An Examination Of Faculty Beliefs Concerning P&T Decisions

Abstract

According to Schuster and Finkelstein (2006) faculty workloads have been increasing dramatically. Besides the additional hours worked by faculty the composition of work has changed as well (Schultz et al., 1989). Studies on research, teaching and service components of promotion and tenure (P&T) decisions at colleges and universities have largely focused on the research and teaching aspects. Research and teaching are consistently given considerably more weight in the P&T decisions (Alshare et al., 2007 and Tripathy and Ganesh, 1996). The purpose of this study is to examine whether faculty believe the perceived weighting of service in P&T decisions is appropriate. A survey was sent to randomly selected business faculty. Participants were asked a series of questions related to the current perceived and desired levels of the significance of service in P&T decisions. The results indicate that in all P&T decisions service should be of greater importance than the current perceived level incorporated into those decisions. Additional analyses revealed that demographic factors appear to affect the significance of the desired level of importance of service.