What is the best approach to inducting lecturers transferring to a new department? A critical incident analysis of staff induction in a private higher education college.

 

Introduction

This essay refers to a critical incident that occurred in my workplace. Working as a programme leader in a small private higher education college in central London, one of my responsibilities is to assure that my department has the right number of lecturers to deliver the courses for all the intakes. At the beginning of the academic year, my department enlarged with one more lecturer, transferred from a different department. The critical incident analysed within this paper involves me and the lecturer joining my department. The hard and soft human resource management approach (Truss et al., 1997) will be used as a starting point for the discussion of various elements of the incident. Then, a review of the literature including the work of Bryman (2007) will help to discuss the roles of the middle leaders in the context of the incident. The critical incident analysis will end placing the critical incident in the context of various management models, using mainly the work of Bush (2011), and Coleman and Earley (2005).

 Critical incident

I booked a 45 minutes meeting with a lecturer joining my department, to brief her regarding the timetable, modules to be delivered, and the students’ characteristics. As the meeting started, I handed in the timetable and I told her about the groups she will have to teach. During all this time she was smiling and seems to be excited about the new role. Then, I started briefing her about the content of the modules to be delivered. The lecturer was happy with the modules assigned to her, and she had a positive attitude, smiling, and taking notes. Toward the end of the meeting, when speaking about designing the summative assessment and the teaching resources, the lecturer refused categorically, saying she will not do it. I was surprised by her answer for two reasons: firstly, it was part of the college’s practice for each lecturer to design assessment and to adapt the resources or to create new resources for the sessions. Secondly, by that time I have never met a lecturer to prefer these resources to be imposed, and not to have an input to it. While asking me why she cannot use earlier resources, the lecturer seemed anxious about the idea of designing them and mentioned that she always works with given resources. At that moment, I said that I will create the summative assessments and she can use existing resources, which she could adjust if required. Also, I reassured the lecturer of my support, for anything she may need. The lecturer was happy with this solution, and I had in mind to investigate the reason for her refusal, and to find what could I do to motivate her to change this attitude.

 Staff induction in higher education

The literature names two opposed models of human resource management: soft and hard (Truss et al., 1997). The hard model is based on the assumption that people dislike work (Theory X), therefore tight control measures are implemented, together with a strategic direction and performance management techniques. In opposition, the soft model has a more flexible and humanitarian approach, based on Theory Y, considering the employees not a resource but a committed individual with self-direction, capable of working without supervision. These two models are influencing the human resource practices and rhetoric adopted by all organisations, as find out by Truss et al. (1997).

The journey of a lecturer in a workplace or a new role starts with induction. The induction process, usually imprinted with elements of hard HR practices and soft rhetoric, plays an important role in an employee’s future attitude and performance in the workplace. According to literature (Bush and Middlewood, 2013), induction is a part of a continuous process that allows the employee to accommodate in the new role and to become self-sufficient and effective within the team. Seen as an important factor for staff retention and satisfaction (Bush and Middlewood, 2013; Torrington, Hall and Taylor, 2005), the induction aims to facilitate socialisation, competent performance, understanding, and acceptance of organisational culture. However, in the case of a lecturer with certain experiences, the induction programme in higher education settings is often overlooked, being limited to a group institutional induction (Barlow and Antoniou, 2007; Billot, 2011; Billot and King, 2017). The line managers do expect the new appointees to be self-sufficient from the first day (Bush and Middlewood, 2013), without considering the need of a proper academic induction, due to the assumption that they are professionals with high qualifications, and they can quickly adjust to the new working environment. The critical incident described above depicts the case of a lecturer taking a new role without the benefits of a proper induction, tailored to individual needs.

From my point of view at that moment in time, the above meeting had the purpose of briefing an existing lecturer. Before the meeting, I never thought about the needs of a lecturer and challenges faced when transferring to a different department, even though they are recognised by the literature (Staniforth and Harlan, 2006; Trowler and Knight, 2000). During the meeting, I adopted a hard approach by deploying job responsibilities and communicating expectations, without giving to the lecturer the opportunity to become familiar with the new context and team. Thus, in a very short period (two weeks) the lecturer was expected to adapt to different work settings, without being asked about her skills, and learning needs. The literature mention that this transition and adaptation should be planned and monitored as a continuous induction process (Mullins, 2005) for a longer time, such as one year (Ingersoll and Smith, 2004), or three years (Bartell, 2005) and involving senior staff (Prajapati, Check and Trivedi, 2017). Moreover, Billot (2011) underlines that for a lecturer to be effective the productivity requirements should be aligned with the support given during the induction.

As suggested by some authors (Barlow and Antoniou, 2007; Mullins, 2005) the meeting described above should have taken the form of a thorough multi-dimensional induction, including elements specific to hard HR such as the orientation to the department (rules, regulations, culture, methods of operations), teaching and assessment processes,  as well as soft HR, like the personal development needs. This multi-dimensional induction therefore will take into account both HR approaches, contradicting Truss et al. (1997) statement that soft and hard HR approaches cannot be applied together because they are opposite.

Based on the critical incident I think that the soft approach is good to ease the transition to new roles and working environments. The lecturer being inducted should not feel rushed into the new responsibilities as it happens in the above critical incident. Barlow and Antoniou (2007) found in their study that some lecturers may prefer a folder with all the basic information (FAQ) that they may need. This is a practical solution, related to the concept of hard HR that I adopted, and which undoubtedly can be useful for future reference. However, in the above case, the FAQ file would have been somehow of use, but not essential, because the lecturer was already familiarised with the institution. Moreover, the turning of the meeting, as I found out later, was linked to personal circumstances and emotional factors, which could be well addressed by a soft HR approach.

Moreover, Billot (2011) states that a hard induction, focused on responsibilities, academic work, and expectations is negatively affecting the formation of professional identity and belonging feelings. The point that I missed when planning that meeting was that the lecturer was familiar with the institution, but working only one day per week she was not having the time to meet and know lecturers from other departments. Therefore, joining my department meant not only delivering new course content but also joining a new team and having a new line manager. It is stated in the literature (Bush and Middlewood, 2013) that the induction has a social aspect, and should be an opportunity for the new staff member to meet the new colleagues and to acknowledge the new working environment and team ethos (Barlow and Antoniou, 2007; Elmore, 2002; Molner-Kelley, 2004). Except for meeting the line manager, that encounter did not allow the lecturer to meet her new colleagues or to get acquainted with the culture of the department, nor it eased the transition to the new working environment. Hodkinson and Taylor’s study (2002) finds that the interaction of a new lecturer with the colleagues has an important contribution to acknowledge the perspective and needs of the department and nurture future collaborative working and learning.

Bush and Middlewood (2013), recognise the socialisation as a main purpose of the induction and referring to the work of Schein (1978) the authors link the socialisation with the resistance to change and the development of professional identity within the organisation. These views are shared by other authors (Mathieson, 2011; Remmik et al., 2011; Wenger, 1998) who do emphasize the role of interaction and relationships for the sense of belonging and professional identity. Moreover, Billot and King (2017), and Hemmings (2012) highlight that the socialisation aspect of induction contributes to confidence-building and a deep understanding of job expectations.  

The critical incident suggests how the rigid discussion about the lecturer’s new roles and responsibilities leads to anxious and overwhelming feelings. Many authors do recognise that the induction process has a great influence on the lecturer’s confidence and stress levels (Barlow and Antoniou, 2007; Bush and Middlewood, 2013; Knight, 2002; Wanus and Reichers, 2000). In this critical incident, as I found out later, the lecturer has contradictory feelings. On one side she was very happy to increase her contract, this was one of her professional goals. On the other side, she was not having much teaching experience and when she realised that she will need to design all those resources and assessments suddenly she started doubting her abilities, she lost confidence and became anxious. At the time of the critical incident, I considered the meeting successful because, at the end, I met the staffing requirements of my department. Regarding the success of the induction the literature states that a successful initial meeting should make the new lecturer feeling comfortable, pro-active (Doods and Verest, 2002; Seyfarth, 1991), and willing to conform with the department’s culture and practice (Sussman, 2005), which it did not happen in my case.

A hard approach to induction with clear goals helps the head of the department aims to introduce the lecturer to the realities of the department and organisational expectations. Still, the experience of the critical incident analysed above suggests that the human factor (soft HR approach) should be considered when tailoring the induction process. For me this incident demonstrates the need of considering individual circumstances and developmental needs, as well as using effectively the emotional intelligence.

 The roles of the middle leader in the induction process

The programme leader is a middle leader position with academic, leadership, and managerial responsibilities. In my experience I noticed that the middle leader in a higher education institution is usually appointed based on academic experience, achievement, and awareness of quality processes. The literature highlights that the academics taking over this role are expected to be as successful as they were as researchers or as educators, without being trained or prepared for it (Bryman, 2007; Carroll and Wolverton, 2004; Chilvers et al. 2018; Thornton et al., 2018;  Wolverton et al. 2001).

The roles of the middle leader are often perceived to be ambiguous, as observed by more authors (Branson et al., 2015; Chilvers et al., 2018; Gonaim, 2016; Thornton et al., 2018; Wolverton et al., 1999). The ambiguity is partly generated by its position between academic and managerial profiles (Murphy and Curtis, 2013). With responsibilities related to course management, curriculum planning, development, staffing, marketing, stakeholders relationships, student academic and pastoral support, the academics taking a middle leader position do expect to have an academic leadership role, but most of them do not expect to have a personal role in staff induction. The study of Staniforth and Harland (2006) underline that most of the time the middle leaders do not benefit themselves of induction when they took over this role. Therefore, the own learning part of an induction process does not inform the professional practice.

 As stated by Bryman (2007), between the responsibilities of a middle leader we find that they are to ensure that the staff members have the resources they need and manageable workloads. The critical incident described above does not offer any information about the middle leader ensuring that the new lecturer has resources and that the allocated workload is manageable for her because the meeting took place on the assumption that the new lecturer can manage the workload with existing resources and materials given during the meeting. However, the lecturer’s point of view in terms of resources and workload is not discussed.

Bryman (2007) underlines that the middle leader is responsible to foster a collaborative working environment while managing expectations from senior managers and own staff members. Therefore, the roles of the middle leader are not limited to deployment, as it happened in the case of the critical incident, but are extended to developing and leading people, creating positive working relationships, and motivating staff. These roles were not considered within the above critical incident, which leads to the lecturer’s low level of motivation to become productive in a short time (Davis, 1994).

The managerial models and the induction process

Based on the characteristics of organisational structure, specific goals, authority, and accountability, a higher education setting can relate to formal management models (Bush, 2011). The college where the critical incident discussed in this paper takes place is characterised by a clear hierarchy, functional departments, and subject-specific departments, as the department that I lead and manage. Being part of an extended group, the college uses some functional departments together with other entities part of the group. This is the case of the human resource department, which is shared between several colleges and other group organisations. This situation is convenient in terms of costs, but it also leads to ambiguity in terms of accountability and authority. In this context, where the HR department is somehow isolated from the realities of the college, some of the HR functions are carried out by the middle leaders. Therefore, the middle leader is responsible to open a business case for budget approval when a new staff member is needed. Later, they are responsible to select the applicants, to conduct the interviews and decide who will receive the job offer. After the job offer is accepted the HR department will complete the documentation and will conduct an institutional induction.

Drawing from the above, it can be concluded that in a formal management model, the organisational structure may lead to multiple administrative roles attached to a middle leadership position. According to Middlehurst and Elton (1992) in a higher education setting three leadership functions can be distinguished: educational, academic, and administrative. The educational leadership is concerned with the progression between different stages, the academic provision, and the complex roles of education. Academic leadership relates more to curriculum management, teaching, and academic collaborations. The administrative leadership has at its centre the wellbeing of the organisation through the staff wellbeing and resources management. Therefore, the staff induction process is part of the administrative leadership functions. The concept of administrative leadership through the resource management dimension resonates well with the hard HR approaches and formal management models.

As explained above, in the case of the critical incident the whole staff recruitment process is marked by bureaucratic elements, which cannot be entirely controlled at the college level. Therefore, the middle leaders are often encouraged to maximise staff utilisation across the college and the group. This is the context of the critical incident described, where a part-time lecturer was approached and proposed to extend her contract with teaching responsibilities within a different department. This situation demonstrates how on various levels of a big organisation we can meet a different management model. It can be observed the coexistence of a micro-political model within the formal bureaucratic model. Concerning the critical incident it can be said that the bureaucracy of the formal model could have protected the new lecturer from being arbitrary treated (Coleman and Earley, 2005). The micro-political model empowered an academic with administrative decision making powers and opportunities for negotiation, which lead to the critical incident. Coleman and Earley (2005) suggest that the limitations of formal and political models can be tacked through the dispersion of power within the organisation. However, the critical incident describes a situation where the middle leader’s power leads firstly to activities and decisions based on assumptions and negotiation.  Then, it leads to an unmanageable workload, a crisis of confidence, and a lack of opportunities to develop relationships and belonging feelings. Therefore, the power should be distributed to an individual who was taught/trained to use it to the benefit of the organisation and all the other employees. Thus, the critical incident underlines the need for synergy between departments with different managerial models. The critical incident could have been a positive experience for all those involved if a better interaction and communication, eventually learning opportunities would have happened between the human resources department and the middle leader.

 As shown in the first part of the critical incident analysis, the socialisation is one of the main purposes of the induction (Bush and Middlewood, 2013), and facilitates collaborative working and good relationships between lecturers fostering competent performance. From this perspective, it can be argued that the lecturer’s induction process could be better managed within a collegial model. This model facilitates the dispersion of power and a decision-making process based on consensus and shared value (Bush, 2011). Furthermore, the collegial model is highly desirable and encouraged within a higher education context.

 Another aim of the induction process, according to Bush and Middlewood (2013) is the understanding of the organisational culture, aim that was not planned for, and not achieved during the critical incident. Analysing closely my behaviour and lecturer’s reactions I can conclude that middle managers’ actions can be highly influenced by the department culture, through a pattern of assumptions developed within the department. Similarly, the lecturer’s reactions were influenced by the experience of the previous roles, in departments with distinctive practices informed by different cultures.  

Conclusion

This critical incident has a happy ending, leading to the professional development and self-efficacy of a lecturer through mentoring and collaborative work. However, after more than a year, reflecting on it, I am still learning about how I should have planned that meeting, and what I could have done differently. Firstly, at that time I could not see that what it was needed was not a briefing meeting, but a proper induction, tailored for individual circumstances. During the meeting, I focused on transmitting information, instead of supporting the transition of the lecturer to a new department and more responsibilities. I had a meeting agenda, but I have not considered or planned it as the first step of a long-term process. Staniforth and Harland (2006) suggest that the induction process should have clear outcomes and should be monitored by the head of the department. Therefore, the induction process should not be seen as an isolated event, but it should expand for a longer time (Bensimon et al., 2000; Boice, 1992; Staniforth and Harland, 2006), in which the new staff member is fully integrated within the department and organisation’s culture and processes. Regarding academic induction, ‘the failure to recognise the individual needs of recruits’ (King, Roed and Wilson, 2018: 471) is identified as a weakness. Therefore, considering the individual abilities and potential of each lecturer taking new roles and responsibilities and supporting them is an important dimension of induction which will trigger outstanding performance.

Following this incident, I aim to improve the experience of any lecturer joining the department through a personalised induction programme, embedding soft and hard HR approaches. A well-planned induction programme with a focus on individual needs, socialisation, learning, and attitude development will help the lecturer and all the other team members not only through facilitating information exchange but also further fruitful relationships.

In consequence, an effective induction is a complex process, that should encompass cultural and collegial dimensions within a formal framework.

 

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