There used to be a car repair commercial that ran in north New Jersey markets. A customer walks into a shop and a guy in coveralls fumbling with a garden hose says, "Sure, boss, I fixed a transmission once."
Higher ed has a strange tolerance for letting generalists and hacks get their hands on the transmission. "Leaders" of all ilk are routinely hired from fields where the core competencies look great on paper, but can't find the correct wrench in their shallow toolbox when the situation demands actual leadership. The assumption that has always perplexed me is that institutions tend to have a "leadership is leadership" perspective on these hires. Sort of, "hey, it says here you were really good at selling shoes. Want to sell education?"
But we know that education isn't shoes, or underwear or soda. And the leadership gap becomes frighteningly visible when these individuals are placed in positions to engage with non-traditional students. Time and again, these individuals make soft and doughy decisions with consultant-like pronouncements, then roll up behind "market challenges and exigencies" to explain why they are actually incapable of leading anything.
This is just an opinion, of course, and it certainly doesn't mean you can't be a good leader in higher ed if your not "of" higher ed. But the industry's casualness about domain expertise deserves more scrutiny than it gets, especially when the stakes are so high.
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