Monday, April 6, 2009

Chapter 10: Extra Readings

The Dean's Disease: How the Darker Side of Power manifests Itself in the Office of Dean, Arthur Bedeian

System vs. Dean's Disease: I would have to say, that this is an effect caused by the system of how the university and college departments are set up, instead of bad ego maniacs trying to get into power so they can start dominating their co-workers. The dean's may be pushed into this preserved class of power abusing managers because faculty members do not understand the pressures of the position, and over time, the deans start to feel ostracized by their previous co-workers. Demands from administrators and influential donors on the deans will also add pressure to bend the deans' previously high "moral values" as "real life" business issues that are not dealt with by researcher and professors are now the every day norm.

What is Deans' Disease? The dean's disease as described by Arthur Bedeian, is the almost unavoidable transformation of a new dean from a well intentioned (if he ever was well intentioned) to a power corrupted morally bankrupted administrator / salesman. It is his argument that many deans are affected by their new found power to influence faculty by the control of resources, and they begin to abuse both coercive and reward power. The deans delude themselves into believing that they power is based off of legitimate power and expert power. "They develop an over inflated sense of self as they come to believe that they are really as gifted and as intelligent as others tell them."

Safeguards against the "dark side of the dean's disease" are: Establish values that are the high in "integrity, honesty, fairness, and selflessness", and Encourage independent though within the faculty.

Staying on the Course: For a dean to keep from being infected by the Dean's Disease, he should maintain " relations with faculty colleagues by routinely joining the daily lunch crowd, attending one's disciplinary meetings, maintaining one's subject area identification, and periodically teaching an undergraduate class."

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