Colleges look further afield for leaders

Adjusting to scholarly culture
Faculty, for their part, don’t want to work for poor, badly managed institutions. But some worry about the new presidents’ commitment to the unique culture of academic life — notably professors’ freedom to teach and research topics that may be neither popular nor profitable.

With outsiders, “the burden of proof is always on the candidate to prove they can adjust to the culture and protect academic freedom,” said Roger Bowen, general secretary of the American Association of University Professors.

Bornstein, who has written a book about how college presidents can build “legitimacy,” says she faced skepticism among some Rollins faculty about her fund-raising background (she also has a doctorate in education and had taught).

But, she says, good leaders can make it work. And even Bowen acknowledges some presidents with thinner academic backgrounds have thrived, while many from traditional academic routes have flopped.

Earning trust from academics
Lindgren, who has been Johns Hopkins University’s chief fund-raiser, has a law degree from the University of Florida and a master’s in management from Oxford but has never taught his own class. He knows he will have to earn trust but believes development work can be good training for a president because it offers exposure to every aspect of a college.

Also, “development officers wind up spending a lot of time with presidents,” said Lindgren, who has worked under seven of them at Florida and Hopkins. “You learn a lot about the business, traveling around, all those airplane rides and car rides. You’re talking — a lot of times — about what’s on the president’s mind.”

Political science professor Lauren Bell said Lindgren persuaded her and the two other Randolph-Macon faculty on the search committee that he was the best of the 100 candidates. When she polled faculty before the search, some were wary of picking a non-scholar. But others wanted someone who could boost the college’s $100 million endowment.

“There are some people who said, ‘There are no problems that we have here that can’t be solved with lots of money. So get us somebody who can get us lots of money.”’

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