Best Practices for Faculty Search Committees

Best Practices for Faculty Search Committees presents a clear, direct action plan for faculty and administration involved in hiring. Written by a veteran university administrator, this book lays out a step-by-step process for selecting the right candidate for the job. Practical guidance on application review, interviewing, and evaluation walks you through established and effective methods, while case studies and examples from a variety of institutions provide insight into real-world implementation. Whether you're serving on a faculty search committee for the first time, or simply seeking a more efficient route to the best candidate, this book provides invaluable guidance that can streamline the search and selection process.

Tenure-track and long-term opportunities don't come about every day, so it's essential for hiring committees to make the correct choice. While the search process may be codified to an extent by your institution, there is still plenty of room for error or misjudgment; this book helps you keep the process on track and moving forward until the best candidate is identified.

• Develop criteria for efficient and informative application review
• Conduct in-depth interviews that provide a clear picture of fit
• Evaluate final candidates on the most pertinent points for the job

Most faculty search resources are technical in nature, with little guidance on getting the job done properly and efficiently; best practices tend to be unwritten, and frequently verge into "habit" rather than critically evaluated method.Best Practices for Faculty Search Committees provides clear, concise, concrete guidance for a more efficient, effective, and successful candidate search.

JEFFREY L. BULLER has served in administrative positions ranging from department chair to vice president for academic affairs at four very different institutions: Loras College, Georgia Southern University, Mary Baldwin College, and Florida Atlantic University. He is the author of thirteen books on higher education administration, a textbook for first year college students, and a book of essays on the music dramas of Richard Wagner. More recently, he has been active as a consultant to the Ministry of Education in Saudi Arabia, and, along with Robert E. Cipriano, is a senior partner in ATLAS: Academic Training, Leadership,& Assessment Services, through which he has presented numerous workshops on academic leadership and faculty searches. His most recent books includeThe Essential Academic Dean or Provost, Second Edition (2015) andChange Leadership in Higher Education: A Practical Guide to Academic Transformation (2014).

The Author viii

Introduction ix

1 Achieving Diversity Goals 1

2 Advertising the Position 23

3 Reviewing the Applications 45

4 Scheduling the Interviews 71

5 Conducting the Interviews 91

Appendix A: Candidate Evaluation Form 114

Appendix B: Suggested Interview Questions 119

References and Resources 123

Index 127