Research in Engineering Education Symposium 2011 - rees2009

Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM) Página 396 de 957
changed their leadership skills throughout the engagement with industry and the
engineering profession? This paper presents data and preliminary analysis seeking a
better understanding of how and why engineering academics react to opportunities to
develop and exhibit leadership. It reports on the preliminary analysis of structured
interviews with participants at the pre-intervention and post-intervention stages;
surveyed data on knowledge and skills, their attitude, and behavioural frequency to
leadership; data from discussions from an industry roundtable as part of the engagement;
and, data from discussions from an internal academic roundtable with other academics
from across the university.
Literature Review
The study of leadership is a diverse and commercialized field of research that is often
linked to corporate executive training or coaching. A comprehensive literature review is a
task that is wrought with danger particularly with literatures that preached “leadership”
but are no more than life-stories and opinions. While some leadership frameworks
encompass a broad range of trait attributes, others focus on specific attributes deemed
most important to a great leader. Refer to Bryman (2004), Collins (2001), Kotter (1990)
for further literature on corporate leadership. Bayne & Constable (2009) is a consolidated
model of leadership. This model is based on a number of previous recognised literatures
on leadership. This model suggest that leadership attributes are very much a combination
of traits and skills, with some leadership elements that can be trained or learned, and
some that are “born” or “grown-up” with. It is categorized into Intelligence, Emotional
intelligence, Narrative intelligence, and Ethical intelligence. One must also ask the question
whether leadership in academia is any difference to the corporate world of which many of
the research output in the form of models are derived from, and how an organization and
its value system will impact on the ability to nurture and exhibit these attributes. There
have been recent studies into leadership in Australian academia such as Marshall (2006)
and Holt & Palmer (2008) that should be referred to, but are mainly based on senior
executive levels and departmental head levels, and a gap exists at the faculty or frontline
level. In saying this, Scott et al (2008) is one notable work has been used as a reference
guide for pursuing this research at the academic frontline (rather than at the management
level). The study based its conceptual framework on academic leadership capability
(personal, interpersonal, cognitive) and competency (generic and role-specific). The study
has highlighted that formulating and implementing desired change is not an event but a
complex learning and unlearning process for all concerned. It is a learning process because
for those who are to deliver it, to do something new requires them to learn a „gap‟ in their
expertise. Such learning for change does not just happen; it must be directly assisted and
deftly led. The approach, attitude and interpersonal strategies found to be most effective
in helping staff make a desired change work closely with those used by the most successful
higher educators with their students. This insight is important because it implies that the
most effective leaders not only help their staff engage with and learn how to do necessary
change, but they also set up an efficient and supportive environment that fosters
productive engagement in such learning. Just as informal and formal elements of
interacting with others can help or hinder student learning, so too relationships and
Proceedings of Research in Engineering Education Symposium 2011
Madrid, 4 th - 7 th October 2011