Leadership skills in the higher education sector: a study of Scotland

Harrison, Christian; Collins, Stephen; Gilardi, Marco; Reilly, Christine Anne; Valentin, Stephanie; Balaraman, Pravin; Papadopoulou, Constantina

Abstract

The dynamic nature of the Higher Education (HE) environment and the challenges faced by institutions has led to a call for effective leadership by academics and practitioners, however what this means in practice remains ambiguous. Particularly, within Scotland there is limited research that examines leadership skills within HE. Therefore, the aim of this study is to examine leadership skills within the HE environment in Scotland. In order to assess this, a research methodology which draws on a pragmatic philosophy and an abductive approach was employed. A mixed method which incorporates both questionnaires and semi-structured interviews as its mode of data collection was used. The study is in two phases. Phase 1 has been conducted in a HE in Scotland with a view of rolling out across other universities. Preliminary findings from phase 1 of the study will be presented at the conference and further developments in improving the paper are considered.

• Presentation Conference Type: Conference Paper (Published)
• Conference Name: 2019 British Academy of Management Conference : Building and Sustaining High Performance Organisations During Uncertain Times (BAM 2019)
• Start Date: Sep 3, 2019
• End Date: Sep 5, 2019
• Publication Date: 2019-09
• Deposit Date: Feb 8, 2023
• Book Title: British Academy of Management (BAM) 2019 Conference Proceedings
• ISBN: 9780995641327
• Keywords: Leadership, Leadership Skills, Higher Education, Higher Education Institutions, Scotland
• Publisher URL: https://www.bam.ac.uk/asset/6D45A684-66EF-432B-AB564CC0D3AA4FD9/