Creating a Tipping Point: Strategic Human Resources in Higher Education
- ASHE Higher Education Report, Volume 38, Number 1
Book description
In a turbulent, unstable era of severe financial pressures, the
development of strategic human resource (HR) practices has become an
urgent mandate in higher education. With significant and widespread
institutional shifts resulting from globalization, heightened
competition, and rapid innovation, educational leaders must optimize
their most significant resource-human capital-and align HR strategies,
structures, and processes with organizational goals. Due to substantial
cuts in state appropriations and rapidly diminishing budgets, public
institutions of higher education in particular are struggling to realign
resources and programs to fulfill their educational missions and
maintain academic quality, while simultaneously responding to complex
external legislative and accreditation mandates.
In light of these challenges, Creating a Tipping Point: Strategic
Human Resources in Higher Education breaks new ground by
presenting a research-based approach that supports the evolution of HR
practices from siloed, transactional models to strategic operations
that serve the entire university. This monograph provides a concrete,
progressive road map to developing organizational capabilities in
support of the university's academic mission and illustrates this
pathway with examples drawn from public research universities. It
offers strategies, tools, metrics, and action steps that support the
development of an effective and efficient strategic HR operation in
higher education. For institutions seeking to implement strategic HR,
this book is a practical and invaluable resource.