The administrative colloquium: developing management and leadership skills for faculty

Development of leadership competencies has become a priority for many academic health science centers. However, traditional faculty development has focused almost exclusively on improving teaching skills. The process and outcomes of developing leadership skills for academic health science center faculty has not been extensively studied.

The University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC) created a year-long course, called the Administrative Colloquium, as a means to enhance faculty leadership skills. Completion of the course required attendance at 8 half-day workshop sessions, each devoted to teaching a leadership competency (eg, leading with vision, managing change) and completing a project with a project report (oral or poster presentation). Course evaluation was multifaceted. Attendees were queried multiple times by a pre- and poststrategy and retrospective pre- and poststrategy concerning their perceptions about knowledge obtained during the course. Paired t testing was used to determine statistical differences between the mean pre- versus postvalues and the retrospective pre- versus postvalues. Project content was qualitatively analyzed for themes.

All comparisons of pre- and postdata and retrospective pre- and postdata were statistically significant (P <.05). Three themes arose from the analysis of projects: change, management, and interpersonal communications.

The pre- and postknowledge data and the retrospective pre- and postknowledge data demonstrate that learning was significant as well as sustained. Qualitative analysis of the project content demonstrates that the participants were applying the course content to solving real-world problems. These results give preliminary support to the conclusion that the Administrative Colloquium has had an impact on faculty leadership development at UNMC.