Higher education institutions often face adaptive challenges—complex problems that need to be addressed through an evolutionary approach that uses investigation, learning, and assessment of a diversity of ideas rather than relying on administrative authority. James Mabry, vice president of academic affairs at Mesa Community College, has employed the adaptive leadership model of Ronald Heifetz to address a common adaptive problem—student success. Because there are so many factors that go into student success and many ways to measure it, there needs to be input from stakeholders.
Connections Are Everything: Putting Relationships at the Heart of Higher Ed
As academic leaders, we are under so much pressure to deliver—enrollment targets, strategic plans, graduation rates, AI policies, and on and on—that we can lose sight of what our students
Isis Artze-Vega, Leo M. Lambert, and Peter Felten
March 4, 2024
