I'm glad you asked.
- I've learned that you can make people really angry by doing nothing at all if they think you've doing something. Depending on their personalities, they may blow up at others to talk through the issue and you may not even know they're mad at you for days. And, when you find out, you really won't know why because you haven't done anything. At all.
- I've learned that I need to learn to accept the above bullet and learn to roll with it. I think I will get there. It's just a shift from trying to stay out of the way and not get people annoyed with me.
- I've learned that you can be sitting at your computer minding your own business and some reporter's request will suddenly turn your whole day upside down.
- I've learned that regardless of how long you've been in the department you are chairing (in my case, 2 weeks), you are expected to know the programs of that department in enough depth that you can talk to people about them. Those people who want to hear you talk about said programs will likely either be reporters or administrators. Either way, you better figure something out!
- I've learned that it feels really good to feel like you're helping a colleague find a way to not only succeed but also be happy. The road may be long, but we are taking baby steps on it together.
- I've learned that I need to find a way to care (or act as if I care) about issues that I don't actually care about if the other faculty in my department care about them. It is my job to advocate for the will of the many and not just what I think.
- I've learned that when people feel that they have been jerked around a lot, they tend to care about things that don't seem all that important, but clearly are to them.
- I've learned that even if an external advisor is warranted in being blunt and dismissive, the will lose the person respect among the faculty. The external advisor has to take the high ground and stay politically neutral to maintain credibility.
- I've been reminded that I love meeting people from area schools and engaging in partner-building activities. I think that will be one of the highlights of this crazy job.
Overall, it's not been too bad. Of course, as pointed out in bullet 1, I haven't really done anything yet.
3 comments:
"I've learned that when people feel that they have been jerked around a lot, they tend to care about things that don't seem all that important, but clearly are to them."
I can confirm this, from the position of the jerkee trying not to sound like she's overinvested in unimportant things. Underlying/related phenomena may provide at least a partial explanation:
--Being jerked around often involves things being declared unimportant at one point, and then very important at some other point (often, but not always, they are very important when the jerkee is expected to spend lots of time and effort crossing every t and dotting every i, and unimportant when the jerker is asked to deliver expected benefits of having treated them, as instructed, as very important).
--Human reactions to randomness, uncertainty, and the fear both can generate also come into play. When things are important/have rewards one year, and don't the next, one is tempted either to underinvest in everything (because chances are good it won't matter), or overinvest in everything (because who knows when something finally will turn out to have a reward). In this sense, being in a work situation where the rewards are unpredictable, and what is rewarded is changeable, is very much like being in a casino. Those overinvested people may well have been playing the professional version of the slots for too long, and are desperate to be rewarded for something, anything.
--And then, of course, there's the old question of respect. "This thing you care about is unimportant" is all too easily heard as (and sometimes all too transparently translates to) "the work you do is unimportant; now please go away and do it, reliably and invisibly, so I can get back to doing important things."
Or, to sum it up in a slightly different way, the less power one has, the more one is likely to value clear, stable, transparent policies and procedures. Of course there do, sometimes, have to be changes in policies and procedures, but it really helps if there's a logical explanation (and "we just don't have time to deal with that right now" doesn't count).
Don't know if any of the above is pertinent to your situation, but those are the associations that bullet point brought up for me.
Cassandra, I think you're point about needing stability is right on target. As one of the people who has been jerked around, that's what I crave. Instead, we keep getting the floor moved around under us. I think your other points are also valid. I also think, on the topic of rewards, the we are so under-rewarded in the first place that being told "No" when we feel like we're doing all we can just becomes ground for deep discontent.
At any rate, as chair I have to treat the situation differently than I treat it as faculty. As faculty, I use the honey badger approach. I fixate on the goal I am trying to reach and just keep pushing forward - even if the snake poisons me, I'm going to eat it. As chair, I have to find a different way of dealing because my colleagues are not all honey badgers!
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