Early in 2022, I gave Maria Flores the task of investigating and making suggestions on the theme of the leadership development of the future. Her investigation identified what expertise characterises well-developed academic leadership and how we can work to strengthen that leadership. As part of these efforts, we have adopted a new policy for academic leadership.
We have plenty of policies, but this is one that I really want to shout about. Above all, there are two important aspects I would like to highlight. The first is that we clearly define the expertise that should characterise good academic leadership. This is important both to clarify what is expected of us as leaders, and to enable us to design support and opportunities for leadership development.
The second is that we define academic leadership by the context in which we operate and not by different leadership roles. We know that leadership in academia is complex. We have traditional line management, but also a strong tradition of collegial leadership. The latter might be particularly important to safeguard. As such, the policy covers everyone with management tasks within the university, whether they are carried out in research, education, external engagement, administration or management and whether they are carried out through collegial leadership or line management.
Maria Flores and Annica Ollerstam and the team for leadership development at the HR Division produced the document with broad support, with the University's reference group for academic leadership in particular contributing invaluable input.
Many thanks to all of you!
/Jimmie Kristensson
Read more
- Policy for academic leadership at Lund University
- The central aspects and guidelines in the report (in Swedish)
This text is included in LU News 1 - 2024
