A new lexicon of followership terms is suggested to develop this innovative area of research, helping to recognize that both our followership and leadership roles are important to organizational success.

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Followership in Educational Organizations: A Pilot Mapping of the Territory

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Angela Thody Followership in educational organizations: a pilot mapping of the territory

This paper presents base‐line data about the incumbency or length of time spent in office by Australian vice‐chancellors who held appointments in the years 1963 to 1983. Principal findings of the analysis are that the average length of incumbency has declined from 13.6 years for 1963 to 8.0 years for 1983 vice‐chancellors, that the period 1983 to 1987 will witness an unprecedentedly high rate of turnover among vice‐chancellors, and that an increasing proportion of vice‐chancellors no longer regard their incumbency as their final full‐time professional appointment. The conclusions are related to apparent stratification and ranking among Australian universities in an emerging system of higher education which is becoming more complex.

Australian vice‐chancellors: incumbency patterns in an emerging system

Leadership was the central issue of concern when academic governance regulations were introduced at Lincoln Institute of Health Sciences in 1978. At the time there was considerable debate about the leadership role of Heads which surfaced again in 1981–82 when the authors undertook a review of the regulations. In this paper the authors analyse the review findings and relate these findings to contemporary theory which sees leadership in terms of the nature of the relationships between leaders and followers. They report that in spite of the existence of a uniform set of regulations the leadership styles of Heads of Schools and Departments varied considerably. Nevertheless it was only in those Schools and Departments where discordancy existed in the leader‐follower relationships that dissatisfaction was expressed about the regulations. The authors conclude that regulations by themselves do not determine the quality of leadership and decision‐making even though they may be intended to settle an agreed organization for decision‐making. However, the introduction of regulations can lead to beneficial modifications to hierarchically based superior‐subordinate relationships with more collegial forms of shared responsibility. “A larger slice of the cake isn't enough — we want a share in the ruddy bakery.” (Mrs. Sheila Egan, East Lancs representative at the 1972 National Conference of Technical Teachers, speaking about Academic Government.)

A. O'neill

Papers

Leadership and academic governance in a college of advanced education