Herbert plan intended to avoid vacancies

A new plan to make leaders out of IU professors is intended to help the University avoid another controversy about senior leadership, officials said Tuesday.\n"Universities are not good at succession planning, so I believe this program fills a real and important need" to train future University leaders, said University Chancellor Ken Gros Louis.\nAbout 30 professors will participate in the IU LeaD program. They will attend two leadership and management seminars each month. The professors, who represent all eight IU campuses, will start the 12-month training program this month.\n"We have an obligation to identify and develop IU's next generation of both academic and administrative leaders," IU President Adam Herbert said in a Feb. 3 press release. "Through this program we will provide an opportunity for outstanding colleagues to develop the expanded knowledge base and skill sets needed as they assume expanded leadership responsibilities throughout the University."\nIU suffered a leadership crisis last fall, when several IU administrators announced they would leave IU and professors questioned Herbert's leadership in a mass meeting. With the new program, IU will always have a pool of capable leaders, officials said.\nGros Louis said the program was "very much" intended to help avoid such a leadership crisis.\nHowever, some participants cautioned that IU should not use LeaD as the only path to administrative positions.\n"We should be careful not to limit our choices by declaring, a priori, that LeaD training is an express lane to leadership jobs in IU administration," said Director of Undergraduate Programs of School of Public and Environmental Affairs Matthew Auer. "It might be useful for LeaD participants and trainers to think of the endeavor of 'leading' in (a) broad sense."\nAuer was one of the administrators selected for the inaugural LeaD program. \nParticipants also said the program will be helpful in simple day-to-day operations of the University.\nBusiness law professor Arlen Langvardt said the program "should enhance (participants') awareness of the importance of focusing on meaningful long-term objectives in decision-making instead of opting for convenient short-term 'solutions' that are likely to cause problems down the road."\nIU is currently searching for a new dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, and will also conduct searches for a provost, College of Arts and Sciences associate dean and IU president. \nCOAS Dean Kumble Subbaswamy was named provost at the University of Kentucky. COAS Associate Dean Joseph Steinmetz will become College of Liberal Arts and Sciences dean at the University of Kansas, and Herbert announced he will not seek to renew his contract after it expires in 2008.