273: [Leadership Series] Becoming a Manager is Inevitable
Jun 10, 2025
Feeling apprehensive about becoming a manager in academia? You're not alone! Embrace the idea that management is an essential part of academic growth and influence. This insightful discussion emphasizes that academic leadership isn't just about independent work; collaboration and mentorship are key. Whether you’re new to academia or already directing a research center, understanding management is crucial. Shift your perspective and prepare to lead with confidence!
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insights INSIGHT
Manager Role is Inevitable
Becoming a manager in academia is inevitable as your career grows and you work with more people.
Modern scholarship requires collaboration, necessitating leadership and management skills.
insights INSIGHT
Academic Leadership Dual Role
Department chairs and academic leaders are peers and supervisors simultaneously.
This creates a unique management challenge in academic leadership roles.
volunteer_activism ADVICE
Effective Academic Management Tips
Develop strong communication and systems to manage academic teams effectively.
Understand your leadership philosophy and values to guide your organization's success.
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Do you cringe at the idea of being a manager in academia? You’re not alone, but it’s time for a mindset shift.
In this new podcast series on leadership in academia, I’m making the case that becoming a manager isn’t just likely -- it’s inevitable. In fact, it’s a sign that your academic career is growing, your influence is expanding, and your work is making an impact.
In this first episode, I’m laying the groundwork for the series by diving into why academic leadership must include management—and why that’s a good thing. Whether you’ve just landed your tenure-track role or you’re directing a major research center, you’re already managing people, even if it doesn’t feel like it.
If you are a professor seeking to grow as a scholar, leader, and mentor, this series is for you. Tune in to shift your perspective on leadership in academia.
Our 12-week Navigate: Your Writing Roadmap® program helps tenure-track womxn and nonbinary professors to publish their backlog of papers so that their voice can have the impact they know is possible. Get on the waitlist here!
Cathy’s book, Making Time to Write: How to Resist the Patriarchy and Take Control of Your Academic Career Through Writing is available in print! Learn how to build your career around your writing practice while shattering the myths of writing every day, accountability, and motivation, doing mindset work that’s going to reshape your writing,and changing academic culture one womxn and nonbinary professor at a time. Get your print copy today or order it for a friend here!
If you would like to hear more from Cathy for free, please subscribe to the weekly newsletter, In the Pipeline, at scholarsvoice.org. It’s a newsletter that she personally writes that goes out once a week with writing and publication tips, strategies, inspiration, book reviews and more.
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