Engagement is more than having lunch with a colleague from another department

Our educational environment is in the midst of big changes... Some would argue we are on the edge of the cliff we don't perceive and we keep doing the same things, recycling the same old arguments and promoting the same practices. We act as though we are insulated from the environment we live in and that we can consider things on our own time cycle... A semester perhaps to contemplate some issue or something we call an "academic year" before a minor change takes effect. We are dinoasuars and move at a glacial pace in a world that moves at a blur.

Frankly, many of us are very insulated. We complain about new duties and roll our eyes at assesments that seem designed to justify our existence and be largely useless exercises (but this is another note). Many practices do seem to be little more than onerous exercises in spreadsheet manipulation that require long weekends and an occasional rhetorical flourish in the attached narrative. And frankly the results and benefits of these exercises seem few.

At the same time I think we seem to be distancing ourselves from our nonacademic neighbors in multiple ways. I worry about the current generation of young colleagues who are likely to be those buffeted most by the winds of change. At Research 1 institutions we talk about protecting new colleagues, mentoring them, cushioning them from the realities of our environments which really are about "doing more with less"... and we do live in an age of limited resources... But that's not surprising and most everyone keeps going about their "normal" business.

That said, we need to break out of these everyday routines and take a serious look at what might be coming for there appears to be a real storm on the horizon... We should prepare and all of us need to examine the work we do, conduct engaged research and demonstrate the utility of our contributions. This is true in the humanities as well as the STEM disciplines.

I'm not a doomsayer... I'm a realist... Someone who strongly feels that we should appreciate the special roles we have been granted, add tangible value to our enterprises and make contributions to society in multiple ways. We do not need to get defensive, or protect our turf, and we do not need to circle the wagons. We should see this as an opportunity to engage.

So move out of the library, put your iPad away and add your voices and your expertise to the national and local conversation. Engage personally in serious interactions with people outside the academy... talk to your neighbors. Frankly, the conversation is likely to be jarring, especially if you've spent most of your time over the last few years talking exclusively to your colleagues, perhaps arguing about the value of one course or another, worrying about how slow your old desktop is or going to the occasion high school soccer game. But don't shy away.

Inaction will not alter what's coming... Big change is here and we need to be prepared to take the opinions of our fellow citizens from outside the academy very seriously. Their attitudes matter... a lot.

Syllabi as strategic and tactical documents

Each semester we are told that we need a detailed syllabus that clearly outlines expectations, grading schemes, assignment dates, etc. and that the syllabus is a contract between the students and the instructor. We dutifully collect these documents and hold copies in our main office for students, colleagues and anyone to view as a guide for course content. Some faculty members are completely true to their documents… topics are covered on the days indicated, PowerPoint slides are uploaded and in a machine-like fashion the process of education takes place… completely predicable, consistent from semester to semester… in some cases the same jokes, the same sentences appear at the same time for 10 consecutive semesters…

There is a quality to this mode of work… an art, the play gets repeated and with a good performance the audience leaves pleased and happy with the price of admission.

Is this the best we can do? Certainly it works. At its best the audience enjoys the performance, sees the connections, responds to the humor and the logic and they get their monies worth.

An alternative form is more impromptu… the general outline is there… but the class is less scripted… it’s “just in time” manufacturing at work… it may drift as new content is added and it requires concentration and participation from the audience… it requires a joint performance with the stage lights turned on the whole group as audience and company become one. There can be traditional components to the performance but it might look like a flash mob. The major characters may shift and uncertainty and surprise may illuminate failures and success.

The final act may not end as predicted or it may not come at all. If there is a lot of technology required, there is always a need to take this factor into account… each day you bring your best game… the students and the faculty members… your talent could be spotlighted… you might have to perform as leaderships shifts and content experts get their chance to strut their stuff…
It can be a little scary… but at the end of the day you leave charged up… ready to bring new stuff to the next session and see how it fits or causes fits.

Umbrellas, parasols and sun screen...

It’s summer time in China… and in the summer it’s not too different from anywhere else in that people dress more casually… sandals and shorts become more the norm. While we all embrace more informality in the summer there are differences in how we deal with the warm weather and the sunshine. One summertime difference that many Europeans and Americans notice during their visits to Asia is the use of umbrellas or parasols… sure we all have them and use them when it rains but in Asia they come out in droves when the sun shines.

Chinese mothers for example hate it when their adult daughters (and younger children) get a tan and are always warning them to stay out of the sun or use their umbrella. Walk across Tiananmen Square in the full sun and the umbrellas are up in profusion… the Western tourists use their sun screen but it’s umbrellas for the Chinese… makes a lot of sense also… well, at least if the umbrellas are properly coated to cut down on the UV or otherwise it’s pretty much a fashion statement!

Somehow all this umbrella use fits… umbrellas are generally thought to have originated in China and they are now a consumer product with a huge international market. And as you might expect, most of the world’s umbrellas are now “made in China” with a majority of umbrellas coming from the Guangdong, Fujian and Zhejiang provinces. According to various sources, the city of Shangyu alone has more than a thousand umbrella factories.

Personally, I’ve always liked the decorative parasols of Japan and China and while there are still a number of these for sale to tourists and collectors, the modern mass produced “made in China” umbrellas have taken over.

Will we see more umbrellas deployed in the bright sunlight of Indiana? Yes, I think so… but we are still pretty much a “pass the sun screen tube” culture. Too bad, parasols are pretty cool.

8 random thoughts for new middle level academic managers…

• Commit to craziness (on occasion)… just don’t go crazy.
• Never give up on a good idea, it’s time will come.
• Never surprise the dean (unless you absolutely cannot help it).
• Never underestimate resistance to change.
• Always have a collaborator you trust.
• Every time you save a dollar, have a plan to spend it… or a place to hide it.
• Try to get excited by adversity… just don’t get too excited.
• Have at least two suits and look like you know how to wear them.

Why a School of Communication?

One of the questions I've gotten from people over the last few weeks has been... "Why a School of Communication"?

My responses have been relatively consistent, or at least I hope they have been. I respond in a few ways...

Well, first, a "school" structure fits the program at Purdue pretty well. The notion of "school" suggests a broader structure than "a department" which is a unit often found within schools. There is the question of breadth. At Purdue we cover a very broad array of topics, from mass communcation to rhetoric, to video production, org com and PR. Most departments of communication are much more narrowly focused.

Second, free standing "Schools" or in some cases "colleges" of communication have become common on our academic horizon and when you look at our peers and direct competitors... most of them are schools or colleges. So, when benchmarking our competitors this is the landscape we see.

I also think that the notion of a "school" creates a bit more visibility and sets us apart from smaller units and as a department we were rather large. Schools are very often free standing units and operate differently from departments.

Finally, for many years "schools" in academe were units that were perceived to be "more professional in orientation"... this has clearly changed in the last two decades and it's now clear that a school is more often perceived as a unit that is larger and broader than a department although it may still have at least a bit of a professional orientation.

So, school it is... why a "named" school...OK, that's the next post...

Stuck in the middle… the role of department heads in raising funds…

One of the expectations… no duties… of being a middle level administrator is something called “development”… or what most would call “fund raising.” This hasn't always been the case but in these days our duties are always growing. It’s not enough that department heads deal with somewhat egotistical but highly productive colleagues, chronic lack of travel funds, GTAs with problematic students, parents who “want to get their money’s worth”, alumni who need to let you know “what it’s really like out there,” dirty floors and shortages in the coffee fund. Now, it’s pretty much "all about money" and it’s part of our job to find it.

The story you get is that this is all about “relationship development” and for those of us in communication, we are supposed to be good at this anyway… don’t we “study it.” Well… of course this is true. Right. But let’s get past this. We could be bogged down with this myth for some time.

When I first began to get involved in the “development scene” I had a lot of assumptions… it seems from the outside like there is order and a reasonably clear processes… for most academics it’s a black box and we just assume that our development offices are well oiled operation with hordes of organized and professional fund raisers scouring the countryside for alumni dying to “give back” to their alma mater.

Then you fall down the rabbit hole and the truth emerges…

More on this and my “five truths about fund raising” in the next edition.

Haibao, Shanghai World Expo and the Branding of Nations

In the biggest World Expo yet, Shanghai and China have pulled out all the stops to make another global post-Olympic splash. In this regard they have succeeded… the waterfront of Shanghai’s Huangpu River has been transformed in just a few years. The Bund has a rival (albeit it temporary) for attention as millions of mostly Chinese crowd into this large Epcot like environment in search of “Better City, Better Life”… the Expo theme.

You can’t go anywhere near China without running into ads for this extravaganza or seeing a Haibao figure (looks a bit like a blue Gumby and represents the color water) on a poster or on television (my favorite is the larger than life “Mexican Haibao” I saw in a downtown Shanghai park)… Expo advertisements like Haibaos are everywhere in China and Asia although if you live in the US or Europe it’s rare to see anything. At this point I’ve seen a short ad on CNN’s airport channel in DC and on Bloomberg’s Asia News on cable… and that was late at night.

On the other hand, if you happen to be anywhere near Shanghai, say in Nanjing or Beijing, it’s worth a trip to visit the site and you still have over four months to make it… the “world’s fair” lasts six months and it’s just started.

But what’s the purpose? Clearly this is another opportunity for China to take the spotlight on the world stage. The Expo is huge… not just in scale but in participation and the lines to get into the pavilions are very very long (when I was there the wait for the Saudi pavilion was 8 hours!). Unfortunately, Expo is not widely known outside of China and Asia and the demographics of the attendees reflects the regional character of this event. At the same time it has a global imprint and impact as almost every nation has a presence (Pavilion) at the site and China made it clear how important it was for every nation to be there.

It’s “public diplomacy” at work… originally a chance to show off the latest in technology and architecture (there are some really cool pavilions!) it’s now mostly an exercise in national pride, showmanship and “nation branding” at work.

Interestingly, the U.S. was almost a noshow… if not for the last minute intervention of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton we would have been most prominently and embarrassingly absent. Since it’s illegal for the US to use public money in this endeavor, corporate donors had to be convinced to step up. This was harder than you might imagine since many of what we think of as US companies (McDonald’s, Coke, Starbucks, KFC, etc.) are really global companies and had already signed on as major Expo sponsors… they were already committed to the Expo and not to supporting a US presence.

Despite what you think of these things, the US needed to be at this Expo. As US Commissioner General for the Expo, Jose Villarreal noted in a conversation to a group I was in… “The US Expo Pavilion will see more Chinese visitors in the next six months than our Embassy and all our consulates in China will during the next 30 years. This is the chance of a lifetime to influence a huge number of people”. It was also vitally important for the Chinese… a U.S. noshow would have been a huge snub and this is not the sort of thing we needed for diplomacy of any sort… public or private.

The wait for entry into the US Pavilion can be as long as 4 hours… see what you can do to get into the VIP line (any VIP line)! Yes, it’s always seemed a bit odd to me that in a country with a recent history like China that there seems to always be a VIP line, or lane, or room, or tables… for high party officials, VIPs, etc… one of the country’s apparent contradictions. I could go on for a while, pointing out other interesting tidbits… for example, I’m trying not to read anything into the fact that while the US Pavilion is near to one of the major entry points, the Iranian and North Korean pavilions are all the way at the other pole of the Expo site… China directly in the middle! I’m sure a lot of thought was put into this placement, for this is the country of Feng Shui.

Meanwhile, I’ll be back in September, I just hope the lines are shorter… I don’t normally qualify for the VIP entrances.

For a view on the US effort at Expo take a look at Jian Wang's comments at:
http://uscpublicdiplomacy.org/index.php/newswire/cpdblog_detail/a_little_good_news_from_the_us_pavilion/