UA-R-GC-1914-01-01-1961-11-18_Page-041

If a new president has not inherited a sound administrative structure, his first task is to build one. There have been outstanding presidents who ignored administrative channels, who did not consult regularly with faculty and administration, and who did not measure new projects against their budget and educational goals. They undoubtedly could have done more had they been good administrators. Management experts who survey colleges and universities report that many educational institutions suffer from grave operating inefficiencies. Their administrative organizations are too complex; areas of responsibility are poorly defined; their chains of command are hazy. Faculty members complain that they get the runaround. Business costs soar because house­keeping methods are wasteful, even obsolete. University presidents frequently reject the applicability of administrative principles developed by management studies of business and government. Yet if a president understands academic physiology he will know how to free himself from slavery to his secondary functions. Unlike business and industry, where top management makes the decisions and subordinates carry them out, a college or university is governed demo­cratically by the faculty, administration, and trustees. Because the president must rely on consultation and persuasion to achieve desirable decisions, he needs to master the consultative process. Consultation must be open and free, allowing full expression to those who have counter views. It must begin early, before conclusions have been reached, decisions made, or lines of battle drawn. Through building a consensus the president can beget a wiser decision than he alone might make. Those whom he consults will have a sense of ownership in the decision and therefore will assume more direct respon­sibility for its execution. EscajJe from entrapment in the net of supporting activities lies in finding strong subordinates to whom to delegate the widest discretion. Presidents agree that their greatest weakness is their inability to delegate work to others. One new president had a dream which changed the course of his life. It was in the form of a series of propositions on a printed page: [ 7