Section 2: Institutional Functioning and Characteristics

The 22 questions in this section, ranging from internal mobility to planning and institutional mission, focus on certain structural and process characteristics that are highly correlated with the management and performance of an institution.

What is our survey data telling us? Columbia is perceived as a place with a special sense of identity and distinctive purpose to fulfill and the academic programs offered reflect the College's special mission. The College creates reasonable benefits to its constituencies. A strong long-term plan guides the College's direction and its ability to meet new challenges and expansion.

Full- and part-time faculty perceives a fair level of formal policies and rules governing most activities. The staff seems to perceive more operational flexibility than full- and part-time faculty. The respondents also recognize that the College has many semi-autonomous subunits. On the other hand, many decisions tend to be made at the top of the organizational hierarchy. The full-time faculty seems to perceive more centralized decision-making than the other two groups.

The administration is viewed as stable and made up of many specialists. According to NCHEMS, large organizations are almost always more specialized than smaller organizations. In general, the top administration is perceived as credible and respondents have confidence in the integrity of top administrators. However, the full-time faculty strongly questions the credibility of the top administration and has little confidence in the integrity of top administrators.

Innovation and experimentation are increasing, indicating that most individuals are willing to accept change. This general response direction does not negate the fact that a certain level of resistance to change is observed -- 37% of the full-time faculty and 42% of the staff agree that there is a lot of resistance to change at Columbia.

Despite the strong identification with the College's mission and our ability to affect the future direction of the College, the data suggest stagnated satisfaction among the faculty and staff, increasing conflicts, and increasingly vocal special interest groups. These perceptions point to the reality that Columbia is becoming a more pluralistic and complex organization. The responses of part-time faculty offer a different view -- perhaps compared to what they see outside of Columbia, what they observe among the full-time employees in terms of the push-and-pull nature of balancing desires/aspirations, control, resource allocation, etc., are not much different from other organizations of this size.

Although many respondents expressed a lack of information about the College's financial resources and budgetary decisions, as a group they agree that cutbacks are not made on strategic decisions but rather are generalized and across-the-board. The respondents agree that the College currently has sufficient financial resources that could withstand cuts in expenditures without severely damaging the College's operation.

The following comments from survey respondents illustrate the range of perspectives on the institutional issues discussed in this section:

Columbia College is a very unique and special place! It provides students the opportunity to learn and grow academically and artistically. It is a great place to work and learn. But with the increase in enrollment, new administrative leaders, and the changes on campus (new buildings, residences...), the college is in a state of transition. Communication and collaboration across the departments is more crucial to the health of the institution than ever. In many ways, Columbia is sitting on a winning lottery ticket, but not quite sure how to cash it in.

Columbia College Chicago is a wonderful place to teach because of the creativity, intensity, and variety of its students, and the expertise and involvement of its faculty.

Columbia College Chicago has been a wonderful place for our students, teachers, and staff, vibrant and rich in its mission to afford arts education to a broad and diverse community of students on an open-admissions basis. This has recently become less true and more problematic given the effort by top administrators to make Columbia a corporate entity plastered all over with flashy branding and crass color schemes rather than ideas and creativity. Bring back the real Columbia.

Data for this section

For further information, please contact: hwexler@colum.edu