Your Career: Should Your Campus Grow More of Its Own Staff Members?

Higher education needs to rethink how it hires and rewards staff employees. ADVERTISEMENT [Your Career Logo]( Did someone forward you this newsletter? [Sign up free]( to receive your own copy. You can now read The Chronicle on [Apple News]( [Flipboard]( and [Google News](. Higher education needs to rethink how it hires and rewards staff employees. Ask almost any enrollment manager, financial-aid director, student-life manager, or counseling-center director, and you’ll hear that the pain of staffing shortages is pervasive across higher education. Since early 2020, the change in staff attitudes and priorities has felt like a seismic shift. While managers have tried desperately to “get back to business” and reach organizational goals, many staff employees have said, “No thank you,” to previous ways of working. They want more flexibility, more work-life balance, more purpose in what they do, and more compensation for doing it. So when it comes to hiring and retaining good staff people, what can the many less-selective, budget-strapped institutions do if they can’t afford to boost pay and benefits, and if offering employees a strong sense of purpose is no longer a convincing inducement to work on a college campus? Some solutions may be found in a two-part strategy that involves a shift in where your college looks for new employees and a change in what you offer them. Continue reading: “[How to Close the Staffing Gap]( by Aaron Basko Share your suggestions for the newsletter with Denise Magner, an editor at The Chronicle, at denise.magner@chronicle.com. If you’d like to opt out, you can log in to our website and [manage your newsletter preferences here](. ADVERTISEMENT SUBSCRIBE TO THE CHRONICLE Enjoying the newsletter? [Subscribe today]( for unlimited access to essential news, analysis, and advice. NEWSLETTER [Sign Up for the Teaching Newsletter]( Find insights to improve teaching and learning across your campus. Delivered on Thursdays. To read this newsletter as soon as it sends, [sign up]( to receive it in your email inbox. LATEST CAREER ADVICE, OPINION, AND NEWS ADVICE [Ask the Chair: ‘Can I Use the Position to Escape My Institution?’]( By Kevin Dettmar [STORY IMAGE]( “Selfish chair” is an oxymoron, assuming you do the job responsibly. ADVERTISEMENT COLLEGE AS MEANING MAKER [Teaching in an Age of ‘Militant Apathy’]( By Beth McMurtrie [STORY IMAGE]( Immersive education offers a way to reach students. But can it ever become the norm? THE REVIEW | OPINION [Women Do Higher Ed’s Chores. That Must Change.]( By Liz Mayo [STORY IMAGE]( From the mundanely sexist to the lawsuit-worthy, service work is inequitable. ADVICE [How to Be Constructive in Disturbing a Program’s Peace]( By Dana S. Dunn and Jane S. Halonen [STORY IMAGE]( You’ve been hired to evaluate an academic department. What to say, and not say, especially if the place is a mess. ADVICE [The Provost Files: Try Not to Do the Deans’ Job]( By George Justice [STORY IMAGE]( How do you, as a new provost, find your place within the complicated internal power dynamic with deans? LEADERSHIP [A College’s Controversial Fund-Raising Event Led a Dean to Quit. Now the President Faces Calls to Resign.]( By Kate Marijolovic [STORY IMAGE]( Katherine Bergeron has apologized, but critics at Connecticut College point to larger problems with her leadership on DEI. FROM THE CHRONICLE STORE [Solving Higher Ed's Staffing Crisis - The Chronicle Store]( [Solving Higher Ed's Staffing Crisis]( The Covid-19 pandemic upended norms surrounding how academic institutions work, putting the relationship between colleges and their staff members under greater stress. [Order your copy]( to explore how higher education can better manage a crucial part of its work force. What we’re reading. Here’s more on career issues and trends from around the web. See something we should include? [Let me know](mailto:denise.magner@chronicle.com?subject=Your Career feedback). - An [essay]( in Nature argues that colleges and universities “need to take faculty mental health more seriously.” - [A report]( the quarterly magazine of the American Association of University Professors explores “eight myths about tenure.” - In the Harvard Business Review, [advice on how to]( create a culture of belong and “psychological safety” in the workplace. MORE CAREER RESOURCES DATA [Big Drops in Enrollment Hit Colleges in the First Fall of the Pandemic. Who Was Able to Bounce Back?]( By Brian O’Leary and Audrey Williams June [STORY IMAGE]( Search our database to see whose enrollments recovered, whose started clawing their way back, and whose kept falling. [Working With the Families of First-Gen Students]( [STORY IMAGE]( UPCOMING: February 21, 2023 | 2 p.m. ET. Join us for this event, in which college administrators will share lessons learned from working with first-gen students and their families. With Support From Ascendium. [Register here.]( [Designing STEM Courses for Today’s Students]( [STORY IMAGE]( UPCOMING: February 22, 2023 | 2 p.m. ET. As demand for STEM hiring rises, what programs should colleges offer? Can they make up for math and science education derailed by Covid? Join us for discussion. With Support From Cambridge. [Register here.]( [From ‘Digital Native’ to Digital Competency]( [STORY IMAGE]( UPCOMING: February 23, 2023 | 2 p.m. ET. The pervasive “digital native” myth is keeping colleges from making critical investments in digital skills. Join us for a virtual forum to chart a new path forward. With Support From Adobe. [Register here.]( JOB OPPORTUNITIES [Search other jobs.]( NEWSLETTER FEEDBACK [Please let us know what you thought of today's newsletter in this three-question survey](. This newsletter was sent to {EMAIL}. 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