Abstract
Framed by the broad considerations of recruiting and managing the academy, this chapter looks at the forces creating increased pressure and responsibility for academic management. Our analysis explores academic work and the academic workforce in the context of current dynamics and likely futures. It discusses the significance of academic work, reviews workforce characteristics, and analyses tensions and pressures. Prevailing conceptualisations, it is argued, do not reflect the current situation in which the profession finds itself, and would provide a very shaky foundation on which to build the future workforce. There is an overarching need for a fresh conceptualisation of academic work that is authentic and feasible and suggestions are offered of what this might look like. A number of strategies are proposed how such a recasting might be implemented. The chapter works from Australian research, and makes suggestions for other systems.
An earlier version of this chapter was published as: Coates, H. and Goedegebuure, L. (2012). Recasting the Academic Workforce: Why the attractiveness of the academic profession needs to be increased and eight possible strategies for how to go about this from an Australian perspective. Higher Education, 64, 875–889.
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Coates, H., Goedegebuure, L., Meek, V.L. (2015). Increasing the Attractiveness of the Academic Profession: A Challenge for Management. In: Teichler, U., Cummings, W. (eds) Forming, Recruiting and Managing the Academic Profession. The Changing Academy – The Changing Academic Profession in International Comparative Perspective, vol 14. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16080-1_16
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