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Folks:
The posting below, a bit longer than most, looks at how a department
chairs can deal more effectively with passive-aggressive faculty
behavior . It is from Chapter 11, Coping with the Passive-Aggressive
Faculty Member, in the book The Essential Department Chair: A
Practical Guide to College Administration by Jeffrey L. Buller,
Mary Baldwin College Copyright © 2006 by Anker Publishing
Company, Inc. All rights reserved. ISBN 1-882982-99-1 Anker Publishing
Company, Inc. 563 Main Street, P.O. Box 249 Bolton, MA 01740-0249
USA
[www.ankerpub.com]. Reprinted with permission.
Regards,
Rick Reis
reis@stanford.edu
UP NEXT: The American Faculty: The Restructuring of Academic Work
and Careers
Tomorrow's Academic Careers
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Coping with the Passive-Aggressive Faculty Member
A particularly difficult mentoring challenge for the department
chair is the faculty member who, while possessing a number of
otherwise admirable qualities, simultaneously undermines the chair,
his or her own colleagues, and possibly the department as a whole
through repeated passive-aggressive behaviors. The passive-aggressive
faculty member who will be addressed in the pages that follow
is not, it should be noted, the sort of pathological individual
who can be clinically diagnosed as passive-aggressive. If you
believe that an employee who reports to you may possibly be passive-aggressive
in this more severe, clinical sense, you should consult your dean
or Office of Human Resources about whether your institution allows
you the possibility of referring this individual for professional
evaluation; there is probably very little that you yourself can
do for such a faculty member unless you are a trained clinical
psychologist. (And under such circumstances, it would be unethical
and inappropriate, not to mention unwise, to confuse your clinical
role with your position as department chair.) Severe passive-aggressive
behavior stems, after all, from a personality disorder; those
afflicted with it are often intractable and may not respond well
even to therapy. In these cases, you are better off allowing the
problem to be handled by professionals and turning your attention
to other matters where you are more likely to make a real difference.
On the positive side, it is not at all common to encounter a
faculty member who demonstrates these extremely severe tendencies.
On the negative side, what you are more likely to encounter is
the type of individual who:
* Has a history of agreeing to change behaviors that are destructive-and
frequently may even express gratitude to the chair for pointing
out these destructive behaviors and helping with them-but later
fails to act upon any of the strategies that he or she had eagerly
declared to be appropriate
* Blames others for problems and claims to be "as confused
as you are" as to why he or she always seems to attract so
many complaints and objections
* When assigned responsibilities that he or she does not want
to do or had resisted when they were initially proposed, performs
the task very slowly or in an unsatisfactory manner, thus "proving"
that the idea or assignment was a poor concept from the beginning.
* Has a highly inflated opinion of his or her contributions to
the department and institution, frequently claiming to be unappreciated,
even though you may find the person's performance to be weak or
substandard
* Impedes departmental work simply by failing to answer routine
requests, memos, or emails in a timely manner
* When challenged about poor performance or uncollegial behavior,
routinely projects the worst of his or her own character traits
unto others.
Unlike other kinds of behavior problems, mild passive-aggressive
tendencies often seem to give little if any distress to the faculty
members demonstrating them. By contrast, chronic complainers may
well be aware that they make themselves as miserable as they make
others. Outright hostile faculty members frequently realize that
their aggressive tendencies alienate those around them, even though
they may be powerless to control those tendencies. Passive-aggressive
faculty members, on the other hand, are often so convinced that
they are trying to improve, that the problems still occurring
are the fault of others, and that the animosity others may show
them is simply the result of jealousy on their own part that they
remain blithely unaware that they have a problem.
The behaviors demonstrated by even mildly passive-aggressive
individuals are probably deeply ingrained. For this reason, you
are unlikely to create dramatically improved behavior in such
a faculty member, even if you make a consistent attempt to do
so. There are, however, three strategies you may wish to attempt
in order to cope with someone's passive-aggressive tendencies
and to reduce the difficulties that are occurring in your department.
Establish with the Faculty Member, Not Mere Goals for Performance,
But Specific Timetables for Their Implementation
As we have seen, it is often not at all difficult to get passive-aggressive
faculty members to agree that an existing problem needs to be
changed. The real challenge comes in prompting significant improvement
in behavior without addressing the underlying causes of the difficulties.
If you wish to see real changes, you will need to establish a
clear and reasonable timetable with the faculty member, monitor
that timetable effectively, and adopt rewards or sanctions based
on whether the goals you have set are actually met.
At a performance appraisal meeting with the faculty member, set
a specific goal that you would like the individual to achieve
and impose a clear deadline. This first task you assign should,
in most cases, be relatively easy and the deadline should be relatively
soon: 48 hours to one week. What you are asking the faculty member
to do might involve completing a long overdue memo or annual report
(provided, of course, that this task can reasonably be accomplished
in the time that you have allowed), contacting a committee in
order to set the date of its next meeting, or returning a graded
course assignment that should have been handed back some time
ago. Get progress reports, if you feel it necessary, even before
the deadline arrives. Let the faculty member resent the pressure
you are applying if he or she must, but take the steps that you
feel are necessary to get the assignment done. In truth, the resentment
may or may not subside once the task is complete, but remember
that your ultimate goal is increasing your department's overall
productivity and service to your students, not generating the
contentment of this particular faculty member.
When the task is complete, review it with the faculty member,
being generous with your approval where it is warranted, but not
accepting shoddy, inferior, or slovenly work. If improvements
are necessary, be very clear about what you would like changed
and why that is important. Set a new deadline (perhaps breaking
the task into even smaller parts, each of which must be approved
in turn) and begin the process again. If the assignment was successfully
completed, praise it appropriately and begin setting new deadlines
for new tasks. Start by planning various assignments perhaps six
weeks out or until the end of the current semester. Establish
a sufficient number of concrete steps along the way so that you
will always know whether the faculty member is making progress
in a timely manner. Then provide the faculty member with frequent,
candid, and constructive feedback regarding the rate of progress
being made.
Allow the Faculty Member Some Flexibility and Choice in Work
Assignments Where This Is Possible, With Standards of Performance
in These Areas Set Proportionately High
One of the justifications frequently made by passive-aggressive
faculty members for their unsatisfactory performance is that they
area asked to take on too many responsibilities, not assigned
tasks that are truly worthy of their talent, or called upon to
work in areas where they have relatively little training, experience,
and interest. One way to respond to this ploy is to allow some
flexibility in the faculty member's work assignment where this
is possible and desirable. If the faculty member is given a chance
to play an active role in selecting the assignment that he or
she will take and in setting the deadline (within limits), then
there can be no such excuse as "this was something I really
didn't want to do in the first place." It can be useful to
have the faculty member provide you with a list in writing of
those committee assignments, tasks, or reports that he or she
is really most interested in. Then, if deadlines go by unmet or
a pattern of excuses begins to emerge, you will have this written
document to go over with the faculty member, saying "But
I'm confused as to why this isn't getting done. Back on such-and-such
a date, you sent me a memo telling me that you really wanted to
do this."
When allowing the faculty member some leeway in selecting responsibilities
and deadlines, it is appropriate to combine this flexibility with
correspondingly higher standards of achievement. Since you are
dealing with a task that the faculty member has personally selected,
poor performance or missed deadlines should not be an option.
Remind the faculty member that with increased freedom comes increased
responsibility, and that your expectations rise proportionately
with the added self-determination you are offering in this task.
Require More Frequent Updates and Progress Reports From This
Faculty Member Than You Might Expect From Most Employees
While your goal is ultimately to wean the faculty member from
the constant supervision and frequent deadlines that you will
use at the beginning of your mentoring process, you should realize
that faculty members with mild passive-aggressive tendencies will
always require a higher level of guidance and supervision than
other faculty members. When you see that genuine progress is being
made, reduce the number of mentoring sessions to once a month,
and eventually to once or twice a semester. At those sessions,
you can review progress towards goals, set new objectives, celebrate
targets that have been reached, and speak candidly about any lapses
or backsliding. Keep the meeting as task-oriented as possible:
don't reinforce the faculty member's tendencies to complain or
to shift blame to others by acknowledging this behavior. You should
not expect progress to be either smooth or rapid. Remember that,
unlike other mentoring challenges, you are far less likely to
"fix" the difficulties arising from the passive-aggressive
faculty member than simply to manage and reduce them.
Your institution's Counseling Center or Human Resources Office
may be able to assist you with further techniques that could be
effective in your individual situation. You may also wish to consult
Lieberman's (2005) How to Change Anybody and Topchik's (2001)
Managing Workplace Negativity for the specific advice they give
on dealing with passive-aggressive temperaments.
Whatever strategy you take, avoid the temptation of trying to
solve the faculty member's problem by addressing his or her underlying
issues of self-image, problems with authority figures, or past
trauma. As an effective mentor for the members of your department,
your role is to help them grow as professionals through your guidance
and example. Being a good mentor does not mean becoming an employee's
spiritual counselor, therapist, or confidante. Whatever other
role you may play in other situations, you are still the faculty
member's boss, and you are entitled to expect a certain amount
of professionalism regardless of the problems that faculty member
has had or is having.
For this reason, keep your focus on the behavior you want the
faculty member to demonstrate, not on the person's underlying
reasons or justifications for past actions. For instance, are
there aspects of this faculty member's performance that you can
legitimately praise and cite as examples of the type of accomplishments
that he or she should continue to pursue? Is the faculty member
a good organizer of plans (though perhaps not as successful at
carrying out those plans)? Does the faculty member tend to work
effectively one-on-one with students (though perhaps less effectively
in committees)? Is the faculty member a polished writer (even
if it takes a very long time for his or her written works to be
completed)?
As you would with all your faculty, conduct your mentoring of
the faculty member by focusing on these areas of demonstrated
strength, perhaps even changing a few of his or her assignments
(where appropriate) as a means of playing to that person's strengths.
Having established a baseline of understanding about "This
is what you do wellŠ," you then can turn to the areas
of performance that really are causing problems for the department.
Start with general observations about the individual's poor performance
("On the other hand, you have the tendency to miss deadlines
and to request extensions repeatedly that causes a number of problems
for us.") Give a few specific examples, but don't pile on
so many instances of poor performance that the faculty member
reverts to self-defense. If you do happen to notice a tendency
towards defensiveness, simply ignore it. Don't let your focus
deviate from the faculty member's actions and don't give in to
comforting the faculty member by discussing any justifications
that he or she may give you for poor performance.
Similarly, if the faculty member keeps blaming others for his
or her poor performance, routinely ignore these statements. (Either
say nothing at all or rapidly return to your primary subject:
"Well, that's not the issue. What we're talking about is
how you can be even more effective.") The important impression
that you wish to establish with the employee is that: 1) there
are good things that he or she does, and these contributions are
both recognized and appreciated by the department; but 2) there
are also some areas in which the faculty member can improve, and
these are areas for which the individual needs to take personal
responsibility, not assign blame to colleagues.
Coping with the passive-aggressive faculty member is likely to
require a great deal of patience and, even then, the situation
may well cause you repeated frustration and irritation. In the
most difficult of times, it may be useful to remember that the
individual's behavior is not caused by anything that you, your
department, or your institution has done. Ultimately, it is the
individual's own problem and, while you can take steps to cope
with the departmental challenges resulting from it, it neither
is nor should be your responsibility to solve it. Only the individual
faculty member can do that.
References
Lieberman, D.J. (2005). How to change anybody: Proven techniques
to reshape anyone's attitude, behavior, feelings, or beliefs.
New York, NY: St. Martin's Press.
Topchik, G.S. (2001). Managing workplace negativity. New York,
NY: American Management Association.
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