Academic Cultures & Perceptions

1. Academic Cultures & Perceptions Taking Your Liaison Program to the Next Level: Strategies for Outreach and Integration ACRL National Conference Baltimore, Maryland March 29, 2007 Craig Gibson

2. What is “Culture”? • (Think-Pair-Share)

3. Culture: Definitions • “Social or normative glue that holds an organization together” (Smirchich) • The “invisible tapestry” that weaves together parts of an organization (Kuh and Whitt) Smirchich, L. 1983. “Concepts of Culture and Organizational Analysis.” Administrative Science Quarterly 28: 339-58. Kuh, George, and Elizabeth Whitt. 1988. The Invisible Tapestry: Culture in American Colleges and Universities. ASHE-ERIC Report no. 1. Washington, D.C.: ASHE.

4. Culture: Features • Distinctive beliefs, ways of interacting and behaving • Unspoken assumptions, tacit knowledge • The predominant paradigm that helps those within it make meaning and understand the environment

5. Culture: How’s it Manifested? • It’s the “unconscious infrastructure” (Kuh and Whitt) • stories, myths, organizational sagas • rituals, ceremonies • specialized terminology • systemic behavior patterns by those within an organization, over time

6. Explicit knowledge Words, numbers written down Reports, manuals, products Tacit knowledge Attitudes, beliefs, skills below the level of awareness Subjective insights, hunches, intuitions Layers of Culture:Explicit and Tacit Knowledge

7. Academic Cultures Institutional Culture Student Culture Faculty Culture Library Culture Administrative Culture

8. Academic Cultures

9. Faculty Culture • Identify a recent experience with a faculty member that shows a systemic aspect of faculty culture. What words would you use to characterize that culture?

10. Relevant Cultural Aspects of Faculty Culture • Emphasis of most academic disciplines on research, content, and specialization • Deemphasis on teaching, process,and undergraduates

11. The Five Core Academic Values (of Faculty) • Collegiality: participation, consensus, the “collegium”; the “company of equals” • Autonomy: individual faculty member’s ability to make decisions without coercion or outside intervention • Academic freedom: substantive intellectual work requires freedom to choose and “profess” in one’s discipline

12. Five Core Academic Values (cont’d) • Specialized expertise: basis for authority, credibility, prestige, recognition, and rewards within the academy • Reason/scientific method: the basis for developing knowledge and expertise Barbara Walvoord, Academic Departments: How They Work, How They Change. ASHE-ERIC Higher Education Report, v. 27, no. 8. San Francisco: Jossey Bass, 2000, pp. 15-17.

13. How do faculty view librarians? • Process, procedure-oriented • Rule-bound • Service role rather than educational one • Not seen as equals • Not aware of instruction that librarians already do

14. Student Culture: Values • Collaborative, peer influences • Credentialism and careerism • “What’s in it for me”? • NetGen/Millenials’ priorities

15. Library Culture • Order, predictability • Standards, expertise • “Mature organizations”: barrier to innovation (Deiss) • Replicability of experience: more important than risk and uncertainty (Deiss) Kathryn Deiss, “Innovation and Strategy: Risk and Choice in Shaping User-Centered Libraries,” Library Trends, vol. 53, no. 1, summer 2004, pp. 17-32.

16. Administrative Culture • Strategic planning • Educational outcomes • Efficiency in resource use • Sensitivity to external pressures: governing boards, employers, the public, alumni • “Rationalized myths” (subjective interpretations and analyses given logical veneer) • Symbolic action, ceremony

17. Coexisting and overlapping institutional cultures (chronological order) • Collegial: epitomizes the five core academic values; the “core culture” of the academy • Managerial: administrative demands for efficiency, outcomes, accountability; an emergent value system • Negotiating: relationship, sometimes adversarial, between faculty and administration • Developmental: professional growth, student development and services Bergquist, W.H. (1992). The Four Cultures of the Academy. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

18. Academic Cultures: Positioning Liaison and Outreach

19. Perceptions

20. Perceptions “Asymmetrical disconnection” between librarians and faculty Lars Christensen, Mindy Stombler, and Lyn Thaxton, “A Report on Librarian-Faculty Relations from a Sociological Perspective,” Journal of Academic Librarianship, 30/2 (March 2004): 116-121.

21. Perceptions • Librarians value contact with faculty and attempt to increase it • Faculty often don’t understand the work of librarians • Librarians see lack of communication with faculty as problematic, a challenge to be overcome • Faculty are often so preoccupied that they don’t identify lack of communication with librarians as a problem Lars Christensen, Mindy Stombler, and Lyn Thaxton, “A Report on Librarian-Faculty Relations from a Sociological Perspective,” Journal of Academic Librarianship, 30/2 (March 2004): 116-121.

22. Realities • Faculty are affiliated with their discipline and/or academic department • Librarians are affiliated with an agency that serves information/research needs of everyone • Faculty have more flexible schedules • Librarians work more standard (40+ hours per week) schedules Lars Christensen, Mindy Stombler, and Lyn Thaxton, “A Report on Librarian-Faculty Relations from a Sociological Perspective,” Journal of Academic Librarianship, 30/2 (March 2004): 116-121.

23. Cultural gaps and perceptions • Librarians are attuned to collaboration, cooperation, sharing • Faculty culture is often more individualistic, isolated, and proprietary • Librarians are not seen as true subject experts by faculty even if librarians have academic preparation and/or degrees • Faculty are not seen by librarians as truly competent/conversant with I.T., searching, or teaching (in some cases) Lars Christensen, Mindy Stombler, and Lyn Thaxton, “A Report on Librarian-Faculty Relations from a Sociological Perspective,” Journal of Academic Librarianship, 30/2 (March 2004): 116-121.

24. Culture, Belief, and Change • Change doesn’t come from following a procedural plan or a “cookbook” approach • Change comes from deepening the beliefs or “internal commitments” of people • Change comes from a collaborative learning process (shared expertise) • The role of the leader is to increase “organizational capacity”

25. Core Change Strategies within the Academy • Senior Administrative Support • Collaborative Leadership • Robust Design • Staff Development • Visible Actions Adrianna Kezar and Peter Eckel, “The Effect of Culture on Change Strategies in Higher Education,” The Journal of Higher Education, vol. 73, no. 4 (July/August 2002), pp. 435-460.

26. Transformational Change Visible Actions Robust Design

27. Robust Design Resources Flexible Picture of the Future Change Strategies compatible with the culture Strategic Directions and Positioning

28. Other Change Strategies . . . • Persuasive communication • Incentives, rewards • Long-term orientation • Connections and synergy • Working within the organizational culture • Bringing in outside perspectives • Using external factors • Capitalizing on unforeseen opportunities

29. Other Change Strategies . . . • Moderating momentum • Establishing new expectations • Using changes in administrative processes • Resocializing groups • Placing local change in broader context Adrianna Kezar and Peter Eckel, “Examining the Institutional Transformation Process,” Research in Higher Education, vol. 43, no. 3, June 2002, pp. 295-328.

30. What’s Your (Library’s Prevailing) Culture? • (Cultural Audit exercise)