, 1991), and Achieving and Sustaining Institutional Excellence for the First Year of College (Barefoot et al., 2005) in that the authors conducted case studies of four institutions through interviews, observations, and document review. The now-defunct American Association for Higher Education nominated approximately 30 institutions for the study and after a careful review process, institutions were selected for study "if they demonstrated they were conducting collaboration across a host of areas, not just in one area" (pp. 251–252). The specific institutions were not identified due to Institutional Review Board considerations (p. 56). The authors indicated that approximately 20 interviews were conducted at each site (p. 259) including faculty, staff, and an institutional representative, usually the provost. Rigorous approaches were used to analyze the data that were collected and standard techniques were used to ensure trustworthiness. The approach appeared to be well conceived and completely appropriate for the purposes of this study.

The book is divided into three parts. In Part I the stage is set for collaboration. In effect, this section defines collaboration and provides the warrant for institutions to engage in this behavior. Of particular value is Chapter 3 that provides a profile about what a collaborative institution might look like. This hypothetical institution features collaborative activities across teaching research and service. Its mission (both espoused and enacted) emphasizes collaboration and from the description in the volume it appears to be clear that the culture of the university prizes collaborative efforts.

Part II provides strategies for reorganizing campuses and the place to start, as has been found in other studies (Barefoot et al., 2005; Kuh et al., 1991), is with the institution's mission, vision, and educational philosophy. Kezar and Lester in chapter 4 point out, "On campuses that have created a collaborative context, collaboration is part of the mission statement and, as several senior administrators noted, 'defines who we are'" (p. 68). In effect, this volume has confirmed what was found in these other studies. That is, an institution's mission is absolutely central in defining an institution of higher education and how it goes about its business. Following this foundational chapter, the authors devote a chapter each to the topics of values, social networks, integrating structures, rewards, external pressures, and learning. In addition to the content of each chapter the reader will find a list of key issues at the end of each chapter. This list is excellent in that the issues can be interpreted as steps that individuals can take if they choose to advance collaboration of their campuses.

The final section of the book, Part III, consists of two chapters that describe how to take the features of Part II and bring them into a three stage of model of collaboration (p. 213). Key lessons are provided for making collaboration work. The book concludes with what external and internal constituents can do to support collaboration in chapter 12, including foundation directors and government leaders, leaders of disciplinary organizations, national and professional organizations, accreditors, government officials...