Facing difficult situations

Difficult situations at work are easy to ignore, but this often leads to ethical failures. Becoming more comfortable managing difficult situations will lead to more ethical decision-making and a more ethical culture.

Our Assessment Tools

Effectively managing the academic environment requires data. A professional, principled, inclusive and psychologically safe climate is crucial to for the facilitation of work flow and interactions between academic leaders, faculty, staff, and students. The National Center for Principled Leadership and Research Ethics has helped to develop tools which make it easier to efficiently measure work place climate. Tools include SOURCE, which measures research integrity, and KINDER, which measures interpersonal engagement. We use a purpose-built Results Analysis Engine to manage the process and present findings. Both SOURCE and KINDER comprise survey questions based on a Likert Scale as well as background questions. The Engine allows leaders to see a full summary on what areas of the environment are succeeding or failing. These tools are useful for addressing long term and short term issues within the professional academic environment, to ensure that each member of the community can thrive.

About The SOURCE

The Survey of Organizational Research Climate (SOURCE) is a validated instrument specifically designed to measure the climate of research integrity in academic organizations. It collects confidential responses from participants and provides a snapshot of program and unit microclimates through the aggregated perspectives of their members. Its use also contributes to the overall climate for research integrity by contributing de-identified data to a national comparison database. For an insight into how SOURCE results relate to institutional research integrity, please see this Nature article on the subject. For our newest white paper on developing academic leaders, see Academic Leadership Development, Critical Capabilities at the Department Level.

Results can help individual academic and research institutions:

  • Characterize and compare departmental research integrity climates,
  • Assess the efficacy of educational and mentoring approaches,
  • Detect where research policies or practices (e.g., concerning data management, etc.) might need attention through responsible conduct of research (RCR) instruction
  • Document and demonstrate for research sponsors institutional commitment to research integrity and RCR education,
  • Justify enhanced efforts to foster a climate of integrity education and quality research.

Running the SOURCE at intervals of two to four years will demonstrate a commitment to improving the research integrity climate and provide data to assess its effectiveness over time.

The survey contains 32 items (5 point Likert scales) plus classification information about respondents (rank, departmental affiliation, type of highest degree). It takes 10-15 minutes to complete online.

In addition to enabling confidential institution-specific reports on units and the campus as a whole, de-identified data is compiled in a national comparison database so that the community as a whole may benefit. The norming initiative permits home institution departments to be appropriately assessed with respect to other comparable units in the same discipline.

About KINDER

KINDER was developed specifically to assess the quality of interpersonal climates in research settings. We know from the validation of this new instrument that results from the KINDER correlate with research integrity climate, organizational commitment, and a sense of integration with one’s work unit.

Although existing work has been done to develop assessments of research integrity climate (via the SOURCE, the Survey of Organizational Research Climate), up to now, no assessment tool has existed to measure interpersonal climate, particularly as it exists within academic research-focused environments. Over the past several years, as part of a project funded by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation (Sloan Grant #2019-12294), our team has rigorously developed and validated such a tool in KINDER.

KINDER includes 24 question items (α=0.95), all asked on a Likert scale ranging from 1 to 5, with the following response categories: Not at All, Somewhat, Moderately, Very, and Completely. A “No basis for judging” option is also provided. These questions yield four means-scored summary dimensions, one tapping Institutional Practices influencing climate, and three tapping various aspects of the work-unit climate.

How can you and your university run the SOURCE or KINDER?

An organization that wishes to run the SOURCE or KINDER can make arrangements to do so with the University of Illinois’ National Center for Professional and Research Ethics (NCPRE). The license fee is based on the size of the project and the level of support desired in interpretation and analysis.

Once the license with NCPRE is in place, an institution provides emails and names of participants with departmental affiliations and status (graduate student, post-doc, faculty member). NCPRE manages the survey administration using the Results Analysis Engine (RAE)

The RAE sends emails via institutional email addresses seeking survey participation and follows up with reminders over a 4 week period.  Response rates during previous studies have ranged from 15-50%.

The RAE provides analyses used to generate the summary reports for the contracting institution. As part of building a national “norming” database for providing comparative data, NCPRE retains de-identified information with limited demographics for comparison and benchmark purposes.

More detailed information on the procedures involved in implementing these instruments at your institution can be found here.

If we can answer any questions for you, please contact us at: ncpre-source@illinois.edu or 217-333-1416.

 

[a-z-listing “Leadership Collection”]

Civility, Interpersonal Dynamics, and Organizational Respect Climate Survey 

Introduction and Background

Cultures are critical to the success of workplaces, and the resulting interpersonal climates are an important factor in research quality and integrity. We believe that cultures of excellence are those that facilitate their members’ ability to produce their best work. Members in these work climates feel welcome to engage fully and share creatively in the workplace. 

Although existing work has been done to develop assessments of research integrity climate (via the SOURCE, the Survey of Organizational Research Climate), up to now, no assessment tool has existed to measure interpersonal climate, particularly as it exists within academic research-focused environments. Over the past several years, as part of a project funded by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation (Sloan Grant #2019-12294), our team has rigorously developed and validated such a tool—the KINDER survey.

 

Survey Domains and Topics  

Survey Features

The KINDER survey includes 24 question items (α=0.95), all asked on a Likert scale ranging from 1 to 5, with the following response categories: Not at All, Somewhat, Moderately, Very, and Completely. A “No basis for judging” option is also provided. These questions yield four means-scored summary dimensions, one tapping Institutional Practices influencing climate, and three tapping various aspects of the work-unit climate.

Excellence in Academic Leadership: LAS

Welcome to the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Excellence in Academic Leadership (EAL) program cohort. This program is presented by the National Center for Principled Leadership and Research Ethics (NCPRE), housed in the Coordinated Science Lab here on campus.

Your cohort facilitators will include an array of highly-experienced Illinois leaders, including NCPRE director and former Associate Provost C. K. Gunsalus, President Emeritus Robert Easter, and Assistant Dean of Inclusive Excellence Lloyd Munjanja.

Your primary point of contact will be Sarah Mustered. She is available for any questions you may have about the program.

General Reference Materials:

EAL LAS Workshop

Session Date: Monday, May 16, 2022

*The Leadership collection videos are temporarily unavailable. They should be available by June. We apologize for any inconvenience!

Leadership Collection Resources: 

  • Bullyproofing:
    • Meet Professor Major (Part I)
    • Meet Professor Major (part II)

Handouts and References:

Slide Deck (for individual use only):

Pre-session homework:  

Before this meeting, we ask that you do the following:
  1. Please read “Are You the Doormat?”, the case study sent via email (marked with “READ ME” in the file name for clarity). We will be discussing this in breakout rooms later in the session and taking the time to read it ahead of time will give you more time to have meaningful group discussions.
  2. You have also been assigned one of two roles for a negotiation role play to be undertaken in pairs. Typically, these documents would be distributed the moment before beginning the exercise. To adapt to an online setting, we will be providing them now, so that you may print them out to have ready for the activity. We ask in the strongest terms that you please refrain from reading them beforehand. For clarity, I have marked these files with “PRINT ONLY” in the file name. The experience will be far more valuable and provide a better learning opportunity if you read their contents for the first time during the exercise.
    • We also request that you please refrain from distributing this particular document in any form. As such, I will not be uploading the roles to the webpage. Typically, we would collect these handouts after the exercise and ask that you please dispose of them with care given this online setting.

 

 

Session Five: Exploring Leadership

Session Date: Friday, February 25, 12pm-1:30pm CT

This session will focus on leadership through the lens of preparing for (and responding to) paradigm shifts–Leadership Through Challenging Times, if you will.
In preparation for this week’s session, we ask that you take the time to:
1) consider and identify a fundamental change occurring in your field and be prepared to describe how your unit will adapt to it. Consider the impact that Einstein’s Theory of Relativity had on Newtonian Physics, or the impact of genetic engineering on agriculture, or the introduction of satellites on meteorology. These are all examples of major paradigm shifts. Other changes are smaller in scale and still impactful. How you recognize and respond to these events is key to being a successful academic leader. Please prepare to discuss the fundamental changes occurring in your fields in breakout sessions.
2) In addition, we ask that you remember to have your definition of leadership from our first session on hand and ready to discuss

Session Materials:

Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

Homework Assigned:

Re-visit your definition of leadership and reflect on your strengths; how will you play to them? What would you like to focus on going forward? Record your thoughts in your journal.

  • Do you see a paradigm shift in your field or institution? How will your leadership help your colleagues prepare for or react to it? Record your thoughts in your journal.
  • Submit via email discussion questions or a topic you would like to discuss with the group from your reading of Crucial Conversations or Crucial Accountability (whichever you read).

 

 

Session Four: Difficult Conversations and Personal Scripts

Session Date: Friday, February 4 at 12pm-2:00pm CT

Please be prepared to share your one-minute elevator pitch and to report back on your Critical Friends sessions.
 
I have attached the conflict self-assessment we sent once before. We ask that you continue to keep this in mind as you consider your conflict style and how you tend to react to difficult conversations. Among other topics we will cover, we will revisit your conflict comfort and style and introduce the And Stance, a powerful tool that grows out of work on influence and persuasion at the Harvard Project on Negotiation. The idea behind the And Stance is that ‘but’ is a stopper word in American English; the exercise is to practice moving to the And Stance, where you use “and” instead of “but” (or “however” or “although”)– without changing your message. If you have time to look over the exercise in advance, we can spend more time discussing and working on it during the session. 

Session Materials:

Leadership Collection Reference Materials:

Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

Homework Assigned:

Practice applying the And Stance in your everyday life. First, try to go one week without using “but” in an email, instead restructuring the statement with “and” in order to align with others. Then, try to go 24 hours without saying “but” at all. This is a very difficult and worthwhile exercise that helps make you aware of just how often you use stopper words and where you can change your approach.

  • Start reading either Crucial Conversations or Crucial Accountability. (If you haven’t read either, start with Crucial Conversations.) Both are readily available for purchase online. We wish to provide time for all members of the cohort to read one or the other before we start a discussion, so are providing a head start for a future discussion.
  • Prepare personal scripts and share them with other members of the cohort, using the Personal Scripts Quick Tips as a guide. Also consider the Complaint-Handling Guidelines. You may find these helpful for handling difficult conversations and for constructing personal scripts when faced with these scenarios.
  • Before our next session, find and have ready the definition of leadership you recorded in your journals during the first session. Prepare to discuss.

 

 

Session Three: Vibrant Academic Units

Session Date: Friday, December 3 at 12pm-1:30pm CT

We ask you to be prepared to discuss the AUDiT that you filled out for your unit along with the real or hypothetical situation you developed for use with a Critical Friends group. We have also attached a self-assessment document that we will be using during today’s session. Please download it to have at hand during our meeting.
 
As always, please make sure that you have your journals at hand. We will be asking you to refer back to them throughout the program. 

Pre-Session Materials:

Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

EAL Session 3 Vibrant Academic Units- Participant Use

Homework Assigned: 

  • Create a ONE MINUTE or shorter elevator pitch for your unit, based in its purpose and mission.
  • Participate in a Critical Friends discussion: be prepared to report back.
  • Remember that there are books available to support your development—use your funds! 

Session Two: Critical Friends/Group Problem Solving

Session Date: 10/22/21 at 12pm-1:30pm CT

For this session, we would like you to watch, in advance, the video provided below. This one is a bit longer than last time, around 9-10 minutes. It depicts a staged meeting discussing the Thomas Santo case study we addressed in the first cohort meeting, using a protocol created by the Annenberg Institute known as Critical Friends. We have provided a description of the protocol along with the full background from the Annenberg Institute for reference. We also have included a quick reference summary sheet of the Decision Making Framework (DMF) discussed in our last meeting that many find useful during a Critical Friends session. We will discuss the protocol, its uses, and do an abbreviated Critical Friends session during our upcoming online meeting.
 
We will be opening with your reviews of items in the Leadership Collection and the Testing Yourself prompts provided as homework after our last meeting, and discussing the AUDiT assessments you started.

Pre-Session Materials:

Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

Homework Assigned:

  • Review the AUDiT you filled out for your unit; be prepared to discuss 
  • Develop a real or hypothetical situation to use in a Critical Friends group

 

 

Session One: The Special Challenges of the Academic Environment

Session Date:  09/24/21 at 12pm-2pm CT

Our first session is scheduled for Friday, September 24, from 12 -2:00 PM in Lincoln Hall 2000. This opening session will be held in-person, over lunch and will serve as an introduction between cohort members and program facilitators. Lunch will be served outside on the quad – east side entrance to Lincoln Hall  at 12pm (weather permitting),  and will be followed by the 90 min session held indoors, starting at 12:30pm. Subsequent synchronous sessions will be held online

Prior to our meeting on Friday afternoon, we ask that you watch this short vignette that was filmed as part of our larger Leadership Collection. This particular clip features a faculty member named “Professor Major” having a conversation with a new Department Head on his first day.

As you watch the scene unfold and the behavior of the characters within it, we invite you to think about what is really happening in this interaction. Please consider the questions posed within the video and write some thoughts down in the Journal we have asked you to maintain as part of the program.

We will begin Friday’s session by discussing this scenario, after which we will take some time to explore the unique challenges our environment presents.

Pre-Session Materials:

Cultures of Excellence

Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

Homework Assigned

  • We invite you all to take a look through NCPRE’s Leadership Collection. This library of resources has been developed over several years, built on the experiences and wisdom of our experts. The collection includes Quick Tips, Executive Briefings and Annotated Bibliographies, as well as many video interviews with our experts themselves sharing their thoughts on a variety of subjects. Please take some time to browse the collection – during our second session we will ask each of you to share a couple of the assets you found most interesting or useful.
  • Find attached the Testing Yourself  exercise and take a few minutes to respond to the prompts within. We will discuss these prompts and share responses in our next session when we dive deeper into handling contentious situations like these.
  • Also attached is a copy of the AUDiT Dashboard developed by NCPRE to help systematically assess the health of your department. Our observation has been that many leaders tend to focus on areas that they think are problematic. The AUDiT approach helps ensure that your assessment is comprehensive. Use the AUDiT table to score your unit. Start by putting a number in each cell – the more the cell describes your unit, the higher the number should be. In the green and red columns, scores run from 0 to 5; in the yellow column, it is 0 to 3. When you are finished, add up your green scores and subtract the totals from your yellow and red scores. We will be revisiting this tool throughout the course so please keep the original with your journal.

The College Administrator’s Survival Guide by C.K. Gunsalus has a new edition. Click here to check it out.

In Teaching Ethics: Instructional Models, Methods, and Modalities for University Studies, follow Elizabeth A. Luckman and C.K. Gunsalus as they explore common ethical missteps, and offer tested and effective approaches for teaching approaches to counteract them. In their chapter of Teaching Ethics: Instructional Models, Methods, and Modalities for University Studies, Luckman and Gunsalus review research on ethical decision-making and connect this to the pedagogical goals of teaching ethics to students in a classroom setting. They offer a variety of exercises focused on academic based decision-making that can be easily adapted to any class. Educators seeking to teach ethical decision-making can adapt the exercises described for any student body in any area of academic study. This chapter’s exercises are meant to challenge readers and get them to think more critically, and solidifying good habits in decision making. 

Excellence in Academic Leadership: Duluth

Greetings and welcome to the Excellence in Academic Leadership (EAL) program presented by the National Center for Principled Leadership & Research Ethics (NCPRE). Our goal is to support your growth as an academic leader. The program will be offered through online group Zoom sessions augmented by outside readings and your reflections and analyses.

NCPRE creates and shares resources to support better ethical and leadership practices in academic and other professional contexts. Leadership—and particularly ethical leadership—is central to creating a culture that establishes healthy and productive professional interactions. We equip you with evidence-based tools to support intentional leadership development and institutional integrity.

Your cohort’s presenters are C. K. Gunsalus and Robert Easter. Sarah Mustered is your Cohort Coordinator and will be your main point of contact for scheduling and logistics.

We are planning 1.5 hour online meetings once a month through the academic year. There are a select few topics that require a longer period of two hours; you will receive advance notice of at least a month before those sessions. Each meeting will focus around a particular topic and include related resources available for you to pursue as your interests direct. Other than these online meetings, you will be in control of how much external time you spend; there will be ‘homework’ assignments after each session and it will always be your choice as to the time you devote.

Please feel free to contact Sarah Mustered, the Cohort Coordinator for this program, if you have any questions: mustered@illinois.edu

General Reference Materials:

Session Ten: Capstone Case and Closing

Session Date Monday, May 11, 2022 at 12:30-2:30pm CT

Session Materials: EAL Session Ten Capstone Case

Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

Session Nine: Leadership, Shared Governance, and You

Session Date: Wednesday, April 20 at 12:30pm – 2:00pm CT

This session, featuring shared wisdom from President Emeritus Robert Easter and Professor Nicholas Burbules, asked you to consider your role as a leader and the values you bring to it. Below are materials you need for completing the homework for session ten and the slides from session nine.
As a reminder, our closing session will be on May 11th from 12:30-2:30pm CT

Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

Homework Assigned:

  • Use the attached capstone case study to develop a plan to address the scenario. Your task is to describe how to navigate the difficult process before you as effectively and constructively as possible. Each group of 2 people will present its approach to the full cohort in a 5-minute presentation. You are welcome to use slides, a document, or any other vehicle for making your presentation. You will be able to share your screen.
    • Be prepared to field questions from the NCPRE team and your peers following your presentation.
    • If you are unable to attend the final session, you are still encouraged to participate in preparing the capstone case with your colleagues.
  • Use the attached guidelines to put together an Individual Development Plan (IDP)
    • You are not expected to have a complete IDP ready by our meeting. We ask that you start to construct one and be prepared to informally discuss your progress with the group.

Session Eight: Bullyproofing Academic Units

Session Date: Wednesday, March 23, 2022 12:30-2:30pm CT

Below are copies of a case study  and  situation analysis  we will be using in the session. In order to make the best use of our time,  we ask that you read them ahead of the session. Please make sure to have them on hand for our group discussion tomorrow.
 
As a reminder, we ask that you dig far back to our first session  together and revisit the short video featuring “Professor Major” having a conversation with a new Department Head on his first day
 
We will be opening our session with a group discussion of the behavior you see in the video and the dynamics involved in the interaction. Please be prepared to share your thoughts.

Pre-Session Materials: 

  • Meet Professor Major, Version 1:
Meet Professor Major, Version 2:

Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

Homework Assigned:

Review the second version of the Professor Major video belowMake note of your thoughts on what the department chair learned in this program. What changes did he make to the interaction and its outcome?
  • Meet in a group to develop a list of skills you’ve acquired through this cohort program that you see being applied in the second version of Professor MajorBe prepared to report at our next session.
  • Meet in a Critical Friends groupuse an issue a member of your group is facing.  If you would like a case study to discuss, please contact us and we will provide one for you.

Session Seven: Giving/Receiving Feedback

Session Date: Wednesday, March 2, 2022 12:30-2:00pm CT

Pre-Session Materials:

Leadership Collection Resources: 

Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

Homework Assigned: 

  • Take care of you and yours until we next meet.
  • Use your Critical Friends to work on difficult feedback situations, whether giving or receiving. (Feedback is a gift.)

Session Six: Negotiation

Session Date: Wednesday, February 9, 2022 at 12:30-2:30pm CT

Before tomorrow’s meeting, we ask that you do the following:
  1. Please read “Are You the Doormat?”, the case study sent via email (marked with “READ ME” in the file name for clarity). We will be discussing this in breakout rooms later in the session and taking the time to read it ahead of time will give you more time to have meaningful group discussions.
  2. You have also been assigned one of two roles for a negotiation role play to be undertaken in pairs. Typically, these documents would be distributed the moment before beginning the exercise. To adapt to an online setting, we will be providing them now, so that you may print them out to have ready for the activity. We ask in the strongest terms that you please refrain from reading them beforehand. For clarity, I have marked these files with “PRINT ONLY” in the file name. The experience will be far more valuable and provide a better learning opportunity if you read their contents for the first time during the exercise.
    • We also request that you please refrain from distributing this particular document in any form. As such, I will not be uploading the roles to the webpage. Typically, we would collect these handouts after the exercise and ask that you please dispose of them with care given this online setting.

Session Reference Materials:

Leadership Collection Resources:

Rob Rutenbar, Senior Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Pittsburgh, talks about the use of data in discussions with decision-makers.

Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

Homework Assigned:

  • Consider interactions you have that you now see as negotiations: what can do you do to improve your preparation for these conversations? Record them in your journal. 
  • Send Sarah topics of difficult conversations around feedback you find challenging (next session is about giving and receiving feedback).
  • Finish reading Crucial Conversations or Crucial Accountability to prepare for our session on giving and receiving feedback.

Session Five: Exploring Leadership

Session Date: Wednesday, January 19, 2022 12:30-2:00pm CT

This session will focus on leadership through the lens of preparing for (and responding to) paradigm shifts–Leadership Through Challenging Times, if you will.
In preparation for this week’s session, we ask that you take the time to:
1) consider and identify a fundamental change occurring in your field and be prepared to describe how your unit will adapt to it. Consider the impact that Einstein’s Theory of Relativity had on Newtonian Physics, or the impact of genetic engineering on agriculture, or the introduction of satellites on meteorology. These are all examples of major paradigm shifts. Other changes are smaller in scale and still impactful. How you recognize and respond to these events is key to being a successful academic leader. Please prepare to discuss the fundamental changes occurring in your fields in breakout sessions.
2) In addition, we ask that you remember to have your definition of leadership from our first session on hand and ready to discuss

Session Materials:

Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

Homework Assigned:

Re-visit your definition of leadership and reflect on your strengths; how will you play to them? What would you like to focus on going forward? Record your thoughts in your journal.

  • Do you see a paradigm shift in your field or institution? How will your leadership help your colleagues prepare for or react to it? Record your thoughts in your journal.
  • Submit via email discussion questions or a topic you would like to discuss with the group from your reading of Crucial Conversations or Crucial Accountability (whichever you read).

Session Four: Difficult Conversations and Personal Scripts

Session Date: Wednesday, December 8 at 1:00pm-3:00pm CT

Please be prepared to share your one-minute elevator pitch and to report back on your Critical Friends sessions.
 
I have attached the conflict self-assessment we sent once before. We ask that you continue to keep this in mind as you consider your conflict style and how you tend to react to difficult conversations. Among other topics we will cover, we will revisit your conflict comfort and style and introduce the And Stance, a powerful tool that grows out of work on influence and persuasion at the Harvard Project on Negotiation. The idea behind the And Stance is that ‘but’ is a stopper word in American English; the exercise is to practice moving to the And Stance, where you use “and” instead of “but” (or “however” or “although”)– without changing your message. If you have time to look over the exercise in advance, we can spend more time discussing and working on it during the session. 

Session Materials:

Leadership Collection Reference Materials:

Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

Homework Assigned:

Practice applying the And Stance in your everyday life. First, try to go one week without using “but” in an email, instead restructuring the statement with “and” in order to align with others. Then, try to go 24 hours without saying “but” at all. This is a very difficult and worthwhile exercise that helps make you aware of just how often you use stopper words and where you can change your approach.

  • Start reading either Crucial Conversations or Crucial Accountability. (If you haven’t read either, start with Crucial Conversations.) Both are readily available for purchase online. We wish to provide time for all members of the cohort to read one or the other before we start a discussion, so are providing a head start for a future discussion.
  • Prepare personal scripts and share them with other members of the cohort, using the Personal Scripts Quick Tips as a guide. Also consider the Complaint-Handling Guidelines. You may find these helpful for handling difficult conversations and for constructing personal scripts when faced with these scenarios.
  • Before our next session, find and have ready the definition of leadership you recorded in your journals during the first session. Prepare to discuss.

Session Three: Vibrant Academic Units

Session Date: Wednesday, November 17 at 1:00pm-2:30pm CT

We ask you to be prepared to discuss the AUDiT that you filled out for your unit along with the real or hypothetical situation you developed for use with a Critical Friends group. We have also attached a self-assessment document that we will be using during today’s session. Please download it to have at hand during our meeting.
 
As always, please make sure that you have your journals at hand. We will be asking you to refer back to them throughout the program. 

Pre-Session Materials:

Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

EAL Session 3 Vibrant Academic Units- Participant Use

Homework Assigned: 

  • Create a ONE MINUTE or shorter elevator pitch for your unit, based in its purpose and mission.
  • Participate in a Critical Friends discussion: be prepared to report back.
  • Remember that there are books available to support your development—use your funds! 

Session Two: Critical Friends/Group Problem Solving

Session Date: Oct 27, 1:00pm-2:30pm CT

For this session, we would like you to watch, in advance, the video provided below. This one is a bit longer than last time, around 9-10 minutes. It depicts a staged meeting discussing the Thomas Santo case study we addressed in the first cohort meeting, using a protocol created by the Annenberg Institute known as Critical Friends. We have provided a description of the protocol along with the full background from the Annenberg Institute for reference. We also have included a quick reference summary sheet of the Decision Making Framework (DMF) discussed in our last meeting that many find useful during a Critical Friends session. We will discuss the protocol, its uses, and do an abbreviated Critical Friends session during our upcoming online meeting.
 
We will be opening with your reviews of items in the Leadership Collection and the Testing Yourself prompts provided as homework after our last meeting, and discussing the AUDiT assessments you started.

Pre-Session Materials:

Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

Homework Assigned:

  • Review the AUDiT you filled out for your unit; be prepared to discuss 
  • Develop a real or hypothetical situation to use in a Critical Friends group

Session One: The Special Challenges of the Academic Environment

Session Date: Oct 6, 1:00pm-2:30pm CT

Prior to our meeting, we ask that you watch this short vignette that was filmed as part of our larger Leadership Collection. This particular clip features a faculty member named “Professor Major” having a conversation with a new Department Head on his first day.

As you watch the scene unfold and the behavior of the characters within it, we invite you to think about what is really happening in this interaction. Please consider the questions posed within the video and write some thoughts down in the Journal we have asked you to maintain as part of the program.

We will begin the session by discussing this scenario, after which we will take some time to explore the unique challenges our environment presents.

Pre-Session Materials:

Cultures of Excellence

Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

Homework Assigned

  • We invite you all to take a look through NCPRE’s Leadership Collection. This library of resources has been developed over several years, built on the experiences and wisdom of our experts. The collection includes Quick Tips, Executive Briefings and Annotated Bibliographies, as well as many video interviews with our experts themselves sharing their thoughts on a variety of subjects. Please take some time to browse the collection – during our second session we will ask each of you to share a couple of the assets you found most interesting or useful.
  • Find attached the Testing Yourself exercise and take a few minutes to respond to the prompts within. We will discuss these prompts and share responses in our next session when we dive deeper into handling contentious situations like these.
  • Also attached is a copy of the AUDiT Dashboard developed by NCPRE to help systematically assess the health of your department. Our observation has been that many leaders tend to focus on areas that they think are problematic. The AUDiT approach helps ensure that your assessment is comprehensive. Use the AUDiT table to score your unit. Start by putting a number in each cell – the more the cell describes your unit, the higher the number should be. In the green and red columns, scores run from 0 to 5; in the yellow column, it is 0 to 3. When you are finished, add up your green scores and subtract the totals from your yellow and red scores. We will be revisiting this tool throughout the course so please keep the original with your journal.

About the Leadership Collection

The Leadership Collection was inspired by, and initiated with support and in collaboration with Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. It is a multi-media library of management and leadership materials curated for academic leaders. The Collection is accessible via the Internet, and is updated regularly. The Collection can be used on a “just in time” basis or as a platform for personal study and reflection. Categories of materials in the collection include:

Just-in-Time Collection (I need to know now!)

  • Quick Tips
  • Checklists
  • Videos: how to “do it right”

Leadership Bookcase

  • Resources for the longer-term, travel, and reflection

Deep-Dive Collection (I am looking for deeper knowledge.)

  • Videos: interviews with, and presentations by, experts and authorities
  • Executive Briefings
  • Curated Articles
  • Annotated Bibliographies
  • Case Studies
  • Self-Assessments
Leadership Collection resources are research and evidence-based; tailored for the academic environment; and practical. They are built around four leadership competencies Ethical: An ethical leader models, requires, and rewards appropriate professional conduct in personal, interpersonal, and organizational settings. He or she makes principle- and fact-based decisions, seeking consistency among ethical beliefs, values, and conduct. Such a leader encourages exploration of and discussion about the ethical challenges inherent in work life. Strategic: A strategic leader develops and implements long-term goals tied to the organization’s mission. A strategic leader sets SMART (specific, measurable, agreed-upon, realistic, and time-based) goals and aims at achieving long-term goals. Competencies include anticipation of pitfalls, management of budget and resources, prioritizing, use of data to inform decisions, and risk assessment. Influential: An influential leader is a strong communicator, motivating, energizing, and facilitating effective interactions. This leader delegates thoughtfully, provides constructive coaching and mentoring, and conducts meaningful performance evaluations. Influential leaders build strong relationships and use skills of persuasion and negotiation effectively. Adaptive: An adaptive leader uses a range of approaches based on situational needs. Adaptive leaders anticipate, identify, and manage change with flexibility rooted in principled approaches. Adaptive leaders devise creative solutions, implement initiatives, maintain and update their skills and knowledge, and manage stress to be effective leaders of others. © 2016 NCPRE

Additional Material

Leadership Collection Overview (PDF) A Brief Introduction to Leadership Essentials (PDF) Leadership Essentials Part 1: Executive Briefing, part I (PDF) Leadership Essentials:  Executive Briefing, part II (PDF) Tools for Leadership – Annotated Bibliography (PDF)

Meet Your Leaders

Meet Our Leaders

  • Meet Andrew Alleyne

  • Meet Michael Loui
  • Meet Barb Wilson
  • Meet Rob Rutenbar

    https://youtu.be/RGVB1OPZV2w

  • Meet Edward Feser
  • Meet Ruth Watkins
  • Meet Joan Dubinsky
  • Meet BrandE Faupell
  • Kendall Zoller
  • Excellence in Academic Leadership: WMU 2021

    Greetings and welcome to the Excellence in Academic Leadership (EAL) program presented by the National Center for Principled Leadership & Research Ethics (NCPRE). Our goal is to support your growth as an academic leader. The program will be offered through online group Zoom sessions augmented by outside readings and your reflections and analyses. You are in a cohort with colleagues from Western Michigan University, tailored to your interests, and supported by resources in the NCPRE online Leadership Collection. NCPRE creates and shares resources to support better ethical and leadership practices in academic and other professional contexts. Leadership—and particularly ethical leadership—is central to creating a culture that establishes healthy and productive professional interactions. We equip you with evidence-based tools to support intentional leadership development and institutional integrity. Your cohort’s presenters are Ann Briggs Addo, BrandE Faupell, and C. K. Gunsalus. Jacob Ryder is your Cohort Coordinator and will be your main point of contact for scheduling and logistics. We are planning two hour online meetings, approximately once a month, throughout the academic year. Each meeting will focus around a particular topic and include related resources available for you to pursue as your interests direct. Other than these online meetings, you will be in control of how much external time you spend; there will be ‘homework’ assignments after each session and it will always be your choice as to the time you devote. Please feel free to contact Jacob Ryder, the Cohort Coordinator for this program, if you have any questions: jjryder2@illinois.edu 
    WMU 2021 Schedule
    • Session 1: September 27 at 2-4pm ET
    • Session 2: October 25 at 2-4pm ET
    • Session 3: November 22 at 2-4pm ET
    • Session 4: December 6 at 2-4pm ET
    • Session 5: January 31 at 2-4pm ET
    • Session 6: February 14 at 2-4pm ET
    • Session 7: February 28 at 2-4pm ET
    • Session 8: March 28 at 2-4pm ET
    • Session 9: April 11 at 2-4pm ET
    • Session 10: April 25 at 2-4pm ET

    General Reference Materials:

    Session Ten: Capstone Case and Closing

    Session Date Monday, April 25, 2022 at 2:00-4:00pm ET

    Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Session Nine: Leadership, Shared Governance, and You

    Session Date: Monday, April 11 at 2:00pm – 4:00pm ET

    This session, featuring shared wisdom from President Emeritus Robert Easter and Professor Nicholas Burbules, asked you to consider your role as a leader and the values you bring to it. Below are materials you need for completing the homework for session ten and the slides from session nine.
    As a reminder, our closing session will be on April 25th from 2:00-4:00pm

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned:

    • Use the attached capstone case study to develop a plan to address the scenario. Your task is to describe how to navigate the difficult process before you as effectively and constructively as possible. Each group of 2 people will present its approach to the full cohort in a 5-minute presentation. You are welcome to use slides, a document, or any other vehicle for making your presentation. You will be able to share your screen.
      • Be prepared to field questions from the NCPRE team and your peers following your presentation.
      • If you are unable to attend the final session, you are still encouraged to participate in preparing the capstone case with your colleagues.
      • Groups are listed here:
        • Group 1:  Cynthia and David
        • Group 2:  Megan and Heather
        • Group 3: Linda and Pablo
        • Group 4: Jon and Dave
        • Group 5: Charles and Mike
        • Group 6: Udaya and Kathleen
    • Use the attached guidelines to put together an Individual Development Plan (IDP)
      • You are not expected to have a complete IDP ready by our meeting. We ask that you start to construct one and be prepared to informally discuss your progress with the group.
    Please let Jacob Ryder know if you have any questions or concerns. We look forward to our next and final session with you. We have valued the opportunity to work so closely with you over the past year, and all of us at NCPRE are thankful for your engagement with the material.

    Session Eight: Bullyproofing Academic Units

    Session Date: Monday, March 14 at 2:00pm-4:00pm ET

    Below are copies of a case study  and  situation analysis  we will be using in the session. In order to make the best use of our time,  we ask that you read them ahead of the session. Please make sure to have them on hand for our group discussion tomorrow.
     
    As a reminder, we ask that you dig far back to our first session  together and revisit the short video featuring “Professor Major” having a conversation with a new Department Head on his first day
     
    We will be opening our session with a group discussion of the behavior you see in the video and the dynamics involved in the interaction. Please be prepared to share your thoughts.

    Pre-Session Materials: 

    • Meet Professor Major, Version 1:
    Meet Professor Major, Version 2:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned:

    Review the second version of the Professor Major video below. Make note of your thoughts on what the department chair learned in this program. What changes did he make to the interaction and its outcome?
    • Meet in a group to develop a list of skills you’ve acquired through this cohort program that you see being applied in the second version of Professor Major. Be prepared to report at our next session.
    • Meet in a Critical Friends group: use an issue a member of your group is facing.  If you would like a case study to discuss, please contact us and we will provide one for you.

    Session Seven: Giving/Receiving Feedback

    Session Date: Monday, February 28, 2022 at 2:00-4:00 PM ET

    Pre-Session Materials:

    Leadership Collection Resources: 

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned: 

    • Take care of you and yours until we next meet.
    • Use your Critical Friends to work on difficult feedback situations, whether giving or receiving. (Feedback is a gift.)

    Session Six: Negotiation

    Session Date: Monday, February 14, 2022 at 2:00-4:00 PM ET

    Before tomorrow’s meeting, we ask that you do the following:
    1. Please read “Are You the Doormat?”, the case study sent via email (marked with “READ ME” in the file name for clarity). We will be discussing this in breakout rooms later in the session and taking the time to read it ahead of time will give you more time to have meaningful group discussions.
    2. You have also been assigned one of two roles for a negotiation role play to be undertaken in pairs. Typically, these documents would be distributed the moment before beginning the exercise. To adapt to an online setting, we will be providing them now, so that you may print them out to have ready for the activity. We ask in the strongest terms that you please refrain from reading them beforehand. For clarity, I have marked these files with “PRINT ONLY” in the file name. The experience will be far more valuable and provide a better learning opportunity if you read their contents for the first time during the exercise.
      • We also request that you please refrain from distributing this particular document in any form. As such, I will not be uploading the roles to the webpage. Typically, we would collect these handouts after the exercise and ask that you please dispose of them with care given this online setting.

    Session Reference Materials:

    Leadership Collection Resources:

    Rob Rutenbar, Senior Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Pittsburgh, talks about the use of data in discussions with decision-makers.

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned:

    • Consider interactions you have that you now see as negotiations: what can do you do to improve your preparation for these conversations? Record them in your journal. 
    • Send Sarah topics of difficult conversations around feedback you find challenging (next session is about giving and receiving feedback).
    • Finish reading Crucial Conversations or Crucial Accountability to prepare for our session on giving and receiving feedback.

    Session Five: Exploring Leadership

    Session Date: Monday, January 31, 2022 at 2:00-4:00 PM ET

    This session will focus on leadership through the lens of preparing for (and responding to) paradigm shifts–Leadership Through Challenging Times, if you will.
    In preparation for this week’s session, we ask that you take the time to:
    1) consider and identify a fundamental change occurring in your field and be prepared to describe how your unit will adapt to it. Consider the impact that Einstein’s Theory of Relativity had on Newtonian Physics, or the impact of genetic engineering on agriculture, or the introduction of satellites on meteorology. These are all examples of major paradigm shifts. Other changes are smaller in scale and still impactful. How you recognize and respond to these events is key to being a successful academic leader. Please prepare to discuss the fundamental changes occurring in your fields in breakout sessions.
    2) In addition, we ask that you remember to have your definition of leadership from our first session on hand and ready to discuss

    Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned:

    Re-visit your definition of leadership and reflect on your strengths; how will you play to them? What would you like to focus on going forward? Record your thoughts in your journal.

    • Do you see a paradigm shift in your field or institution? How will your leadership help your colleagues prepare for or react to it? Record your thoughts in your journal.
    • Submit via email discussion questions or a topic you would like to discuss with the group from your reading of Crucial Conversations or Crucial Accountability (whichever you read).

    Session Four: Difficult Conversations and Personal Scripts

    Session Date: Monday, December 6 at 2:00pm-4:00pm ET

    Please be prepared to share your one-minute elevator pitch and to report back on your Critical Friends sessions.
     
    I have attached the conflict self-assessment we sent once before. We ask that you continue to keep this in mind as you consider your conflict style and how you tend to react to difficult conversations. Among other topics we will cover, we will revisit your conflict comfort and style and introduce the And Stance, a powerful tool that grows out of work on influence and persuasion at the Harvard Project on Negotiation. The idea behind the And Stance is that ‘but’ is a stopper word in American English; the exercise is to practice moving to the And Stance, where you use “and” instead of “but” (or “however” or “although”)– without changing your message. If you have time to look over the exercise in advance, we can spend more time discussing and working on it during the session. 

    Session Materials:

    Leadership Collection Reference Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned:

    Practice applying the And Stance in your everyday life. First, try to go one week without using “but” in an email, instead restructuring the statement with “and” in order to align with others. Then, try to go 24 hours without saying “but” at all. This is a very difficult and worthwhile exercise that helps make you aware of just how often you use stopper words and where you can change your approach.

    • Start reading either Crucial Conversations or Crucial Accountability. (If you haven’t read either, start with Crucial Conversations.) Both are readily available for purchase online. We wish to provide time for all members of the cohort to read one or the other before we start a discussion, so are providing a head start for a future discussion.
    • Prepare personal scripts and share them with other members of the cohort, using the Personal Scripts Quick Tips as a guide. Also consider the Complaint-Handling Guidelines. You may find these helpful for handling difficult conversations and for constructing personal scripts when faced with these scenarios.
    • Before our next session, find and have ready the definition of leadership you recorded in your journals during the first session. Prepare to discuss.

    Session Three: Vibrant Academic Units

    Session Date: Monday, November 22 at 2:00pm-4:00pm ET

    We ask you to be prepared to discuss the AUDiT that you filled out for your unit along with the real or hypothetical situation you developed for use with a Critical Friends group. We have also attached a self-assessment document that we will be using during today’s session. Please download it to have at hand during our meeting.
     
    As always, please make sure that you have your journals at hand. We will be asking you to refer back to them throughout the program. 

    Pre-Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    EAL Session 3 Vibrant Academic Units- Participant Use

    Homework Assigned: 

    • Create a ONE MINUTE or shorter elevator pitch for your unit, based in its purpose and mission.
    • Participate in a Critical Friends discussion: be prepared to report back.
    • Remember that there are books available to support your development—use your funds! 

    Session Two: Critical Friends/Group Problem Solving

    Session Date: Monday, October 25th at 2:00pm-4:00 PM ET

    For this session, we would like you to watch, in advance, the video provided below. This one is a bit longer than last time, around 9-10 minutes. It depicts a staged meeting discussing the Thomas Santo case study we addressed in the first cohort meeting, using a protocol created by the Annenberg Institute known as Critical Friends. We have provided a description of the protocol along with the full background from the Annenberg Institute for reference. We also have included a quick reference summary sheet of the Decision Making Framework (DMF) discussed in our last meeting that many find useful during a Critical Friends session. We will discuss the protocol, its uses, and do an abbreviated Critical Friends session during our upcoming online meeting.
     
    We will be opening with your reviews of items in the Leadership Collection and the Testing Yourself prompts provided as homework after our last meeting, and discussing the AUDiT assessments you started.

    Pre-Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned:

    • Review the AUDiT you filled out for your unit; be prepared to discuss 
    • Develop a real or hypothetical situation to use in a Critical Friends group

    Session One: The Special Challenges of the Academic Environment

    Session Date:  Monday, September 27th at 2:00-4:00 PM ET

    Prior to our Zoom Call on Monday afternoon, we ask that you watch this short vignette that was filmed as part of our larger Leadership Collection. This particular clip features a faculty member named “Professor Major” having a conversation with a new Department Head on his first day. As you watch the scene unfold and the behavior of the characters within it, we invite you to think about what is really happening in this interaction. Please consider the questions posed within the video and write some thoughts down in the Journal we have asked you to maintain as part of the program. We will begin Monday’s session by discussing this scenario, after which we will take some time to explore the unique challenges our environment presents.

    Pre-Session Materials:

    Cultures of Excellence

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned

    • We invite you all to take a look through NCPRE’s Leadership Collection. This library of resources has been developed over several years, built on the experiences and wisdom of our experts. The collection includes Quick Tips, Executive Briefings and Annotated Bibliographies, as well as many video interviews with our experts themselves sharing their thoughts on a variety of subjects. Please take some time to browse the collection – during our second session we will ask each of you to share a couple of the assets you found most interesting or useful.
    • Find attached the Testing Yourself exercise and take a few minutes to respond to the prompts within. We will discuss these prompts and share responses in our next session when we dive deeper into handling contentious situations like these.
    • Also attached is a copy of the AUDiT Dashboard, developed by NCPRE to help systematically assess the health of your department. Our observation has been that many leaders tend to focus on areas that they think are problematic. The AUDiT approach helps ensure that your assessment is comprehensive. Use the AUDiT table to score your unit. Start by putting a number in each cell – the more the cell describes your unit, the higher the number should be. In the green and red columns, scores run from 0 to 5; in the yellow column, it is 0 to 3. When you are finished, add up your green scores and subtract the totals from your yellow and red scores. We will be revisiting this tool throughout the course so please keep the original with your journal.
     

    Meet Our Leaders

  • Meet Andrew Alleyne

  • Meet Michael Loui
  • Meet Barb Wilson
  • Meet Rob Rutenbar

    https://youtu.be/RGVB1OPZV2w

  • Meet Edward Feser
  • Meet Ruth Watkins
  • Meet Joan Dubinsky
  • Meet BrandE Faupell
  • Kendall Zoller
  • Meet Our Leaders

  • Meet Andrew Alleyne

  • Meet Michael Loui
  • Meet Barb Wilson
  • Meet Rob Rutenbar

    https://youtu.be/RGVB1OPZV2w

  • Meet Edward Feser
  • Meet Ruth Watkins
  • Meet Joan Dubinsky
  • Meet BrandE Faupell
  • Kendall Zoller
  •   Quick Tips
     
      Videos
     
      Mastery
     
    Leadership Collection
     
    Follow us on Twitter @ncprenews or check out #leadershipcollection to stay informed about our monthly updates.
     

    Excellence in Academic Leadership

    If you are interested in forming a cohort for your institution, seeking a seat in an individual-enrollment EAL program, or have any questions, please contact NCPRE at ethicsctr@illinois.edu
    Excellence in Academic Leadership (EAL) is a professional development program tailored to develop the skills needed to survive and thrive while navigating the special challenges of the academic environment. Through highly interactive programs, sitting and emerging academic leaders consider and practice proven, relentlessly practical tools that can be put into immediate use. Program participants gain concepts and skills needed for dealing with unpleasant and costly elements of interpersonal interactions, those that too often drive people out of leadership positions or that underlie dysfunction in academic units. This is our focus

    “The sessions I selected [as favorites] were not just practical for academic department head leadership, rather, have been very helpful to developing who I am as a leader in my research and project groups. I have found the philosophy of leading with intention: understanding the mission and keeping people focused on that.”

    Effective leadership creates and sustains inclusive working environments that advance the unit or organization’s mission at a high level of quality and integrity. NCPRE’s program is rooted in its philosophy of Cultures of Excellence: excellence encompasses more than just what work is done, but also how it is done–with rigor, reproducibility,  meaningful inclusion, and integrity. 

    “This really helped remind me that to be put in a leadership position is both an honor and a chore, but it’s best to look at it as a responsibility and an opportunity. This course really helped me feel good about the leadership positions I am in. It reminded me how important the good leaders I have and have had in my life have been to me personally and has re-energized me to try and be a strong, trustworthy, reliable leader. This class has made me stand up straighter.” 

    Participants build skills for making and implementing decisions required in leadership positions and the conversations that follow. By applying tools and skills to case studies, cohort members work together to develop solutions and approaches to many of the unique hurdles of the academic environment. The program presents strategies for building vibrant academic units and bully-proofing challenged units. Participants are encouraged to evaluate their own leadership needs and growth throughout the program and to reflect on their role and impact as an academic leader.
    Over the course of an academic year, participants engage through synchronous online sessions with their cohort, limited to no more than fifteen members. Time between sessions allows for reflection which facilitates deeper learning and exploration of NCPRE’s extensive online Leadership Collection, which includes both videos with experienced academic leaders and a range of written resources from just-in-time Quick Tips to deeper dive Executive Briefings. 

    “The component of this experience that will have lasting value is the relationships that I have built with a group of like minded leaders who are developing the same skills that I am. They have become my friends and my support system.”

    Leadership is not a solitary endeavor, and the networks formed within our cohorts are among the program’s strongest assets. Refined through many years of feedback from online and in-person program participants, the content and small cohort model assists participants in building personally-fitting skills and provides ongoing opportunities to practice them. 

    “The [EAL] program not only gave me tools and strategies to be a better person at academic work place but also at my home and other business endeavors that I am involved in.”

     
     
         
     
    Topics covered include 
      • Building Cultures of Excellence 
      • Giving and Receiving Feedback
      • Managing Difficult Conversations
      • Exploring Leadership in Academia
      • Building unit vibrancy, working effectively to improve challenged academic units
      • Negotiation 
      • Effective inclusion
      • Critical Friends: a proven approach to group problem-solving for academic leaders
      • Use of the Academic Unit Diagnostic Tool (AUDiT)
      • Bullyproofing Academic Units
      • Conflict resolution
      • Listening and asking questions
      • Effective mentoring and feedback, career development 
      • Other topics, as agreed with cohort, liaison

    Participant Testimonials

    You know to be perfectly honest, sometimes trainings like this are kind of a waste of time, or offer only a few nuggets of good advice … but this one was just phenomenal. I wish I would have had a warning that this was going to be so good.”
    You provided us with so many tools that I hadn’t really considered to be tools. It seemed like a common theme in many of the lessons was to always come back to finding common ground – why are we here? Because of the students. That was a huge realization for me.”
    “The program exposed areas for me to continue to develop and improve on as a leader.”
    “Thank you for providing a space for this group of people to get together to share ideas. I looked forward to these sessions and came away with new ideas to chew on after each meeting”
    “I have used the critical friends group.  I have recentered conversations around policy and procedure when colleagues have tried to overstep bounds.  I am working to become a better listener. I have a different outlook on how to use my time as a leader to accomplish something more than just maintaining the status quo.”
    “This program gave me a lot to think about re leadership, from defining who I am and aspire to be as a leader to giving me specific skills (e.g., scripts, decision-making framework, negotiation tactics, etc.) to use from a leadership perspective.”
    “Robert Easter is an outstanding resource. He is an exemplary leader who is experienced, poised, and savvy. I would love to have him as a mentor!”
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    Academic Leadership in Challenging Times – Alaska Cohort

    Greetings and welcome to the Academic Leadership in Challenging Times program of the National Center for Professional and Research Ethics (NCPRE). Our goal is to support your growth as an academic leader. The program will be offered through on-line group Zoom sessions augmented by outside readings and your reflections and analyses. Your cohort meetings will be on Thursdays from 10:00-11:30 am AKT, 1:00-2:30 pm CT.  You are in a cohort with colleagues from the University of Alaska, tailored to your interests, and supported by resources in the NCPRE online Leadership Collection. This is a pilot program, and will be shaped as we go in response to your feedback and interests. We will conduct a small set of individual online meetings to learn more about your environment and any special concerns. If you feel strongly that your circumstances are ones we should understand, please alert your Cohort Coordinator, Sarah Mustered.   NCPRE creates and shares resources to support better ethical and leadership practices in academic and other professional contexts. Leadership—and particularly ethical leadership—is central to creating a culture that establishes healthy and productive professional interactions. We equip you with evidence-based tools to support intentional leadership development and institutional integrity.  The members of our Excellence in Academic Leadership Program group are provided here. Please feel free to contact Sarah Mustered, the Cohort Coordinator for this program, if you have any questions: mustered@illinois.edu

    General Reference Materials:

    Session Ten: Capstone Case and Closing

    Session Date: 6/3/21 1:00-3:00pm CST

    Homework Assigned:

    • Use the attached capstone case study to develop a plan to address the scenario. Your task is to describe how to navigate the difficult process before you as effectively and constructively as possible. Each pair will present its approach to the full group in a 5-minute presentation. You are welcome to use slides, a document or any other vehicle for making your presentation. You will be able to share your screen.
      • Be prepared to field questions from the NCPRE team and your peers following your presentation.
      • Be considerate of your partner! We understand that conflicts and emergencies happen, and also wish to  encourage you to do your best to attend, so no one is left to present the material on their own.
    • Use the attached guidelines to put together an Individual Development Plan (IDP)
      • You are not expected to have a complete IDP ready by our meeting. We ask that you start to construct one and be prepared to informally discuss your progress with the group.
    Please  let me know if you have any questions or concerns. We have greatly enjoyed the opportunity to work so closely with you over the past year. We could not have asked for a better pilot cohort.

    Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only)

    Session Nine: Leadership, Shared Governance, and You

    Session Date: Thursday, May 13 from 10:00-11:30am AKDT/1:00-2:30pm CDT

    This session, featuring shared wisdom from President Emeritus Robert Easter, Professor Nicholas Burbules, and Ann Briggs Addo asked you to consider your role as a leader and the values you bring to it. Below are materials you need for completing the homework for session ten and the slides from session nine.
    As a reminder, our closing session will be on Thursday, June 3 from 10:00am-12:00pm AKDT/1:00-3:00pm CDT.

    Homework Assigned:

    • Use the attached Capstone Case Study to develop a plan to address the scenario. Your task is to describe how to navigate the difficult process before you as effectively and constructively as possible. Each group of 4-5 people will present its approach to the full group in a 5-minute presentation. You are welcome to use slides, a document or any other vehicle for making your presentation.
      • Select a group ASAP! Please email me once you have chosen a partner. To ensure that no one is left on their own, I will assign groups for anyone who has not responded by 5pm  Alaska Time next Thursday, May 20. The short window here is to make sure that you have time to make arrangements to prepare your work on the capstone case.
      • If you are unable to attend the final session, you are still encouraged to participate in preparing the capstone case with  your colleagues.
    • Use the attached guidelines to put together an Individual Development Plan (IDP)

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only)

    Session Eight: Bullyproofing Academic Units

    Session Date: 4/15/2021 1:00-3:00pm CST

    Below are copies of a case study  and  situation analysis  we will be using in the session. In order to make the best use of our time,  we ask that you read them ahead of the session. Please make sure to have them on hand for our group discussion tomorrow.
     
    As a reminder, we ask that you dig far back to our first session  together and revisit the short video featuring “Professor Major” having a conversation with a new Department Head on his first day.
     
    Our next session will take place Thursday, May 13 from 10:00-11:30am AKDT/1:00-2:30pm CDT
     
    We will be opening our session with a group discussion of the behavior you see in the video and the dynamics involved in the interaction. Please be prepared to share your thoughts.

    Homework Assigned:

    • Review the second version of the Professor Major video below. Make note of your thoughts on what the department chair learned in this program. What changes did he make to the interaction and its outcome?
    • Meet in a group to develop a list of skills you’ve acquired through this cohort program that you see being applied in the second version of Professor Major. Be prepared to report at our next session.
    • Meet in a Critical Friends group: use an issue a member of your group is facing.  If you would like a case study to discuss, please contact us and we will provide one for you.
    Meet Professor Major, Version 2:

    Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only)

    Pre-Session Materials:

    Meet Professor Major, Version 1:

    Session Seven: Giving/Receiving Feedback

    Session Date: 3/18/21 10:00-11:30am AKDT/1:00-2:30pm CDT

    Pre-Session Materials:

    Leadership Collection Resources:

    LC Section: Maintaining Processes for Managing Careers

    • Giving Performance Feedback: Quick Tips
    • Sonya Stephens on Giving Feedback (3:10)
    • Ed Feser on Giving Feedback (1:28)

    LC Section: Handling Difficult Situations

    Andrew Alleyne Difficult Conversations

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned:

    • Meet with your Critical Friends to work on difficult feedback situations, whether giving or receiving. (Feedback is a gift.)
    • Reflect on skills learned so far in this program: practice them in your daily life! Make notes about their usage in your journal.
    • Be prepared to revisit the Professor Major video from our first session; we will open our meeting with a discussion of the scenario through the lens of bullying and applying the concepts covered throughout the program 

    Session Six: Negotiation

    Session Date: 2/18/21 10:00am-12:00pm AKST/1-3:0pm CST

    Session Materials Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only): Leadership Collection Reference Materials:

    Session Five: Exploring Leadership

    Session Date: 1/21/21 10:00am-11:30pm AKST/1-2:30pm CST

    I  hope that you all had a restful holiday break and wish you a Happy New Year! We are looking forward to our upcoming session focused on Leadership next Thursday, January 21 from 10:00-11:30am AKST/1:00-2:30pm CST. I have copied the Zoom details below for your convenience.
    This session will feature President Emeritus Robert Easter sharing his thoughts on leadership in the academic environment, gleaned across his long career in all levels of university leadership: department head, dean, provost, chancellor, president.
    In preparation for this week’s session, we ask that you have your definition of leadership on hand and ready to discuss. We will also open with your experience practicing the And Stance.
    Please let me know if you have any questions. We look forward to seeing you next week!
    Session Materials
    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):
    Leadership Collection Reference Materials:
    Homework Assigned
    • Re-visit your definition of leadership and reflect on your strengths; how will you play to them? What would you like to focus on going forward? Record your thoughts in your journal.
    • We invite you to reflect on paradigm shifts occurring in your field or life. Consider the impact that Einstein’s Theory of Relativity had on Newtonian Physics, or the impact of genetic engineering on agriculture, or the introduction of satellites to meteorology. These are all examples of major paradigm shifts. Other changes are smaller in scale and still impactful. How you recognize and respond to these events is key to being a successful academic leader. Do you see a paradigm shift in your field or institution? How will your leadership help your colleagues prepare for or react to it? Record your thoughts in your journal.

    Session Four: Difficult Conversations and Personal Scripts

    Session Date: 12/3/20 10:00am-12:00pm AKST/1-3:00pm CST

    Thank you for your patience regarding the difficult in uploading reference copies of the slides to our cohort webpage. Unfortunately, I am still working on a long-term solution. For now, I am making pdf copies of the slides available via a WeTransfer link: here. Please be advised that this link will only be active for seven days, so please download copies promptly if you wish to have them.
    As a reminder, our next session on Difficult Conversations and Personal Scripts will be next Thursday, Dec 3 from 10:00am-12:00pm AKST/1:00-3:00pm CST. Please note that this meeting is two hours long, rather than our standard 90 minutes. I have copied the Zoom details below for your convenience. We ask that you be prepared to share your one-minute elevator pitch and to report back on your Critical Friends sessions.
    I have attached the conflict self-assessment we sent once before. We ask that you continue to keep this in mind as you consider your conflict style and how you tend to react to difficult conversations. Among other topics we will cover, we will revisit your conflict comfort and style and introduce the And Stance, a powerful tool that grows out of work on influence and persuasion at the Harvard Project on Negotiation. The idea behind the And Stance is that “but” is a stopper word in American English; the exercise is to practice moving to the And Stance, where you use “and” instead of “but” (or “however” or “although”)– without changing your message. (You may have noticed a distinct lack of “buts” in these emails–this is not a coincidence!) If you have time to look over the exercise in advance, we can spend more time discussing and working on it during the session
    We look forward to seeing you Thursday and hope you have a happy (and delicious) break.

    Pre-Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Leadership Collection Reference Materials:

    Session Three: Vibrant Academic Units

    Session Date: 11/12/20 10-11:30am AKST/1-2:30pm CST

    In preparation for next week’s meeting, we ask you to be prepared to discuss the AUDiT that you filled out for your unit along with the real or hypothetical situation you developed for use with a Critical Friends group. We will have you participate in Critical Friends sessions as future homework, so taking the time to consider possible scenarios now will better prepare you.
    I have also attached a self-assessment document that we will reference during the session. We find that reflecting upon the questions within to be a useful tie-in for this topic. We suggest that you take the time to fill out this assessment and keep it with your journal.
    As always, please make sure that you have your journals at hand. We will be asking you to refer back to them throughout the program. 

    Pre-Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned:

    Session Two: Critical Friends/Group Problem Solving

    Session Date: 10/22/20 10-11:30am AKDT/1-2:30pm CDT

    For this session, we would like you to watch, in advance, the video provided below. This one is a bit longer than last time, around 9-10 minutes. It depicts a staged meeting discussing the Thomas Santo case study we addressed in the first cohort meeting, using a protocol created by the Annenberg Institute known as Critical Friends. We have provided a description of the protocol along with the full background from the Annenberg Institute for reference. We also have included a quick reference summary sheet of the Decision Making Framework (DMF) discussed in our last meeting that many find useful during a Critical Friends session. We will discuss the protocol, its uses, and do an abbreviated Critical Friends session during our upcoming online meeting.
    We will be opening with your reviews of items in the Leadership Collection and the Testing Yourself prompts provided as homework after our last meeting, and discussing the AUDiT assessments you started.

    Pre-Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned:

    • Review the AUDiT you filled out for your unit; be prepared to discuss
    • Develop a real or hypothetical situation to use in a Critical Friends group

    Session One: The Special Challenges of the Academic Environment

    Session Date: 10/1/20 10-11:30am AKDT/1-2:30pm CDT

    Prior to our Zoom Call, we ask that you watch this short vignette that was filmed as part of our larger Leadership Collection. This particular clip features a faculty member named “Professor Major” having a conversation with a new Department Head on his first day. As you watch the scene unfold and the behavior of the characters within it, we invite you to think about what is really happening in this interaction. Please consider the questions posed within the video and write some thoughts down in the Journal we have asked you to maintain as part of the program. We will begin Thursday’s session by discussing this scenario, after which we will take some time to explore the unique challenges our environment presents.

    Pre-Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Resources:

    AUDiT Versions:

    Homework Assigned:

    • We invite you all to take a look through NCPRE’s Leadership Collection. This library of resources has been developed over several years, built on the experiences and wisdom of our experts. The collection includes Quick Tips, Executive Briefings and Annotated Bibliographies, as well as many video interviews with our experts themselves sharing their thoughts on a variety of subjects. Please take some time to browse the collection – during our second session we will ask each of you to share a couple of the assets you found most interesting or useful.
    • Find attached the Testing Yourself exercise and take a few minutes to respond to the prompts within. We will discuss these prompts and share responses in our next session when we dive deeper into handling contentious situations like these.
    • On this page, we provide several versions of the AUDiT Dashboard, developed by NCPRE to help systematically assess the health of your department. Please fill out the version that best applies to your unit.
      • When assessing the health of a department, our observation has been that many leaders tend to focus on areas that they think are problematic. The AUDiT approach helps ensure that your assessment is comprehensive. Use the AUDiT table to score your unit. Start by putting a number in each cell – the more the cell describes your unit, the higher the number should be. In the green and red columns, scores run from 0 to 5; in the yellow column, it is 0 to 3. When you are finished, add up your green scores and subtract the totals from your yellow and red scores. We will be revisiting this tool throughout the course so please keep the original with your journal.

    Pre-Session: Introduction

    First Steps:

    • Please introduce yourself to us by sending a bio to your Cohort Coordinator, Sarah Mustered. We seek to learn about you, your research and scholarship, your professional activities, role in your unit, education, etc. Your CV, a standard introduction, or an existing biosketch would suit the purpose of letting us learn a bit about you before we talk the first time.
    • Next, please review and return the participant agreement (attached) and respond to the informational link about your preferences and contact information here.

    Introductory Materials:

    Academic Leadership in Challenging Times – Duluth Cohort

    Greetings and welcome to the Academic Leadership in Challenging Times program of the National Center for Professional and Research Ethics (NCPRE). Our goal is to support your growth as an academic leader. You are in a cohort with colleagues from UM-Duluth Swenson College of Science and Engineering, tailored to your interests, and supported by resources in the NCPRE online Leadership Collection. This is a pilot program, and will be shaped as we go in response to your feedback and interests. We will start with individual online meetings to get to know you. The program will be offered through on-line group Zoom sessions augmented by outside readings and your reflections and analyses.  NCPRE creates and shares resources to support better ethical and leadership practices in academic and other professional contexts. Leadership—and particularly ethical leadership—is central to creating a culture that establishes healthy and productive professional interactions. We equip you with evidence-based tools to support intentional leadership development and institutional integrity. Dr. Robert Easter, President Emeritus of the University of Illinois, is the cohort leader for your program, and you can meet all the Academic Leadership Excellence Program team here. Please feel free to contact Sarah Mustered, the Cohort Coordinator for this program, if you have any questions: mustered@illinois.edu

    General Reference Materials:

    Session Ten: Capstone Case and Closing

    Session Date: 4/1/21 2:00-3:30pm CST

     As a reminder, our closing session will be on Thursday, April 1 from 2:00-3:30pm CDT.   

    Homework Assigned:

    • Use the attached capstone case study to develop a plan to address the scenario. Your task is to describe how to navigate the difficult process before you as effectively and constructively as possible. Each pair will present its approach to the full group in a 5-minute presentation. You are welcome to use slides, a document or any other vehicle for making your presentation. You will be able to share your screen.
      • Be prepared to field questions from the NCPRE team and your peers following your presentation.
      • Be considerate of your partner! We understand that conflicts and emergencies happen, and also wish to  encourage you to do your best to attend, so no one is left to present the material on their own.
    • Use the attached guidelines to put together an Individual Development Plan (IDP)
      • You are not expected to have a complete IDP ready by our meeting. We ask that you start to construct one and be prepared to informally discuss your progress with the group.
    Please  let me know if you have any questions or concerns. We have greatly enjoyed the opportunity to work so closely with you over the past year. We could not have asked for a better pilot cohort.

    Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only)

    Session Nine: Leadership, Shared Governance, and You

    Session Date: 2/25/21 2:00-3:30pm CST

    This session, featuring shared wisdom from President Emeritus Robert Easter and Professor Nicholas Burbules, asked you to consider your role as a leader and the values you bring to it. Below are materials you need for completing the homework for session ten and the slides from session nine.
    As a reminder, our closing session will be on Thursday, April 1 from 2:00-3:30pm CDT

    Homework Assigned:

    • Use the attached Capstone Case Study to develop a plan to address the scenario. Your task is to describe how to navigate the difficult process before you as effectively and constructively as possible. Each pair will present its approach to the full group in a 5-minute presentation. You are welcome to use slides, a document or any other vehicle for making your presentation.
      • Select a partner ASAP! Please email me once you have chosen a partner. To ensure that no one is left on their own, I will assign groups for anyone who has not responded by 5pm next Monday, March 8. The short window here is to make sure that you have time to make arrangements to prepare your work on the capstone case.
    • Use the attached guidelines to put together an Individual Development Plan (IDP)

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only)

    Session Eight: Bullyproofing Academic Units

    Session Date: 2/4/21 2:00-3:30pm CST

    Below are copies of a case study  and  situation analysis  we will be using in the session. In order to make the best use of our time,  we ask that you read them ahead of the session. Please make sure to have them on hand for our group discussion tomorrow.
    As a reminder, we ask that you dig far back to our first session  together and revisit the short video featuring “Professor Major” having a conversation with a new Department Head on his first day
    We will be opening our session with a group discussion of the behavior you see in the video and the dynamics involved in the interaction. Please be prepared to share your thoughts.
    Additionally, based on your responses, we will be rescheduling  Session 9 for Thursday, Feb 25 from 2:00-3:30pm CST. Unfortunately, we were not able to accommodate  everyone’s scheduling preferences. This was the option that worked for the most people. Once again, thank you for your flexibility and willingness to adjust the schedule. I will be updating the calendar invites shortly.
    As always, feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns. I look forward to seeing you tomorrow!

    Homework Assigned:

    • Review the second version of the Professor Major video below. Make note of your thoughts on what the department chair learned in this program. What changes did he make to the interaction and its outcome?
    • Meet in a group to develop a list of skills you’ve acquired through this cohort program that you see being applied in the second version of Professor Major. Be prepared to report at our next session.
    • Meet in a Critical Friends group: use an issue a member of your group is facing.  If you would like a case study to discuss, please contact us and we will provide one for you.
    Meet Professor Major, Version 2:

    Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only)

    Pre-Session Materials:

    Meet Professor Major, Version 1:

    Session Seven: Giving/Receiving Feedback

    Session Date: 11/19/20 2:00-3:30pm CST

    Pre-Session Materials:

    Leadership Collection Resources:

    LC Section: Maintaining Processes for Managing Careers

    • Giving Performance Feedback: Quick Tips
    • Sonya Stephens on Giving Feedback (3:10)
    • Ed Feser on Giving Feedback (1:28)

    LC Section: Handling Difficult Situations

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned:

    • Take care of you and yours until we next meet.
    • Use your Critical Friends to work on difficult feedback situations, whether giving or receiving. (Feedback is a gift.)
    • We’ll have an informal, optional group check-in on December 10 (during our previously scheduled session), and we will schedule one in January.

    Session Six: Negotiation

    Session Date: 10/29/20 2:00-4:00pm CDT

    Thanks once again for agreeing to a longer session! We hope that you will find the additional time for the exercises useful.
    Before tomorrow’s meeting, we ask that you do the following:
    1. Please read “Are You the Doormat?”, the case study sent via email (marked with “READ ME” in the file name for clarity). We will be discussing this in breakout rooms later in the session and taking the time to read it ahead of time will give you more time to have meaningful group discussions.
    2. You have also been assigned one of two roles for a negotiation role play to be undertaken in pairs. Typically, these documents would be distributed the moment before beginning the exercise. To adapt to an online setting, we will be providing them now, so that you may print them out to have ready for the activity. We ask in the strongest terms that you please refrain from reading them beforehand. For clarity, I have marked these files with “PRINT ONLY” in the file name. The experience will be far more valuable and provide a better learning opportunity if you read their contents for the first time during the exercise.
      • We also request that you please refrain from distributing this particular document in any form. As such, I will not be uploading the roles to the webpage. Typically, we would collect these handouts after the exercise and ask that you please dispose of them with care given this online setting.

    Session Reference Materials:

    Leadership Collection Resources:

    Rob Rutenbar, Senior Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Pittsburgh, talks about the use of data in discussions with decision-makers.

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned:

    • Consider interactions you have that you now see as negotiations: what can do you do to improve your preparation for these conversations? Record them in your journal. 
    • Send Sarah topics of difficult conversations around feedback you find challenging (next session is about giving and receiving feedback).
    • Finish reading Crucial Conversations or Crucial Accountability to prepare for our session on giving and receiving feedback.

    Session Five: Exploring Leadership

    Session Date: 9/24/20 1-2:30pm CDT

    This session will focus on leadership through the lens of preparing for (and responding to) paradigm shifts–Leadership Through Challenging Times, if you will. In preparation for this week’s sessionwe ask that you take the time to:
    1) consider and identify a fundamental change occurring in your field and be prepared to describe how your unit will adapt to it. Consider the impact that Einstein’s Theory of Relativity had on Newtonian Physics, or the impact of genetic engineering on agriculture, or the introduction of satellites on meteorology. These are all examples of major paradigm shifts. Other changes are smaller in scale and still impactful. How you recognize and respond to these events is key to being a successful academic leader. Please prepare to discuss the fundamental changes occurring in your fields in breakout sessions.
    2) In addition, we ask that you remember to have your definition of leadership from our first session on hand and ready to discuss

    Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned:

    • Re-visit your definition of leadership and reflect on your strengths; how will you play to them? What would you like to focus on going forward? Record your thoughts in your journal.
    • Do you see a paradigm shift in your field or institution? How will your leadership help your colleagues prepare for or react to it? Record your thoughts in your journal.
    • Submit via email discussion questions or a topic you would like to discuss with the group from your reading of Crucial Conversations or Crucial Accountability (whichever you read).

    Session Four: Difficult Conversations and Personal Scripts

    Session Date: 8/27/20 1-3:00pm CDT

    Thank you for your responsiveness in scheduling for this week. This is to confirm that our next session, Difficult Conversationswill be this Thursday, August 27 from 1:00-3:00pm CDT. Please be prepared to share your one-minute elevator pitch and to report back on your Critical Friends sessions.
    I have attached the conflict self-assessment we sent once before. We ask that you continue to keep this in mind as you consider your conflict style and how you tend to react to difficult conversations. Among other topics we will cover, we will revisit your conflict comfort and style and introduce the And Stance, a powerful tool that grows out of work on influence and persuasion at the Harvard Project on Negotiation. The idea behind the And Stance is that ‘but’ is a stopper word in American English; the exercise is to practice moving to the And Stance, where you use “and” instead of “but” (or “however” or “although”)– without changing your message. If you have time to look over the exercise in advance, we can spend more time discussing and working on it during the session. 
    We look forward to seeing you Thursday. 

    Session Materials:

    Leadership Collection Reference Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned:

    • Practice applying the And Stance in your everyday life. First, try to go one week without using “but” in an email, instead restructuring the statement with “and” in order to align with others. Then, try to go 24 hours without saying “but” at all. This is a very difficult and worthwhile exercise that helps make you aware of just how often you use stopper words and where you can change your approach.
    • Start reading either Crucial Conversations or Crucial Accountability. (If you haven’t read either, start with Crucial Conversations.) Both are readily available for purchase online. We wish to provide time for all members of the cohort to read one or the other before we start a discussion, so are providing a head start for a future discussion.
    • Prepare personal scripts and share them with other members of the cohort, using the Personal Scripts Quick Tips as a guide. Also consider the Complaint-Handling Guidelines. You may find these helpful for handling difficult conversations and for constructing personal scripts when faced with these scenarios.
    • Before our next session, find and have ready the definition of leadership you recorded in your journals during the first session. Prepare to discuss.

    Session Three: Vibrant Academic Units

    Session Date: 8/13/20 10-11:30am CDT

    We ask you to be prepared to discuss the AUDiT that you filled out for your unit along with the real or hypothetical situation you developed for use with a Critical Friends group. I have also attached a self-assessment document that we will be using during today’s session. Please download it to have at hand during our meeting.
    As always, please make sure that you have your journals at hand. We will be asking you to refer back to them throughout the program. 

    Pre-Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned:

    • Create a ONE MINUTE or shorter elevator pitch for your unit, based in its purpose and mission.
    • Participate in a Critical Friends discussion: be prepared to report back.
    • Remember that there are books available to support your development—use your funds! 

    Session Two: Critical Friends/Group Problem Solving

    Session Date: 7/30/20 10-11:30am CDT

    For this session, we would like you to watch, in advance, the video provided below. This one is a bit longer than last time, around 9-10 minutes. It depicts a staged meeting discussing the Thomas Santo case study we addressed in the first cohort meeting, using a protocol created by the Annenberg Institute known as Critical Friends. We have provided a description of the protocol along with the full background from the Annenberg Institute for reference. We also have included a quick reference summary sheet of the Decision Making Framework (DMF) discussed in our last meeting that many find useful during a Critical Friends session. We will discuss the protocol, its uses, and do an abbreviated Critical Friends session during our upcoming online meeting.
    We will be opening with your reviews of items in the Leadership Collection and the Testing Yourself prompts provided as homework after our last meeting, and discussing the AUDiT assessments you started.

    Pre-Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned:

    • Review the AUDiT you filled out for your unit; be prepared to discuss 
    • Develop a real or hypothetical situation to use in a Critical Friends group 

    Session One: The Special Challenges of the Academic Environment

    Session Date: 7/16/20 2-2:30pm CDT

    Prior to our Zoom Call on Thursday afternoon, we ask that you watch this short vignette that was filmed as part of our larger Leadership Collection. This particular clip features a faculty member named “Professor Major” having a conversation with a new Department Head on his first day. As you watch the scene unfold and the behavior of the characters within it, we invite you to think about what is really happening in this interaction. Please consider the questions posed within the video and write some thoughts down in the Journal we have asked you to maintain as part of the program. We will begin Thursday’s session by discussing this scenario, after which we will take some time to explore the unique challenges our environment presents.

    Pre-Session Materials:

    Slide Deck Reference (for Personal Use Only):

    Homework Assigned

    • We invite you all to take a look through NCPRE’s Leadership Collection. This library of resources has been developed over several years, built on the experiences and wisdom of our experts. The collection includes Quick Tips, Executive Briefings and Annotated Bibliographies, as well as many video interviews with our experts themselves sharing their thoughts on a variety of subjects. Please take some time to browse the collection – during our second session we will ask each of you to share a couple of the assets you found most interesting or useful.
    • Find attached the Testing Yourself exercise and take a few minutes to respond to the prompts within. We will discuss these prompts and share responses in our next session when we dive deeper into handling contentious situations like these.
    • Also attached is a copy of the AUDiT Dashboard, developed by NCPRE to help systematically assess the health of your department. Our observation has been that many leaders tend to focus on areas that they think are problematic. The AUDiT approach helps ensure that your assessment is comprehensive. Use the AUDiT table to score your unit. Start by putting a number in each cell – the more the cell describes your unit, the higher the number should be. In the green and red columns, scores run from 0 to 5; in the yellow column, it is 0 to 3. When you are finished, add up your green scores and subtract the totals from your yellow and red scores. We will be revisiting this tool throughout the course so please keep the original with your journal.
    Some photos on this page courtesy of the Jopwell collection Follow us on Twitter @ncprenews or check out #leadershipcollection to stay informed about our monthly updates.
    Some photos on this page courtesy of the Jopwell collection Follow us on Twitter @ncprenews or check out #leadershipcollection to stay informed about our monthly updates.

    NCPRE Research Role-playing Scenarios

    Articles on Responsible Conduct of Research Role-playing Scenarios

    The development, testing, and formative assessment of nine role-play scenarios for the teaching of central topics in the responsible conduct of research to graduate students in science and engineering. The summative assessment of role-play scenarios that we previously developed to teach central topics in the responsible conduct of research (RCR) to graduate students in science and engineering
    An Introduction: The Illinois Two-Minute Challenge (2MC) Approach

    2MCs for Research Ethics

    Authorship (Graduate version) You are a beginning graduate student, having started in the program six months ago. Your advisor hands you a manuscript by one of the postdocs in your group and asks you to check the correspondence between numbers in a data sheet and the paper and to proofread it carefully … Authorship (Undergraduate version) You are an undergraduate research intern, just starting in a lab. Your supervisor hands you a manuscript by a postdoc in the group and asks you to check the correspondence between numbers in a data sheet and the paper and to proofread it carefully … Smoking Gun You had just become a postdoc for a PI who gave me data on 50 subjects to work with. However, the research coordinator, who was resigning, told you that fMRI scans had only been done on 6 of the 50 subjects and that the results did not support the PI’s hypotheses … Intellectual Property – Copyright A scientist is invited to give a talk at a conference, sponsored in part by a US scientific organization and in part by a non-US scientific society. A condition of participating is to upload a manuscript containing the essence of the talk prior to the conference …

    2MCs for Business Education

    Stop Sign It’s 2 a.m. and you are out with some friends. You are driving. The roads seem deserted. You come to a stop sign. Do you stop? … Your Resume You have taken advantage of the many opportunities the University of Illinois has to offer. You are heavily involved in the Greek system, volunteer at the local food shelter, and have season tickets … I‐Clicker You are taking a large lecture class with over 600 students in Foellinger Auditorium. You have a group of friends that you normally sit with during the class. The professor takes attendance by asking I–Clicker questions each class … Employee Discount Your student loans do not cover the entire cost of college for you. While your parents would like to help, they just cannot do any more right now. In order to pay your bills, you get a job at one of … You Pick Two Your dream company has come on campus to interview. They have decided to award you an “alternate” interview slot, meaning you have the last pick at signing up. They have two openings: one at 2 pm, … Office Supplies You are working at your summer internship. While having lunch in the break room, you overhear another intern talking about how great it is to have access to all of these office supplies and how he’s … Library/Database Use You are working as an intern when your supervisor asks you to do a rush research project on reputation management strategies of executives who use social media. You know that you could do a fast, quality job using the University of Illinois Library resources … Submitting Receipts It is your first job after school. You are an accountant for a small firm in Chicago. One day, your supervisor hands you a set of receipts from a restaurant and lounge, and asks you to process them … Game Reviews You are an intern for an independent video game development company. Your supervisor asks you to write and post under your own name rave reviews for games that are made by your company, regardless of … Friend Asking You for a Recommendation You have a summer internship with a very competitive firm. It’s been a great summer, and you have made a lot of good connections. You are telling your good friend about your experiences and s/he … Conduct Abroad You are the CEO of a large, multinational corporation. You have been alerted to payments by one of your major foreign subsidiaries that may be construed as bribery of government officials … Brand Manager You are working as a Brand Manager, Right after the release of a highly publicized new product, after shipping over 4,000 units to your customers, you receive a report that your R&D team has … Pollution vs Profit You are the CEO of a US-based company that specializes in producing high-tech products that are growing rapidly in the market. Your company is experiencing tremendous economic growth, and you … A Tale of Five Fire Trucks You are beginning to budget for the holiday season, and you must purchase gifts for your three children. Your total budget for gifts is $75, and although this is a bit of a stretch for you, you want … Reverse or Not? You are the CEO of Alpha Computers, a large multinational electronics company. Your company pays royalties to Beta Electronics Suppliers for special-purpose and unique components used in a key … Not Expired or You’re Fired? You have just been hired at McDonald’s in China. You’ve heard that it is statistically more difficult to be hired by McDonald’s than it is to gain acceptance to Harvard University, so this is a great … Flitter and Freedom You are CEO of Flitter, a social media company that allows users to share short messages. As a popular blog recently stated, “Flitter famously publishes government data requests and positions itself …
    Responses to research ethics dilemmas require quick analysis of the situation, moving through a problem solving strategy to decide on a course of action. To effectively develop these problem solving skills, learners need to be actively engaged in practicing these skills – to make them habits which reduce the cognitive load needed for dealing with new situations. Two active learning strategies that can be used for developing problem-solving skills for research ethics dilemmas are role-playing scenarios and two-minute challenges.

    Managing Up – Quick Tips

    Five quick tips to establish an effective working relationship with the person you report to.

    Set an Efficient Communication Early On

    Efficient communication is critical for establishing a good working relationship. Maximize your knowledge on working styles of the person you report to, his/her goals, and the constraints s/he faces. Pay attention to the language, word choice, or communication style of the person; establishing effective communication early on is critical for good working relationship, so ask important questions: “how would you like to receive information from me?” Ask about how s/he prefers you to communicate: email? voicemail? paper documents? texts?

    Sample scripts for effective communication

    • How would you like to receive information from me?
    • How do you prefer to communicate? Email, voicemail, paper document, text, or in-person discussion?
    • How often do you want to receive updates?
    This information will prepare you with effective and appropriate strategies for working effectively with the person.

    Frame Your Need Around Common Interests and Goals

    Learn as much as you can about the person whom you report to, and his or her priorities, goals, and challenges. Invest time to build a good working relationship within the available time constraints: ask about his or her job and what he or she seeks most from you in your role. Clearly understand your own interests to find the common ground between yours and his or hers. If you also know yourself and focus on communicating through common interests, you will have more successful meetings than if you go in with a “me-first” approach. Avoid egocentric presentations; instead, reframe ideas and present them in a way that highlights how your interests align and why what you are seeking is relevant to his or her goals. Remember that human beings have strong hypocrisy detectors! This is not about manipulation or being false: the ultimate purpose is to respect time and resource and to achieve institutional goals through efficient communication.

    Expect Some Difficulties

    It is reasonable to expect difficulties working among high achievers. Anticipate some by-products of high confidence in your interactions and be prepared for them. Take a step back and focus on solving problems and addressing issues together rather than seeing your interactions as a power struggle. You have both personal and institutional/role relationships, and maintaining cordial personal interactions and seeking a problem-solving stance in alignment with those to whom you report will make it more likely that you can help your unit advance at the same time. Your responsibility to serve as an advocate for your unit may not always align with the constraints and larger picture faced by the person to whom you report, so it can be a delicate task to walk the line between being a good advocate for your unit and being a good institutional citizen. There may be a steep learning curve about when to keep asking and when it is your duty to take adverse news back to your unit.

    Prepare, Prepare, Prepare

    One-to-one time with the person you report to may be scarce. Your responsibility is to prepare. Efficient meetings are appreciated by everyone. When you meet, have a clear idea in mind of your goals and what you’re presenting with a tangible action plan; where necessary, and especially for difficult topics, prepare personal scripts beforehand. To maximize the likelihood of prompt and constructive responses, do not approach only with a problem. No one wants a tangled mess left on his or her desk, with the tag line: “Over to you, boss.” Your job is to get the most out of her or his input during the meeting, and work to solutions. If there are options in a situation, be ready to effectively present and articulate them. If you are to persuade the person, clearly present your argument with supporting data. Whining up may release your anxiety on an issue, but it is never an effective way to make your opinions heard.

    Policies, Procedures, and Principals Are Your Friends

    Approach your duties with principled positions; don’t make it about personalities. Familiarize yourself with institutional rules, boundaries, and control systems. Take the time to learn where the limits are drawn and make sure your requests or proposals are consistent with them–or build a strong case for an exception. © C.K. Gunsalus. Licensed through the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois, 2017

    Listening and Asking Questions – Quick Tips

    Five quick tips for understanding the nuances and benefits of listening in the workplace.

    Listening Matters

    • Listen to the people who work with and for you. This is an essential duty and an invaluable skill in leadership. Knowing their minds is crucial to building a sense of trust and community with those people, and you will gain important information and new perspectives in the process.
    • Listening is a powerful tool for increasing your stock at work, at any position. It helps you ensure you are looking out for all the members of your team, as well as your external and internal stakeholders.
    • If the people who work under you are comfortable bringing their ideas, concerns and issues to you, they will generally be happier and more productive, and you will know about problems and potential problems sooner. It is important for people to know who they can go to if they have a problem. When the boss is regarded as a good listener, everyone is more at ease.

    Active Listening vs Passive Listening

    • There are different kinds of listening and they are best suited to different kinds of conversations. Whether you need to employ active listening or passive listening depends largely on what you believe the other person’s goals are in the conversation…
      • Is this a discussion in which you need to learn something? Perhaps gather more information or more perspectives regarding an incident? This indicates that you should ask particular questions to draw out details and paraphrase their statements to confirm understanding.
      • Are you having a conversation where someone is upset about something? Maybe the person just needs to vent, or perhaps he or she is just seeking your moral support or sympathy? Such a conversation may still involve questions to confirm understanding, and may generally need more simple responses through body language and affirmation.
    • Sometimes it is enough for people to simply feel they have been heard; other times you will need to invest more actively in the conversation to glean more details, and confirm facts.

    Good Follow Up Questions are a Part of Good Listening

    • Particularly in difficult conversations, try to focus on asking follow up questions rather than just reacting to what you are hearing. This can be an effective means of keeping the conversation steady and avoiding escalation.
      • Simple questions like “And then what happened?” or “Can you tell me more about that?” serve not only to elicit more information, they also acknowledge your engagement and presence in the moment with the speaker.
    • Phrasing questions in an open-ended manner promotes purity in what you’re being told. When your queries are leading, you may find you wind up hearing what you want to hear, rather than what the person is really trying to say.
    • Take care not to “weaponize” your questions. Do not use them as a means of attack or to elicit “gotcha!” moments. Cultivate curiosity in the way you ask questions.
      • e.g.: if some aspect of a project has not been progressing at the pace you expected, asking “I’m trying to understand how we got here, can you walk me through these events?” is an effective way of delivering your assessment in a way that promotes cooperation and elicits information. Asking “what were you thinking when you did X??” delivers the same assessment but immediately puts the person on the defensive.

    Listening is influencing

    • The single most powerful way to influence people is to listen to them. It helps to build rapport, indicating that you care about them and what they have to say. It is an efficient way of accumulating information and reducing misunderstandings.
    • Very few of us are ever heard clearly or truly understood. If you are able to make those who come to you with their issues feel that way, you will increase your value immeasurably in the eyes of your colleagues.
    • When you are regarded as a good listener, people tend to listen more carefully to you as well. You are able to convey your ideas more effectively and present more convincing arguments to others. The best listeners in an organization are also frequently the biggest influencers.
    • Listening carefully also pays huge dividends in negotiations, allowing you to focus on the interests of all parties involved and find potential extra value to bring to the table.

    Nonverbal Aspects of Listening

    • Body language plays an important role in conversations, and is often overlooked or not thought about at all because many of its effects are not obvious … some are even subconscious. In a surprisingly short time span, body language can aid you in establishing rapport and trust with another person, or antagonize the person without you even realizing it.
      • The orientation of your shoulders and center of mass can indicate your level of engagement in a conversation. Are you facing the other person? Angling to the side can give the impression you are not fully focused, not truly listening, or perhaps don’t care about the situation as much as you could.
      • Likewise, your posture and sitting position give off signals about your level of interest. Slouching and leaning back can make one seem unconcerned or aloof, whereas leaning in too far forward can come off as aggressive or even irritated.
      • Head movement and eye contact convey a lot of information about your current state. Not responding at all and never making eye contact indicates no enthusiasm for the conversation, while staring too hard, fidgeting or nodding vigorously appears frenetic. As always, maintaining a balance is the goal, between showing you are engaged and exhibiting a sense of calm.
    • Not all conversations call for the same uses of body language. For example, if you are discussing data or examining materials, orienting yourself towards those assets rather than the person you are with can help to keep the conversation on point, or de-escalate when things are getting tense. As always, assessing whether your body language is effective is best done by watching for the impact you are having.
    • One of the simplest means of establishing rapport via your body language is to mirror your partner. This doesn’t mean mimicking his or her every move. It is about adopting similar sitting positions, angling your head the same way, or using shared styles of speech. Two people in rapport will often exhibit these similarities unconsciously
    ©C.K. Gunsalus. Licensed through the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois, 2017

    Issue Spotting – 5 Quick Tips

    1. Don’t take it personally

    People coming to you with problems and complaints may often be upset or agitated. Their distress may well have nothing to do with you as an administrator, but is simply a byproduct of their familiarity and proximity to the issue in question. To the maximum extent possible, try not to get defensive when they complain and do not jump to conclusions about their causes or solutions. Thank the person for reporting the problem – better you know about it than not, especially if it turns out to be a misunderstanding – and then set about collecting the facts.

    2. Never act on a complaint without hearing all sides of the story

    Many complaints and problems stem from people perceiving the same set of facts in different ways. Get as full a picture of any situation as possible by telling all involved that the issue has been brought to your attention and that you need to collect more information on it. Avoid accusations while gathering information, simply inform people in a low-key manner that an issue has been brought to your attention and you are attempting to collect basic information about it.

    3. Follow up!

    Just as problems can arise from a difference in perspective, a meeting with someone bringing a complaint to you can be remembered differently by different parties. If you have concerns that your advice was not clearly heard, send a short note or email about your meeting summarizing what was said and what subsequent actions were discussed. Good news can be put in writing, but bad news should be delivered in person.

    4. Never attribute to malice that which incompetence will explain

    The person bringing a complaint to you may have concerns or biases which are deeply rooted and possibly irrelevant to the actual issue. Their own opinions of another individual or group may color their interpretation of what happened. Sometimes what seems like intentionally bad behavior is actually the result of inattention, inaction, miscommunication or ineptitude. These may require dealing with in their own right, but do not assume malicious intent without clarifying the situation. Ask questions and repeat back answers to confirm your understanding.

    5. Say what you’ll do and do what you say

    Once you have decided on a course of action, no matter what it is, follow through on it when you say you will. Nothing will compromise your credibility more than to make commitments you do not fulfill or to declare boundaries you do not ultimately enforce. Stick to your plan or people may end up doubting you in future situations, making your job more difficult in the long run. Follow up on your actions as you do them, keeping each party apprised of developments. Leaving distraught or anxious people hanging can make matters worse – what they imagine might be happening during that time is often worse than the reality. © Jeremy D. Meuser and the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois, 2017

    Incivility and Bullying – Quick Tips

    Incivility and bullying are damaging to academic unit culture, collegiality, and productivity. If left unchecked, these behaviors can become the norm. Creating a culture of civility that minimizes these behaviors is the leaders’ job. Such a culture doesn’t occur by accident; positive professional interactions must be modeled, encouraged and rewarded. If cultivated and maintained, a positive culture supports creativity, better employee health, greater levels of cooperation, and higher retention of top performers.

    Incivility and Bullying in Academic Units

    • We begin with a brief description of incivility and bullying behaviors effectively summarized by Bob Sutton in his “dirty dozen”:
    1. Insults
    2. Violation of personal space
    3. Unsolicited touching
    4. Threats
    5. Sarcasm
    6. Flames
    7. Humiliation
    8. Shaming
    9. Interruption
    10. Backbiting
    11. Glaring
    12. Snubbing
    • Colleagues do not always get along. Complete consensus is not required; for the academic mission to be fulfilled, disagreements and antipathy must be professionally bounded. It is possible for an otherwise positive unit culture to be undermined or destroyed through negative, uncivil, or anti-social behaviors if these are not confined and limited.
    • In a 2016 US survey, 64 percent of academic respondents said they have been the target of faculty incivility; 77 percent said they have witnessed someone else being targeted (Gluckman, 2017). Yet it is rarely reported—only an estimated 1-6% of employees who experience incivility ever Uile a complaint (Cortina & Magley, 2009).
    • Examples of damaging incivility include:
      • Unrealistic expectations for responses and requests
      • Continued complaining
      • Making belittling or denigrating comments
      • Engaging in disrespectful meeting conduct: eye-rolling, negative side comments, etc.
      • Faculty dismissing or disrespecting staff, viewing them as lower class group members
      • Public shaming or blaming
      • Taking credit for work done by someone else
      • Ignoring the contributions of colleagues
      • Forming silent coalitions that do not surface disagreements and express them in a passive-aggressive manner
    • Examples of bullying include:
      • Expressing rude or aggressive judgment of others
      • Pushing relentlessly for one’s own views
      • Being intolerant of other perspectives or positions
    • Another type of of bullying, victim bullying, superficially appears passive and considerate: the perpetrator expresses excessive concern about his or her fear and victimization, and the effect is to put others on the defensive and advance the priorities of the “victim” in a way that shields him or her from questioning.

    When Incivility and Bullying go Unchecked, It Is Costly

    • Unchecked incivility escalates and spreads because it sets the norm for “how we do it here”—it provides evidence that incivility is what works if one wishes to succeed in the immediate environment.
    • Endemic uncivil conduct diminishes cohesion, commitment, and communication. It can aggravate disagreements into the development of factions. It makes it harder to recruit and retain top performers, and spreads hostility and division.
    • Rude, uncivil, and unprofessional behavior can be costly for organizations through reduced performance, productivity, and creativity, as well as increased distraction and negative emotions (Cortina & Magley, 2009).
    • The effects of incivility on individuals accumulate and can raise stress levels, cause health problems, increase absenteeism, and lower achievement (Sliter, Sliter, & Jex, 2012). It can lead even to acts of violence.
    • The effects of incivility generally, and bullying specifically, are to distort communication and make it harder for certain people to express some or any views without fear. Even more seriously, whole views or positions can simply get excluded even from consideration. Incivility thus works against one of the main goals of an academic community: idea generation. Creating and maintaining a respectful research, teaching, and learning environment enhances collegial relationships and creates psychological safety, thus supporting increased creativity and productivity.

    How it Spreads: The Contagion Effect

    • Incivility and bullying flourish where:
      • the risks of exposure are low; and
      • the likelihood of being held accountable is low.
    • If faculty and staff see these behaviors and see no intervention, the behaviors are likely to spread. This contagion is dangerous.
      • An individual’s emotions, perceptions, and behaviors can be “caught” by others in the group through social contagion.
      • Negative emotions and behaviors are more contagious, and can be more powerful, than positive behaviors.
      • Uncivil behavior can, over time, become the group norm even if initially only deployed by one or a few group members.
    • Be aware of your own behavior as a leader. Incivility from your unit members can spread to you, influencing how you behave. If you model incivility as a leader, it will increase the contagion effect within the unit, hastening the spread of these behaviors. Incivility from a leader is even more powerful and deleterious than incivility from peers (Cortina & Magley, 2009).

    Establishing Community Norms: Leadership Action Plan

    • A culture of civility doesn’t occur by accident; positive academic and professional interactions must be modeled, encouraged and rewarded.
    • Action—or lack of action—by authority figures and opinion leaders can unintentionally reward uncivil behavior, and thus encourage it.
    • Good administrative hygiene matters: communicate expectations about how members of a unit should interact with each other, especially in disagreements, and reinforce those expectations.
    • Leaders who model courteous, respectful professional conduct help set and enforce community norms. Members of the unit (and beyond) are watching.
    • Listen and interact respectfully:
      • Frequently and regularly check for understanding, for example by saying “Let me see if I understood correctly…”
      • Ask open-ended questions that begin with a request, such as “Tell me more about…”
      • Restate what was heard to ensure understanding, and demonstrate active listening.
    • Establish meeting protocols: Step in if conduct is over the line, and Uirmly and respectfully ask for inappropriate comments to be rephrased to be more constructive and actionable.
    • Do not permit insults or belittling of others in meetings. Develop personal scripts to address these.
    • Provide opportunities for quiet members to speak.
    • Be vigilant: Many of your colleagues will not report incidents. Instead, it is more common (and the path of least resistance) to ignore or avoid unpleasantness. Many will seek to re-frame incidents of incivility as “no big deal” (Cortina & Magley, 2009).

    Respond to All Reports Seriously

    • Prevention is better than reaction. Sometimes, though, it is too late for anything other than responding. If you are too late to prevent, make sure you respond.
    • Practice how to respond effectively, including preparing personal scripts for speaking up, for asking for comments to be reframed, or for when you hear concerns about uncivil or bullying behavior (NCPRE, 2017). For example:
      • Your remarks about [colleague] are making me uncomfortable. Let’s stick to facts in our staff meetings.
      • I understand you do not like [colleague]. Can you explain your complaint again without using sarcasm? It will help me understand it better.
      • I am sorry you had these negative experiences. We want a workplace where we all feel valued. I will think over my course of action and get back to you by [timeframe].
    • Cultivate open communication. All members of a unit should be aware of the appropriate channels for assistance in dealing with uncivil or bullying behavior.
    • Speak to your faculty and staff about having disputes civilly and respectfully. Encourage them to take their issues to the person closest to the problem first, and offer assistance (impartial third parties, for example) to assist in facilitating difficult conversations if necessary.
    • Apply consistent consequences for the same conduct. This is essential for establishing and maintaining healthy social norms in the unit.

    References

    Cortina, L. M., & Magley, V. J. (2009). Patterns and profiles of responses to incivility in the workplace. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 14(3), 272–288. Gluckman, Nell. (2017). You’re not the only one getting put down by your colleagues, survey finds. The Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrived from: http://www.chronicle.com/article/You-re-Not-the-Only-One/239756 National Center for Professional & Research Ethics (Producer). (2017, June 28). Personal scripts [Video file]. Retrived from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KK2YYtdvpak&feature=youtu.be Sliter, M., Sliter, K., & Jex, S. (2012). The employee as a punching bag: The effect of multiple sources of incivility on employee withdrawal behavior and sales performance. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 33(1), 121-139. Sutton, R. (2007). The no asshole rule: Building a civilized workplace and surviving one that isn’t. New York, NY: Business Plus. © C.K. Gunsalus. Licensed through the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois, 2017

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    Our Inside Higher Ed columns focus on academic leadership challenges and tools for strengthening shared governance. To learn about new columns as they are published, follow us on Twitter or on LinkedIn. Below is the list of our published entries:

    How to Raise Your Leadership EQ

    Jacob J. Ryder, Nicolas C. Burbules, BrandE Faupell and C. K. Gunsalus offer advice to academics for enhancing the vital quality of emotional intelligence in their work groups.

    Defining a Culture of Excellence in Research

    The principal investigator and other leaders play a key role in encouraging group dynamics that make people feel respected and included — or not, Elizabeth A. Luckman, C. K. Gunsalus, Nicholas C. Burbules and Robert A. Easter write.

    How Healthy Is Your Academic Department?

    Nicholas C. Burbules, C. K. Gunsalus, Robert A. Easter and BrandE Faupell have created a tool to help you diagnose problems in your academic unit and identify ways to improve it.

    Creating and Sustaining a Culture of Excellence

    How can academic leaders foster a culture of excellence in their departments and other units? Robert A. Easter, C. K. Gunsalus, Sebastian Wraight, Nicholas C. Burbules and Jeremy D. Meuser suggest some specific actions to take.

    Challenged Academic Units

    C. K. Gunsalus, Nicholas C. Burbules, Robert A. Easter and Jeremy D. Meuser recommend five steps for managing conflicts and disputes.

    Reforming Challenged Departments: The Faculty Role

    Dysfunctional departments have identifiable patterns, and faculty members share some responsibility for dealing with them, argue Nicholas C. Burbules, C. K. Gunsalus, and Robert A. Easter.

    Taking Over a Troubled Unit?

    Robert A. Easter, C. K. Gunsalus and Nicholas C. Burbules offer advice to increase the likelihood you’ll leave things better than you found them — as well as remain healthy and balanced yourself.

    Understanding and Navigating Cognitive Biases

    They are often at work in troubled academic units and in how people react — or fail to react — to the problems, write Sebastian Wraight, C. K. Gunsalus, and Nicholas Burbules.

    Understanding and Navigating Cognitive Biases: Part 2

    Sebastian Wraight, Nicholas C. Burbules, C. K. Gunsalus, and Robert A. Easter explore how to reduce the problems cognitive biases can produce in your academic department.

    Fostering Trust in Academic Departments

    It is crucial in a vibrant academic unit, and you can cultivate it in some specific ways, advise Elizabeth A. Luckman, C. K. Gunsalus, Nicholas C. Burbules, and Robert A. Easter.

    How to Change an Unhealthy Department Culture

    It can make the difference between a high-performing collegial unit and one riven by factions, rivalries or unproductive friction, argue Elizabeth A. Luckman, Robert A. Easter, C. K. Gunsalus and Nicholas C. Burbules.

    The Self-Aware Leader

    Effective leadership is rooted in understanding the leader you currently are as well as the leader you need to become for your unit to thrive, write Elizabeth A. Luckman, Nicholas C. Burbules, C. K. Gunsalus and Robert A. Easter.

    Why Listening Matters for Leaders

    It can help you build a healthy and productive unit in a least three significant ways, write Sebastian Wraight, Nicholas C. Burbules, Elizabeth A. Luckman and C. K. Gunsalus.

    Incivility, Bullying and Academic Dysfunction

    How can departments foster an environment that encourages productive discourse, even in the face of vigorous disagreement? Nicholas C. Burbules, Ashley Albrecht Weaver, Elizabeth A. Luckman and C. K. Gunsalus provide some recommendations.

    The Tension of We vs. I

    As a leader, when should you put the focus on yourself and when should you put it on others? Virginia K. B. Lehmann, Jarvis Smallfield and several other scholars share some advice.

    Dealing with the Now

    Much of what occurs in the next weeks and months will turn on how academic leaders make choices and adapt no longer effective behaviors, write Nicholas Burbules and C.K. Gunsalus.

    Leading Students During Departmental Conflicts

    As the mentor, guide and role model, you have the responsibility to maintain inclusive environments and steer the debate in a productive direction, advise Ronald J. Threadgill, Nicholas C. Burbules and C. K. Gunsalus.
    Readings: Settling In New Staff – Quick Tips (PDF) Welcoming New Faculty – Quick Tips (PDF) Social Media – Quick Tips (PDF) Conducting a Committee Meeting – Quick Tips (PDF) Crisis Management – Quick Tips (PDF) Interviews with Klara Nahrstedt Interviews with Susan Koch Interviews with Steve Sonka  

    Resources

    Decision Making Framework: Quick Guide (Reading time: 5 minutes) Cognitive Bias: Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) One possible framework for developing good decision-making habits Crisis Management As A Leader: Quick Tips (Reading time: 6 minutes) How to manage a public relations crisis effectively

    Michael Loui on Making Difficult Decisions (3:52)

    Andrew Alleyne Decision Making and OODA Loops (4:55)

    Billy Tibrizi on Making Decisions (1:37)

    Barb Wilson on Data-Informed Decision-Making (2:54; 2:37; 12:59)

      Barb Wilson, Executive Vice President and Vice President for Academic Affairs at the University of Illinois, describes some of her strategies for decision-making. Bob Easter, President Emeritus of the University of Illinois, discusses the fundamentals of decision-making as a leader. Jump to section: Dealing with Challenges to Your Decisions, Making Merit Based Decisions, Decisions About a GroupMaking Good Decisions, Understanding the Impact of Your Decisions, What Decisions Should You Make?When to Decide, A Tough Decision Well MadeHave a Process for Making DecisionsThe Role of AnalysisFinding Balance as a Leader  
    Strategic leadership relates to making organizationally relevant decisions that go beyond the individual unit.
    Difficult situations at work are easy to ignore, but this often leads to ethical failures. Becoming more comfortable managing difficult situations will lead to more ethical decision-making and a more ethical culture.
    Being an ethical leader requires building trust with the people around you; this comes from effective communication techniques and relationship development.
    Human resources perspective; ensuring there are effective systems for managing careers.
    Leading effectively requires the ability to manage the technical aspect of work; including the processes required to make the department/unit/organization function.
    This section starts by asking people to think about their own strengths/opportunities.
    Being in a leadership role includes navigating both the technical and social elements of the unit. Leaders need to understand how to navigate the daily processes of getting work done effectively, while also developing and motivating the other people in their unit. The purpose of this unit is to introduce the distinction between management and leadership, then to provide tools and guides for being an effective and ethical leader. Challenges for Women in Senior Positions – Quick Tips (Reading time: 10 minutes) Challenges for Women in Leadership – Annotated Bibliography (Reading time: 5 minutes) Settling In New Staff – Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) Welcoming New Faculty – Quick Tips (Reading time: 8 minutes)
    You don’t become a leader overnight, successful leadership development starts with a basic understanding of the self and the way people think. The purpose of this section is to focus on self-refection and assessment, to develop a better understanding of how people make decisions, and to consider what happens when you shift from being a peer to a leader.
    Can I review the actual items before deciding to contract with NCPRE to use the survey? The SOURCE is a copyrighted tool that requires permission for use by contracting with NCPRE or via license from the survey authors.  Individuals may not use the survey items without permission, but a sample of the types of survey items asked on the SOURCE can be viewed by reading the article, table 2:  https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3594655/ Can I license a paper and pencil version of the SOURCE that organizations can administer/analyze themselves? If you are interested in using the SOURCE at your organization, but would prefer to conduct the survey fielding, data cleaning, analysis, summarization and report generation internally, the SOURCE can be licensed independently of NCPRE. If you are interested in pursuing such licensing, please contact Dr. Carol R. Thrush at: thrushcarolr@uams.edu. Can I add or modify question items? The developers of the survey recognize that some contracting organizations may want to add descriptive or classifying questions that will allow them to subset survey responses along meaningful dimensions.  Such classification items may be placed in the survey prior to the research integrity climate measures themselves. The addition of up to 10 items is allowed within the standard license. Changes to the wording or phrasing of any SOURCE items are not permitted without written consent. In some cases, users may also wish to add one or more substantive question items about their organizational climates which will be placed after the SOURCE items. Should we survey a sample of organizational members or the entire universe of members? The SOURCE is most appropriate to use with organizational members who are engaged in research.  Because the survey is intended to provide results for discrete organizational units, sampling may reduce the data below the number necessary to protect confidentiality.  Therefore, in most organizations assessing the universe of research participants is recommended.  In fielding the survey, one should be cognizant of the size and distribution of organizational units to be included.  It is our experience that the climate of integrity inheres in small, face-to-face work groups that have common physical proximity, goals, or supervision.  The more closely one can measure the climate in these small units, the better one will be able to use the SOURCE to improve overall research integrity and consistency across the institution.  Averaging scores across an entire institution or large division may mix and muddle smaller units with varying climates.  It would be difficult in such circumstances to use the SOURCE results for quality improvement.  Beyond this, in some places where there may be meaningful subunits more granular than the department level, to further understand such nuances may require alternative qualitative or other methods. Is the SOURCE appropriate for use with undergraduate as well as graduate students and faculty? The SOURCE is not recommended for populations such as undergraduate students who are not engaged in research or some graduate students (e.g., those in course-based masters programs, where the direct experience of research climates is unlikely). Experience shows that they will exhibit a high tendency to choose “No Basis for Judging” responses. Do I need to get IRB approval before contracting with NCPRE to administer the SOURCE at my organization? If you are not conducting the SOURCE for research purposes but for internal quality improvement only, and you never plan to publish any of your results then IRB approval may not be required.  However, it is always a good idea to check with an IRB representative at your institution if you have any questions.  If you plan to use the SOURCE for research purposes, you will need to pursue IRB review or exemption at your organization. Are there other Institutional Review Board (IRB) considerations? The SOURCE was originally designed to be used in settings where institutions have a commitment to follow through on research integrity regulations and policies governing research activities.  Typically, such organizations will have requirements for review of proposed research such as by Institutional Review Boards, Institutional Animal Care and Use Committees, Institutional Biosafety Committees, Stem-Cell Research Oversight Committees and the like.  Additionally, these institutions will have made a commitment to training and outreach surrounding responsible conduct of research more generally. How do you protect our data and participants’ privacy? When contracting with NCPRE to administer the survey for your organization, NCPRE receives names and e-mail addresses of its Customers and of intended Survey Participants for the purposes of administering the Survey and for providing the Customer/Administrator with survey reports.  Beyond the NCPRE team, this information is not shared with anyone other than the Customer. NCPRE will report only aggregated results of the survey, with no individual information provided to the contracting institution; all responses are aggregated at the department or similar organization level. As each response is submitted, the NCPRE SOURCE system will separate individual answers from any of the identifying information and the identifying information will be permanently deleted. No individual responses or data will ever be reported and no group with fewer than five people responding will be reported. The very low risk of breach of confidentiality is protected against by removing identifiers and only reporting aggregated data. Participation in the survey is completely voluntary. Because the SOURCE administration and data analysis occurs at NCPRE, participating institutions are blinded to which of their members have or have not responded to the survey. Because no individually-identifiable data is ever associated with the results, retained by NCPRE or provided to the home institution, survey reports are not human subject research. All SOURCE administration procedures have been reviewed and approved by the University of Illinois Institutional Review Board. Aggregated, de-identified data are retained by NCPRE and are owned by the contracting organization. All reports with aggregated information, belong to contracting institution; identifying data is discarded as part of survey administration process. NCPRE retains rights to use the aggregated, de-identified data in the future for unanticipated purposes. What standard reporting is available? Mean values for SOURCE scales and items are, by default, reported at the following levels, for the institution as a whole, for departments/work units (defined by institution) but with comparisons by standardized taxonomy; for work roles reported by aggregated groupings. Standard aggregation output will include the equivalent of an Excel workbook in which each worksheet will mean values of survey items for a given departmental unit/work group. The columns of each such worksheet will represent work-role categories, the rows represent individual SOURCE items, and the cell values for each row by cell combination will contain the mean value of the question item based on all valid data from respondents in a given work-role category. Cells in which the mean value would be based on fewer than five valid responses will be redacted throughout this workbook. Can I get additional analyses beyond those in the standard report? Additional summary analyses beyond the standard reports may be desired, for instance to obtain scale or item means for standard SOURCE measures grouped by classification variables other than work-group and work-role, or for substantive items that the contracting organization may have requested to be added to the survey.  NCPRE is able to conduct such analyses, but some additional costs beyond those covered by the contract will likely be incurred to cover the staff time required. Can the instrument be translated from English into another language? The developers of the SOURCE welcome discussion about translating the tool.  The most obvious issue might appear to be whether the tool could be translated from English into some native language.  However, we encourage potential users to also consider the question of whether the content of the SOURCE covers all of the appropriate domains of concern for the particular system of science in a specific country and the applicability and translatability of language and concepts or language may not be applicable in other countries. Governmental oversight bodies of research differ by country (human subjects’ protection entities).  Other governmental regulations or restrictions may also need to be considered.  Import and export rules regarding exchange of data may also need to be considered by the user. How much does it cost? Please contact NCPRE at ncpre-source@illinois.edu for costs.  NCPRE sets pricing to cover costs only, and these levels vary somewhat as our assessment of costs continues.
    The Survey of Organizational Research Climate (SOURCE) is the first validated instrument specifically designed to measure the climate of research integrity in academic organizations. It collects confidential responses from the members of an organization so the perspectives of the members represent the overall measures, once aggregated. Results can help academic and research institutions identify strong and vulnerable departments; assess efficacy of educational approaches; detect where research policies and practices (e.g., concerning data management, etc.) might be improved through RCR instruction; and generally support efforts to bolster research integrity. Administering the SOURCE at intervals of three to five years will permit institutions to provide data to document changes over time and demonstrate commitment to improving the research integrity climate. The National Center for Principled Leadership and Research Ethics (NCPRE) at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign offers wraparound services for administering the SOURCE at an institution. The advantages of administering the SOURCE through NCPRE include:
    • Partnering with a trusted, known organization
    • Leveraging the expertise of the NCPRE SOURCE team
    • Using a standardized approach with validated methodology
    • Gaining access to comparative results and summary reports
    • Actively demonstrating commitment to research integrity in your organization
    • Contributing to the community of scholars through the de-identified norming database
    For more information on how you can arrange with NCPRE to administer the Survey of Organizational Research Climate at your institution, or if we can answer any questions or concerns for you, please contact NCPRE at: ncpre-source@illinois.edu or 217-333-1416.

    1. ADMINISTERING THE SOURCE USING NCPRE

    Background: The survey contains 28 items (rated on 5-point Likert scales) plus items to assess classification information about respondents (academic rank, departmental affiliation, type of highest degree). It takes 10-15 minutes to complete. It is possible for institutions to propose a small number of additional or customizing questions for the survey, subject to our review to assure that the validity of the results is not compromised and that responses could not be used to identify individual respondents. Steps: After arranging a license through NCPRE, your institution provides emails and names of participants and matches your institutional units to the SOURCE taxonomy in an administrative module. The SOURCE administers the gathering of responses on the survey and reminders to non-respondents. To encourage high response rates, it is helpful for respected institutional leaders to communicate in advance to alert potential participants to the coming survey, the reasons for the survey, and how its use will inform and benefit the research environment. Sample content will be provided upon request. The NCPRE SOURCE sends emails to the designated respondents via institutional email addresses seeking survey participation. The invitation contains a link to the survey and a passcode. Customized follow-up reminders are sent once every four days four times only to those who have not yet responded. The NCPRE SOURCE performs data cleaning, statistical analyses, data summarization and access to the SOURCE Results Analysis Engine. As part of building an NCPRE SOURCE database of aggregated data for comparative purposes, NCPRE retains de-identified information with limited demographics for comparison and benchmarking. The only data identifiers retained in the comparison database are institutional characterization (research-intensive, 4-year college, etc.), gender of respondents, stage of career (student, faculty member, etc.), discipline/department, and region of the US. To initiate: An organization that wishes to employ NCPRE services to administer the SOURCE can contact NCPRE to discuss the license and fee. The fee is based on the level of NCPRE support and service selected. BASIC: access to the Results Analysis Engine, which sets out results based on standard classification questions; administration of the survey; no customization. Reports provided include unit-level means, standard deviations(SDs) and percentile rankings for seven integrity climate scales; department-level summarization of each survey item (28 means, SDs); by statuses (e.g. graduate students, post-docs, faculty, staff, technicians). BASIC PLUS: addition of a limited number of customized items. BASIC (OR BASIC PLUS) WITH TAILORED REPORT: Once the norming database is adequately populated, it will be possible to provide comparative data tailored to specific types of organizations. This might include a narrative interpretation of the survey results, along with one’s own organizational scores compared to aggregate scores of user-specified types of organizations. INTERPRETATION/INTERVENTION CONSULTATION: Basic plus report plus a series of consultations providing experienced assistance interpreting the report; insights about what stands out about that institution based on its responses, assistance developing intervention possibilities; sub-setting data by more dimensions. Results are available through the Results Analysis Engine on EthicsCORE for 90 days after the survey closes. Screenshots of data can be made for later reference. SOURCE RESULTS ANALYSIS ENGINE ON EthicsCORE: Access to your institution’s data is offered online, with differentiated access for different users (unit heads, college deans, institutional leaders). The online tool uses a reporting engine that can tap into all the aggregated, de-identified data held by NCPRE. The real-time interaction with the data permits comparisons between your institution and other like institutions, right down to discipline level or looking across results for entire institutions. The SOURCE Results Analysis Engine on EthicsCORE provides a variety of reporting formats and interactive tools, and protects both aggregated data and institutional data through comprehensive security from the first point of access. Access to the SOURCE Results Analysis Engine on EthicsCORE is available for 90 days after the results have been prepared, with fees set as described above. REPEAT SURVEYS: Institutions that plan to administer a repeat survey within five years of the initial survey are charged at a discounted package price.

    2. VALIDATION

    SOURCE provides empirical measures of organizational research climate in the form of seven scales of organizational climate. The instrument was developed by Thrush, Martinson and Wells in part through a collaboration with the Council of Graduate Schools, and validated in a project with funding from the DHHS Office of Research Integrity. These measures of organizational climate correlate with self-reported research-related behavior of individuals at both the department level and individual level (Crain, Martinson & Thrush 2012). Relationships Between the Survey of Organizational Research Climate (SOURCE) and Self-Reported Research Practices Development and Validation of the Survey of Organizational Research Climate (SOURCE)

    3. HOW NCPRE HANDLES DATA

    NCPRE will report only aggregated results of the survey, with no individual information provided to the institution; all responses are aggregated at the department or similar organization level. As each response is submitted, the NCPRE SOURCE system will separate individual answers from any of the identifying information and the identifying information will be permanently deleted. No individual responses or data will ever be reported and no information will be reported for groups with fewer than five people responding. The very low risk of breach of confidentiality is protected against by removing identifiers and only reporting aggregated data. Participation in the survey is completely voluntary. Because SOURCE administration and data analysis occurs at NCPRE, participating institutions are never aware of who has or has not responded to the survey. Because no individually-identifiable data is ever associated with the results, retained by NCPRE or provided to the home institution, survey reports are not human subject research. All SOURCE administration procedures have been reviewed and approved by the University of Illinois Institutional Review Board. Aggregated, de-identified data is owned by NCPRE. All reports with aggregated information, and the individual-level data, if requested to be returned, belong to the institution; identifying data is always discarded as part of survey administration process. NCPRE retains rights to use the aggregated, de-identified data in the future for unanticipated purposes.

    4. OTHER WAYS TO USE THE SOURCE

    Making the SOURCE available through NCPRE has allowed us to automate as many aspects of the data collection, summarization and report generation as possible. As such, we believe that for most institutions, employing NCPRE services to administer the SOURCE will be more cost-effective than in-house survey administration. It also provides an opportunity for your organization to contribute to the development of a norming database that can be used for comparative purposes to inform and support advancement of institutional integrity across research institutions nationally and internationally. If you are interested in using the SOURCE at your institution, but would prefer to conduct the survey fielding, data cleaning, analysis, summarization and report generation internally, the SOURCE can be licensed independently of NCPRE. If you are interested in pursuing such licensing, please contact Dr. Carol R. Thrush at University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences at: thrushcarolr@uams.edu or by phone at: 501-603-1217.

    HOW TO CONTACT NCPRE

    For more information on how you can arrange with NCPRE to administer the Survey of Organizational Research Climate at your institution, or if we can answer any questions or concerns for you, please contact NCPRE at: ncpre-source@illinois.edu or 217-333-1416.
    The Survey of Organizational Research Climate (SOURCE), available online through the National Center of Professional and Research Ethics (NCPRE), provides empirical data for assessing institutional climate and knowledge about responsible research practices. The confidential survey contains 28 items (5 point Likert scales) plus basic classification information about respondents (rank, departmental affiliation, type of highest degree) and takes respondents about 10-15 minutes to complete. The survey is designed to assess organizational members’ perceptions of their organizational environments for responsible research practices both in general organizational settings and in specific working groups or divisions. The survey’€™s 28 items comprise seven sub-scales, providing an empirical measure of organizational research climate. The NCPRE analysis of the confidential survey submissions will support institutions engaged in organizational change efforts to measure their efficacy over time. The instrument was developed and validated by Thrush, Martinson and Wells in part through collaboration with the Council of Graduate Schools in a pilot with five institutions. It was further validated in a project with funding from the DHHS Office of Research Integrity involving 40 institutions. The SOURCE measures of organizational climate correlate with self-reported research-related behavior of individuals at both the department level and individual level (Crain, Martinson & Thrush 2012). FIND OUT MORE
    We have recreated the Center for Materials and Devices for Information Technology Research RCR modules on Compass at the University of Illinois.  If you are seeking to complete this RCR certification, please contact ethicsctr@illinois.edu and we will help you secure access to Compass. If you are seeking other resources from Ethics CORE, we are now housing these on this website.  Due to unforeseen circumstances, the Ethics CORE server was decommissioned at short notice.  Please check the options under the “Research Ethics” menu above for what we offer.
    Please see NCPRE’s sample unit infographics dashboard, here. The sample dashboard provides one style for collecting information about a unit that may inform academic leaders working with the AUDiT.  

    Differences Between Research Studies and Service Projects

    Discussion of Risks and Benefits

    The Informed Consent Process

    • Data Management
    • Data Discrepancy (part 1 and part 2)

    The Big Ten Academic Alliance Virtual Conference

    Access the talks Lectures given by C.K. Gunsalus or other NCPRE-related people.

    ICIP IEEE 2020 Gunsalus Talk – Presented by C. K. Gunsalus, 2020

    Fostering Integrity in Research: Why, What, and How? – Presented by C.K. Gunsalus, 2018

    View the lecture

    Illinois Ethics Leadership – Presented by C. K. Gunsalus, January 6, 2018

    See the Prezi

    Responsible Conduct in Research – Presented by C.K. Gunsalus, September 17, 2013

    View the PowerPoint

    Featured Resources

    Discussion on Research Misconduct

    This video is a part of a series of videos on Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) produced by the Office of Research, University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
    • Other Research Training Materials
      • R. Bulger. (2009). Social Responsibility. Discussions and case studies on the social responsibilities of Science and Scientists from the UCSD Resources for Research Ethics Education.

    Introductory Packet

    Discussions and case studies on publication from the Resources for Research Ethics Education, UC San Diego. Republished with permission.

    Active Learning Exercises

     

    Videos

    Other Training Materials

    This video is a part of a series of videos on Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) produced by the Office of Research, University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
    • Other Research Training Materials
    This video is a part of a series of videos on Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) produced by the Office of Research, University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
    • Other Research Training Materials
    1. The informed consent process
    2. Discussion of risks and benefits
    3. Differences between research studies and service projects
    • Other Research Training Materials
    This video is a part of a series of videos on Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) produced by the Office of Research, University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
    • Data Discrepancy (part 1 and part 2)
    • Other Research Training Materials
    This video is a part of a series of videos on Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) produced by the Office of Research, University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
    • Other Research Training Materials
    This video is a part of a series of videos on Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) produced by the Office of Research, University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
    • Other Research Training Materials

    Introductory Packet

    Discussions and case studies on authorship from the Resources for Research Ethics Education, UC San Diego. Republished with permission.

    Active Learning Exercises

    Videos

    This video is a part of a series of videos on the Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) produced by the Office of Research, University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

    Other Training Materials

    Introductory Packet

    Discussions and case studies on animal research subjects from the Resources for Research Ethics Education, UC San Diego. Republished with permission.

    Active Learning Exercises

     

    Videos

     

    Other Training Materials

    Ideally, RCR instruction changes not only attitudes, but also behavior. Examples of altered behaviors consistent with responsible conduct are:
    • Use of ethical principles/moral reasoning in decisions in the gray areas
    • Acting in a manner consistent with having identified with those who are suffering and/or vulnerable
    • Taking an active role to keep current with policy changes
    Many believe that ethics instruction can influence the thinking processes that relate to behavior. Others have stated “it is unlikely that we will detect any behavioral change from having students take our course” (Sachs and Siegler, 1993). A hope of many has been that training in the responsible conduct of research would decrease the incidence of serious research misconduct. This may be the case, but it is not supported by the evidence (Kalichman and Friedman, 1992; Eastwood et al, 1996; Brown and Kalichman, 1998; Kalichman, 2009). A study by Laczniak and Inderrieden (1987) showed that organizations that create an ethical environment and enforce their codes of ethics have higher levels of ethical decision making. This study supports organizational efforts to foster ethical behavior. Ultimately the goal is to cultivate thinking processes that develop moral behavior, which in turn leads to professionally ethical behavior. “A person must have sufficient perseverance, ego strength, and implementation to be able to follow through on his/her intention to behave morally, to withstand fatigue and flagging will, and to overcome obstacles” (Rest et al, 1986). If one believes that ethics can be taught, then one aims to influence thinking processes that relate to behavior — that is, to change student minds about what they ought to do and how they wish to conduct their personal and professional lives (Bebeau et al, 1995).

    Community

    An additional dimension for behavioral change is to develop community; that is, to make changes not only in individual behavior but in the relationships among individuals and to develop a sense of solidarity with others. Some examples of this sense of community include:
    • To increase conversations among researchers about the ethical dimensions of the practice of research
    • To identify with other researchers
    • To decrease the gulf between researchers and subjects
    • To know the institution believes this is an important goal
    • To define and refine community standards
    One perspective is that an important goal of RCR progrms is to help trainees understand the relationship of science to society (Reiser and Heitman, 1993). Swazey, Anderson and Lewis (1993) surveyed doctoral candidates and faculty from 99 of the largest graduate departments in chemistry, civil engineering, microbiology and sociology to measure the rates of exposure to perceived misconduct in academic research. Their study highlights the significant influence that a faculty member’s behavior may have on the formation of a student’s values and standards. Equally important, graduate students perceptions about the position of their universities relative to RCR are formulated by the university’s willingness, or lack of it, to undergo self-examination. Sachs and Siegler (1993) believe that teaching scientific integrity and the responsible conduct of research may benefit the research community in general not just course participants. Science itself is fundamentally grounded in ethical values, notably truthfulness and benefiting others. Involvement of an individual in producing knowledge creates an ethical responsibility for its outcome.  
    Originally published 1999-2013 at Resources for Research Ethics Education, a web project directed by Michael Kalichman, Ph.D., and Dena Plemmons, Ph.D., from the University of California-San Diego Research Ethics Program and the San Diego Research Ethics Consortium. Republished with permission.
    Attitudes that promote RCR can be defined by an acceptance and understanding of the value of acting in ways which foster responsible conduct. Attitudes are closely related to opinions and beliefs, and are based upon personal experiences, and can be influenced by interactions with others. Examples of such attitudes include:
    • Importance: understanding the importance of thinking through cases; understanding why good research ethics are important; appreciation for why both high crimes and misdemeanors matter
    • Morality: sense of solidarity and identification with others, e.g. research subjects; sense of moral obligation and personal responsibility regarding practices in general and specific
    • Practical Considerations: sensitivity regarding ethical issues and RCR in the practice of science; sense of appreciation for the range of acceptable practices; sense of empowerment
    • Interest: continued interest and positive attitude toward continued learning.
    An intrinsic assumption for discussing the goals and core competencies for teaching RCR is that ethics can be taught. One must first believe that RCR instruction can influence the thinking processes that underlie behavior, and that students can learn the conventions and rules for appropriate research conduct, to reflect on choices and decisions regarding RCR, to develop ethical sensitivity and critical thinking skills, and can learn to effectively resolve ethical conflicts in new situations. In a review of The University of Chicago’s program on scientific integrity, Sachs and Siegler (1993) discussed this question of benefits in teaching research ethics. They cited similar discussions relative to teaching medical ethics to medical students and residents (Miles et al, 1989; Clouser, 1975). Critics of teaching medical ethics said that a trainee’s character and moral constitution were determined by his or her upbringing many years before reaching medical school or residency training. However, in a study of the benefits of medical ethics courses, a large number of practicing physicians responded that ethics courses were beneficial for teaching physicians to identify values conflicts, for increasing sensitivities to patients’ needs, for increasing their understanding of their own values, and dealing more openly with moral dilemmas (Pellegrino et al, 1985). There has been increased focus on developing moral awareness about ethical issues in scientific research. Rest and colleagues (1986) demonstrated that a person’s moral development—the way the person approaches and resolves ethical issues—continues to change throughout formal education. They proposed a Four-Component Model of Morality, posing the question: When a person is behaving morally, what must we suppose has happened psychologically to produce the behavior?
    • Moral sensitivity: person made interpretation of situation in terms of what actions were possible, who (including oneself) would be affected by each course of action, and how the interested parties would regard such effects on their welfare.
    • Moral reasoning: person must have been able to make a judgment about which course of action was morally right…what he ought to do.
    • Moral commitment: person must give priority to moral values above other personal values – to do what is morally right.
    • Moral perseverance or implementation: person must have sufficient perseverance, ego strength, and implementation skills to be able to follow through on his/her intention to behave morally, to withstand fatigue and flagging will, and to overcome obstacles.
    From this work, Bebeau (1994) suggests that training in ethical reasoning can be effective in increasing the ability of emerging professionals to engage in ethical behavior in scientific research (Rest, 1986; Rest et al, 1986; Bebeau, 1991; Piper et al, 1993; Bebeau et al, 1995). RCR instruction, which includes training in ethical reasoning and decision-making, can help trainees become more sensitive to and more capable of recognizing areas of ethical conflict in research and scientific training. It can help encourage students to reflect on and understand their own values in a deeper way, and this may be beneficial when faced with real-life pressures of publishing, obtaining grants and advancing up the academic ladder (Sachs and Siegler, 1993).  
    Originally published 1999-2013 at Resources for Research Ethics Education, a web project directed by Michael Kalichman, Ph.D., and Dena Plemmons, Ph.D., from the University of California-San Diego Research Ethics Program and the San Diego Research Ethics Consortium. Republished with permission.
    By Michael Kalichman, 2002, with contributions from Mark Appelbaum, 2010.

    What Is The Goal of Evaluation?

    Teachers of research ethics have a professional obligation as academics and as researchers to aspire to the highest quality of educational programs. As a minimum, it is often necessary to rely on anecdotal resports of best practices; however, the best use of all of our resources will occur only with seeking evidence-based approaches that align pedagogical and curricular goals with measurable outcomes. In short, we should be evaluating the outcomes of our teaching programs. Evaluation of training programs is essential to:
    • Determine whether training goals are being met.
    • Identify areas for improvement in program format and content.
    • Provide quantitative evidence of success to administrators, faculty, and funding agencies.
    • Demonstrate to trainees that the training is important and taken seriously.

    What Are The Basic Principles of Evaluation?

    Proper conduct of evaluation studies is governed by many principles that are not necessarily familiar to experienced researchers. The following are examples of some excellent, and accessible starting points for designing and executing studies that can help us to understand the impact of research ethics training programs upon those for whom the training was intended:

    What Should Be Evaluated?

    An implicit assumption of evaluation is that it is possible to measure evidence for success in achieving goals of training in research ethics. This view is often assumed, but much more research is needed to assure that this is in fact the case. Mechanisms of feedback can consist of written evaluation forms, but verbal feedback can be at least as valuable. Verbal evaluation may consist of unsolicited comments, but can and should be explicitly requested in conversations with trainees or others, or as a topic of discussion at one or more points during (or after) the course of a training program. Evaluation instruments can be used to assess virtually all aspects of a training program including content, format, the trainees, the instructor, and the program itself. Examples of topics to be considered by the evaluation include:
    • Course content
      1. Relevance (Is the material covered relevant to the trainees?)
      2. Currency (Is the information up to date?)
      3. Completeness (Have important topics been left out?)
    • Course format
      1. Frequency and duration of meetings
      2. Cases (Is the use of cases effective?)
      3. Lectures (Are the lectures useful?)
      4. Discussions (Is the time spent in discussion useful?)
    • Trainees
      1. Increased knowledge
      2. Improved decision-making skills
      3. Increased awareness
      4. Ability to identify practical applications of what has been learned
    • Instructor
      1. Knowledgeable
      2. Effective
    • Program
      1. Number of participating trainees
      2. Institutional awareness of program
      3. Institutional support for program

    Who Should Do The Evaluation?

    Evaluation is not solely a matter of assaying student satisfaction using a form distributed at the end of a course. The process of evaluation should include feedback from:
    • Trainees (What are their perceptions of program effectiveness? What have they learned?)
    • Peers of the instructor
    • The instructor (self-evaluation)
     
    Originally published 1999-2013 at Resources for Research Ethics Education, a web project directed by Michael Kalichman, Ph.D., and Dena Plemmons, Ph.D., from the University of California-San Diego Research Ethics Program and the San Diego Research Ethics Consortium. Republished with permission.

    Perspectives on Teaching Ethics

    Pimple, K. D. (2011). Teaching Research Ethics: An Overview. Gunsalus, C. K. (2011). Perspectives on Teaching Research and Professional Ethics. Loui, M. C. (2011). Using Role-Play to Teach Ethics in Engineering and Science. Starrett, S. (2011). Perspectives on Students Creating Engineering Ethics Video Skits. Starrett, S. (2011). Examples from “Create Your Own Code of Ethics” Assignment. Kalichman, M. (2011). The Problem of Research Misconduct.

    Requirements

    21st Century Competitiveness Act of 2007: Responsible Conduct of Research. SEC. 7009. RESPONSIBLE CONDUCT OF RESEARCH. Aug 9, 2007 [Public Law 110-69] NIH. (1992). Reminder and Update: Requirement for Instruction in the Responsible Conduct of Research in National Research Service Award Institutional Training Grants. NIH GUIDE, Volume 21, Number 43, November 27, 1992. http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/not92-236.html NIH. (2000). Required Education in the Protection of Human Research Participants. Release Date: June 5, 2000 (Revised August 25, 2000). NOTICE: OD-00-039. http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-OD-00-039.html NIH. (2009). Update on the Requirement for Instruction in the Responsible Conduct of Research. Release Date: November 24, 2009. NOTICE: OD-10-019. http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-OD-10-019.html NSF. (1997-present). Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship (IGERT) Program. NSF 08-540. http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2008/nsf08540/nsf08540.pdf NSF. (2009). Proposal and Award Policies and Procedures Guide. October 1, 2009. http://www.nsf.gov/publications/pub_summ.jsp?ods_key=nsf101 PHS. (2000). Policy on Instruction in the Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR).

    Overview

    Clouser, K.D. (1975). Medical ethics: some uses, abuses, and limitations. New England Journal of Medicine, 293: 384-487. Dingell, J.D. (1993). Shattuck lecture – misconduct in medical research. New England Journal of Medicine, 328(22): 1610-1615. Kalichman, M.W. & Plemmons, D.K. (2007). Reported Goals for Responsible Conduct of Research Courses. Academic Medicine, 82(9): 846-852. Korenman, S.G. & Shipp, A.C. with the AAMC Ad Hoc Committee on Misconduct and Conflict of Interest in Research Subcommittee on Teaching Research Ethics. Teaching the Responsible Conflict of Research through a Case-Study Approach: A Handbook for Instructors. Washington, D.C.: Association of American medical Colleges, Division of Biomedical Research. LaFollette, M.C. (1994). The pathology of research fraud: The history and politics of the US experience. Journal of Internal Medicine, 235: 129-135. Miles, S.H., Lange, L.W., Bickel, J., Walker, R.M., & Cassel, C.K. (1989). Medical ethics education: Coming of age. Academic Medicine, 64: 705-714. National Academy of Sciences. (1992). Responsible Science: Ensuring the Integrity of the Research Process. Vol.1. Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press. Pellegrino, E.D., Hart, R.J. Jr., Henderson, S.R., Loeb, S. & Edwards, G. (1991). Relevance and utility in courses in medical ethics: A survey of physicians’ perceptions. JAMA, 253: 49-53. Sachs, G.A. & Siegler, M. (1993). Teaching scientific integrity and the responsible conduct of research. Academic Medicine, 68(12): 871-875. Swazey, J.P., and Bird, S.J. (1997). Teaching and Learning Research Ethics. In Elliott, D. and Stern, J.E. (eds.), Research Ethics: A Reader. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England: 1-19. US Congress, House. (1981). Fraud in Biomedical Research, Hearings before Committee on Science and Technology, Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight; 97th Congress, 1st Session. Washington DC: US Government Printing Office.

    Knowledge

    Bebeau, M.J., Pimple, K.D., Muskavitch, K.M.J., Borden, S.L., & Smith, D.H. (1995). Moral Reasoning in Scientific Research: Cases for Teaching and Assessment. Indiana University. Fischer, B.A. & Zigmond, M.J. (2001). Promoting responsible conduct in research through “survival skills” workshops: Some mentoring is best done in a crowd. Science and Engineering Ethics, 7(4):563-587. Plemmons, D.K. & Kalichman, M.W. (2007). Reported Goals For Knowledge to be Learned in Responsible Conduct of Research Courses. Journal of Empirical Research on Human Research Ethics. 2(2): 57-66. Sachs, G.A. & Siegler, M. (1993). Teaching scientific integrity and the responsible conduct of research. Academic Medicine, 68(12): 871-875. Swazey, J.P. & Bird, S.J. (1997). Teaching and Learning Research Ethics. In Elliott, D. & Stern, J.E. (eds.) Research Ethics: A Reader. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England: 1-19.

    Teaching specific skills

    Bebeau, M.J. (1991). Can ethics be taught? A look at the evidence. Journal of the American College of Dentists, 58(1). Bebeau, M.J. (1994). Can ethics be taught? A look at the evidence: revisited. NY State Dental Journal, 60(1), 51-57. Bebeau, M.J. (1994). Influencing the moral dimensions of dental practice. In Moral Development in the Professions: Psychology and Applied Ethics. New York: Erlbaum Associates, 121-146. Bebeau, M.J., Pimple, K.D., Muskavitch, K.M.J., Borden, S.L. & Smith, D.H. (1995). Moral Reasoning in Scientific Research: Cases for Teaching and Assessment. Indiana University. Piper, T.R., Gentle, M.C. & Parks, S.D. (1993). Can Ethics Be Taught? Boston: Harvard Business School. PHS. (July 17, 2000). Policy on Instruction in RCR. http://www.onlineethics.org/CMS/research/resref/phs_draft.aspx Rest, J.R. (1986). Moral development in young adults. In Mines, R.A. & Kitchener, K.S.(eds.) Adult Cognitive Development: Methods and Models. New York: Praeger: 92-111. Rest, J.R., Bebeau, M., & Volker, J.(1986). An overview of the psychology of morality. In Rest, J.R. et al. (eds.) Moral Development in Research and Theory New York: Praeger, 1-27. Sachs, G.A. & Siegler, M. (1993). Teaching scientific integrity and the responsible conduct of research. Academic Medicine, 68(12): 871-875.

    Attitudes and Behavior

    Bebeau, M.J., Pimple, K.D., Muskavitch, K.M.J., Borden, S.L. & Smith, D.H. (1995). Moral Reasoning in Scientific Research: Cases for Teaching and Assessment. Indiana University. Brown, S. & Kalichman, M.W. (1998). Effects of training in the responsible conduct of research: A survey of graduate students in experimental sciences. Science and Engineering Ethics, 4: 487-498. Eastwood, S., Derish, P., Leash, E. & Ordway, S. (1996). Ethical issues in biomedical research: Perceptions and practices of postdoctoral research fellows responding to a survey. Science and Engineering Ethics, 2: 89-114. Kalichman, M.W. & Friedman, P.J. (1992). A pilot study of biomedical trainees’ perceptions concerning research ethics. Academic Medicine, 67: 769-775. Kalichman, M. (2009). Evidence-Based Research Ethics. The American Journal of Bioethics 9(6&7): 85-87. Lazniak, G.R. & Inderrieden, E.J. (1987). The Influence of Stated Organization Concern Upon Ethical Decision Making. Journal of Business, 6: 297-307. Rest, J.R., Bebeau, M., & Volker, J.(1986). An overview of the psychology of morality. In: Rest, J.R. et al. (eds.) Moral Development in Research and Theory. New York: Praeger, 1-27. Sachs, G.A. & Siegler, M. (1993). Teaching scientific integrity and the responsible conduct of research. Academic Medicine, 68(12): 871-875. Reiser, S.J. & Heitman, E. (1993). Creating a course on ethics in the biological sciences. Academic Medicine, 68(12): 876-879. Sachs, G.A. & Siegler, M. (1993). Teaching scientific integrity and the responsible conduct of research. Academic Medicine, 68(12): 871-875. Swazey, J.P., Anderson, M.S. & Lewis, K.S. (1993). Ethical problems in academic research. American Scientist, 81: 542-553.  
    Originally published 1999-2013 at Resources for Research Ethics Education, a web project directed by Michael Kalichman, Ph.D., and Dena Plemmons, Ph.D., from the University of California-San Diego Research Ethics Program and the San Diego Research Ethics Consortium. Republished with permission.
    Skills to promote ethical practice in science include specific proficiencies, for example:
    • Ethical decision-making, including recognizing problems, identifying and examining assumptions underlying practices, using analytical skills and strategies in addressing issues and problems, and exploring implications of different courses of action.
    • Critical thinking and problem solving
    • Conflict resolution
    • Arbitration and mediation
    • People management
    • Stress management
    • Communication skills
    A goal described by many authors is to enhance students’ ability to recognize and identify ethical issues and conflicts, analyze and develop well-reasoned responses to the kinds of ethical problems they are likely to encounter in the future (Sachs and Siegler, 1993; Bebeau, Pimple, Muskavitch, Borden, and Smith,1995; Swazey and Bird, 1997).
    Originally published 1999-2013 at Resources for Research Ethics Education, a web project directed by Michael Kalichman, Ph.D., and Dena Plemmons, Ph.D., from the University of California-San Diego Research Ethics Program and the San Diego Research Ethics Consortium. Republished with permission.
    Knowledge about the responsible conduct of research would include the facts, guidelines, policies, data and other sources of information that answer “what” questions. Examples include:
    • Written rules and guidelines, including regulations for PHS-funded research and specific guidelines for specific practices.
    • Unwritten standards such as principles that guide opinions on unresolved ethical issues and standards of practices that make up RCR.
    • Processes for dealing with misconduct, such as procedures for investigating concerns, handling misconduct or perceptions of misconduct, or where to turn if misconduct has occurred.
    • Resources for making ethical decisions, e.g. where to access RCR regulations.
    Mastroianni and Kahn (1998) described a core competency in RCR as “the achievement of a satisfactory level of proficiency in mastering a specified knowledge base or skill.” Additionally, they recommended that students gain “a fuller understanding of ethical issues that may arise in research careers.” Among the core competencies that have been discussed are:
    • Knowledge of, and sensitivity to, issues surrounding the responsible conduct of research and research misconduct.
    • Appreciation for accepted, normative scientific practices for conducting research.
    • Awareness of the gray areas and ambiguities of ethical issues, including differences between compliant and ethical behavior in the conduct of research, or the range of acceptable and unacceptable practices.
    • Awareness that rules change over time and vary across disciplines or nations.
    • Information about the regulations, policies, statutes, and guidelines that govern the conduct of research in PHS funded institutions.
    • Resources for additional study on topics related to scientific integrity, responsible conduct of research, and research misconduct.
    Although it is important that students learn the conventions and rules for appropriate research conduct, knowing the rules and conventions of science is not sufficient to ensure responsible research conduct (Bebeau et al, 1995). It is important, therefore, that students develop skills and habits that prepare them to effectively resolve ethical conflicts they may encounter in professional life.
    Originally published 1999-2013 at Resources for Research Ethics Education, a web project directed by Michael Kalichman, Ph.D., and Dena Plemmons, Ph.D., from the University of California-San Diego Research Ethics Program and the San Diego Research Ethics Consortium. Republished with permission.
    The need for research ethics education is specified, in part, by federal requirements from the NIH and NSF, and so some extent by institutions. Some of the rationale behind these requirements is discussed below as well.

    Funding/Sponsoring Agencies

    NIH

    The first such requirement was for National Institutes of Health (NIH) Training Grants to provide an opportunity for trainees to receive instruction in RCR (NIH, 1989 and 1992). A recent update refining this policy is more explicit about the audience, frequency, and format of RCR instruction: Update on the Requirement for Instruction in the Responsible Conduct of Research.

    NSF

    While the National Science Foundation (NSF) has had a longstanding interest in education in the ethical practice of science, it has only recently introduced a broad requirement for all undergraduate, graduate, and postdoctoral researchers receiving funding from the NSF. The requirement can be found at: Chapter 4 of NSF Grantee Standards and additional information can be found at: Frequently Asked Questions.

    Institutional

    With increasing federal requirements, and increasing attention to the need for research ethics education, more and more institutions or individual programs and departments are making such education a requirement for all students or even all researchers.

    Rationale for Requirements

    The purpose of teaching research ethics is to promote integrity in the work of scientists, scholars, and professionals involved in the field of scientific and scholarly inquiry and practice. Responsible and ethical research behavior of researchers, research institutions, and government agencies has historically relied on a system of self-regulation based on shared ethical principles and generally accepted practices. Interest in the teaching of responsible conduct of research (RCR) has surged in response to federal requirements for PHS-funded researchers to receive RCR training. Recent national attention to highly publicized cases of fraud, plagiarism, and other instances of professional misconduct have only elevated the importance of teaching RCR. Blatant forms of research misconduct have included cases of fabrication, falsification or plagiarism, resulting in political attention and intense reaction. The consequences of such wrongdoing are not only lost opportunities in science, but also a risk for decreasing public trust. At the opening of hearings on scientific fraud before the Committee on Science and Technology, Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight, Chairman Albert Gore of Tennessee stated, “At the base of our investment in research lies the trust of the American people and the integrity of the scientific enterprise” (US Congress, House, 1981). Representative John Dingell (1993) in his Shattuck lecture summarized high profile cases of medical research misconduct that resulted in political scrutiny in the 1980s and 1990s, leading to federal policies and guidelines requiring RCR instruction. Research fraud became a governmental concern, “a matter of politics not science” due in part to the reactions of the scientific leadership to instances of research fraud and misconduct (LaFollette, 1994). In response to the many instances of research misconduct and questionable research practices at major research institutions in the 1980s, the Institute of Medicine in a 1989 report noted “[I]nstruction in the standards and ethics of research is essential to the proper education of scientists.” Following implementation by the NIH of a requirement that training grant programs provide training in the responsible conduct of research, many formal RCR training programs have now been established. Although NIH mandated instruction in RCR, specific goals and core competencies were not defined. Nor does the requirement specify a particular format or curriculum. Other governmental and nongovernmental advisory bodies have endorsed RCR education and training. These agencies recognize the need for curriculum and core competency development (DHHS, 1995; Korenman,SG, Shipp, AC, 1994; National Academy of Sciences, 1992). More recently, a legislative mandate calls for the National Science Foundation (NSF) to provide appropriate training and oversight in the responsible and ethical conduct of research to undergraduate students, graduate students and postdoctoral researchers participating in grant proposals funded by the NSF (P.L. 110-69, The 21st Century Competitiveness Act of 2007).
    Originally published 1999-2013 at Resources for Research Ethics Education, a web project directed by Michael Kalichman, Ph.D., and Dena Plemmons, Ph.D., from the University of California-San Diego Research Ethics Program and the San Diego Research Ethics Consortium. Republished with permission.
    Stop Sign It’s 2 a.m. and you are out with some friends. You are driving. The roads seem deserted. You come to a stop sign. Do you stop? … Your Resume You have taken advantage of the many opportunities the University of Illinois has to offer. You are heavily involved in the Greek system, volunteer at the local food shelter, and have season tickets … I‐Clicker You are taking a large lecture class with over 600 students in Foellinger Auditorium. You have a group of friends that you normally sit with during the class. The professor takes attendance by asking I–Clicker questions each class … Employee Discount Your student loans do not cover the entire cost of college for you. While your parents would like to help, they just cannot do any more right now. In order to pay your bills, you get a job at one of … You Pick Two Your dream company has come on campus to interview. They have decided to award you an “alternate” interview slot, meaning you have the last pick at signing up. They have two openings: one at 2 pm, … Office Supplies You are working at your summer internship. While having lunch in the break room, you overhear another intern talking about how great it is to have access to all of these office supplies and how he’s … Library/Database Use You are working as an intern when your supervisor asks you to do a rush research project on reputation management strategies of executives who use social media. You know that you could do a fast, quality job using the University of Illinois Library resources … Submitting Receipts It is your first job after school. You are an accountant for a small firm in Chicago. One day, your supervisor hands you a set of receipts from a restaurant and lounge, and asks you to process them … Game Reviews You are an intern for an independent video game development company. Your supervisor asks you to write and post under your own name rave reviews for games that are made by your company, regardless of … Friend Asking You for a Recommendation You have a summer internship with a very competitive firm. It’s been a great summer, and you have made a lot of good connections. You are telling your good friend about your experiences and s/he … Conduct Abroad You are the CEO of a large, multinational corporation. You have been alerted to payments by one of your major foreign subsidiaries that may be construed as bribery of government officials … Brand Manager You are working as a Brand Manager, Right after the release of a highly publicized new product, after shipping over 4,000 units to your customers, you receive a report that your R&D team has … Pollution vs Profit You are the CEO of a US-based company that specializes in producing high-tech products that are growing rapidly in the market. Your company is experiencing tremendous economic growth, and you … A Tale of Five Fire Trucks You are beginning to budget for the holiday season, and you must purchase gifts for your three children. Your total budget for gifts is $75, and although this is a bit of a stretch for you, you want … Reverse or Not? You are the CEO of Alpha Computers, a large multinational electronics company. Your company pays royalties to Beta Electronics Suppliers for special-purpose and unique components used in a key … Not Expired or You’re Fired? You have just been hired at McDonald’s in China. You’ve heard that it is statistically more difficult to be hired by McDonald’s than it is to gain acceptance to Harvard University, so this is a great … Flitter and Freedom You are CEO of Flitter, a social media company that allows users to share short messages. As a popular blog recently stated, “Flitter famously publishes government data requests and positions itself …
    These 2MCS were developed for Business 101 – An Introduction to Professional Responsibility at the Gies College of Business, University of Ilinois Urbana-Champaign

    Other 2MCs

    Authorship (Graduate version) You are a beginning graduate student, having started in the program six months ago. Your advisor hands you a manuscript by one of the postdocs in your group and asks you to check the correspondence between numbers in a data sheet and the paper and to proofread it carefully … Authorship (Undergraduate version) You are an undergraduate research intern, just starting in a lab. Your supervisor hands you a manuscript by a postdoc in the group and asks you to check the correspondence between numbers in a data sheet and the paper and to proofread it carefully … Smoking Gun You had just become a postdoc for a PI who gave me data on 50 subjects to work with. However, the research coordinator, who was resigning, told you that fMRI scans had only been done on 6 of the 50 subjects and that the results did not support the PI’s hypotheses … Intellectual Property – Copyright A scientist is invited to give a talk at a conference, sponsored in part by a US scientific organization and in part by a non-US scientific society. A condition of participating is to upload a manuscript containing the essence of the talk prior to the conference …
    Guide to Using Two-Minute Challenges (2MCs) Presents the essence of the 2MC and how you can utilize them in your instruction in order to give students real-world ethical challenges to ponder.

    Contributed resources

    CORE Issues in Professional and Research Ethics

    Other useful resources

    Supporting materials for the analysis:

    The Access database and Excel spreadsheet.

    A list of the sampled universities and a map showing their locations.

    A single PDF file with a list of the policies.

    A preliminary analysis of 4 of the policies completed on September 8, 2011.

    The National Center for Principled Leadership & Research Ethics (NCPRE) creates and shares resources to support the development of better ethics and leadership practices in academic and other professional contexts. In our model, leadership—and particularly ethical leadership—is a key component of setting an institutional tone and promoting healthy and productive professional interactions. Intentional leadership development and institutional integrity are linked. We create tools and resources to support both. Institutions have a central role in protecting the integrity of research. This page features some helpful resources for creating and maintaining institutional integrity in research environments.

    Featured Resources

    Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) Education

    Our perspective on RCR education encompasses roles and responsibilities (who does what); best practice (essential elements of and common challenges to effective RCR training); resources to support faculty in delivering high-quality RCR education; and recommended formats and frequency.

    Discussion on Research Misconduct

    Measuring research integrity environments

    • The Survey of Organizational Research Climate (SOURCE) provides universities with tools to assess their research ethics climates and benchmark themselves against institutional peers.
    • The Academic Unit Diagnostic Tool (AUDiT) provides a way to create a snapshot of the vibrancy and challenges of an academic unit. The tool lays out key factors present in vibrant units, warning signs, and in challenged units developed through extensive consultation with deans, provosts, and department heads at colleges and universities.

    Talks on Research Integrity

    • “Plenary: Challenges for Institutions and the Public – Advancing Research Integrity” by C. K. Gunsalus
    • “Systems Matter: Research Environments and Institutional Integrity” by  C. K. Gunsalus
     

    Contributed resources

    Research Integrity materials

    • Netherlands Code of Conduct for Research Integrity. A new Code of Conduct that applies to fundamental, applied, and practice-oriented research developed by the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW), Netherlands Federation of University Medical Centres (NFU), Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO), Associated Applied Research Institutes (TO2), Netherlands Association of Universities of Applied Sciences (VH), and the Association of Universities in the Netherlands (VSNU). This new Code of Conduct describes clear standards that researchers in many research organizations can apply to their daily practices.
    • Fostering Integrity in Research (2017). A report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine that stresses the important role played by institutions, environments, and individual researchers in supporting scientific integrity (Free PDF available).
    • On Being a Scientist: A Guide to Responsible Conduct in Research (third edition, 2009). Written for beginning researchers, this guide sought to describe the ethical foundations of scientific practices and some of the personal and professional issues that researchers encounter in their work. It was meant to apply to all forms of research-whether in academic, industrial, or governmental settings-and to all scientific disciplines (Free PDF available).

    Discussion on Research Integrity

     
    These videos are part of a series of videos on Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) produced by the Office of Research, University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

    Overview

    Our perspective on RCR education encompasses roles and responsibilities (who does what); best practice (essential elements of and common challenges to effective RCR training); resources to support faculty in delivering high-quality RCR education; and recommended formats and frequency.

    Featured Resources

    NCPRE active learning exercises

    The collection of role-play scenarios for the teaching of central topics in the responsible conduct of research to graduate students and Two-Minute Challenge (2MC) Exercises developed by NCPRE.

    Contributed Resources

    Resources for academic instruction and professional training through fictional case studies and commentaries, role plays, and tools for formative assessment

    Tools for developing programs on responsible conduct of research for postdocs

    The list of some case studies for use in teaching ethics across many professions and disciplines.

    The writing and discussion prompts meant to encourage open-ended, thoughtful, and reflective dialogue about RCR on Authorship.

    Ethics issues for postdocs can be extraordinarily complex: you already have your Ph.D. but are still participating in research as a mentee and strengthening your leadership skills. NCPRE is here to help you find information on research ethics in the sciences that will help you learn and address ethics issues that you encounter in this transitional role. Here are some places where you might want to start exploring:

    Tools for developing programs on responsible conduct of research for postdocs

    Relevant Links

    Information on Teaching Research Ethics

    NCPRE active learning exercises

    The collection of role-play scenarios for the teaching of central topics in the responsible conduct of research to graduate students and Two-Minute Challenge (2MC) Exercises developed by NCPRE.

    Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) Education Materials

    Collection of RCR resources for academic instruction and professional training through various fictional case studies and commentaries, role plays, and tools for formative assessment.

    Other Useful Teaching Resources

    Discussions on teaching

    Originally published 1999-2013 at Resources for Research Ethics Education, a web project directed by Michael Kalichman, Ph.D., and Dena Plemmons, Ph.D., from the University of California-San Diego Research Ethics Program and the San Diego Research Ethics Consortium. Republished with permission.

    Educational Settings

    Below are examples of different settings for teaching research ethics. Each section includes a brief description of the setting, followed by links to some examples.

    Discussion Tools

    Instructional tools that promote active, participatory learning are widely recognized as the most effective way to engage trainees, convey knowledge, develop skills, and change attitudes. While case studies are one such tool, there are in fact many other approaches that may be more or less useful depending on the audience, the instructor, or the specific goals for the research ethics instruction. The pages below provide a broad overview of a variety tools and approaches to facilitate discussion in the classroom or, in some cases, in the context of the research environment.

    More Information

    Before creating a program of instruction or education in the responsible conduct of research, it is essential to first ask: What are the goals for teaching responsible conduct of research? While some courses may be created only in response to federal or institutional requirements, it is nevertheless important for an instructor to assess what outcomes he/she hopes to achieve, and what changes he/she wants to evoke in a student’s thinking, attitudes and actions. Currently there is no agreed upon set of goals or objectives across institutional training programs in RCR (Kalichman and Plemmons, 2007); however, most teaching goals could fit into one or more of the following four general categories: knowledge, skills, attitudes, and behavior. The current requirements for RCR education, and these different pedagogical goals, are the subject of this section. Before addressing these goals, it is important to recognize that many scientists are skeptical about the value of explicit education in RCR. While this skepticism is healthy and sometimes appropriate, many arguments against instruction are based on some of the misconceptions described below.

    Isn’t responsible conduct just a matter of following regulations?

    Although there are explicit regulations that govern some aspects of scientific practice — for instance, the treatment of human subjects — these regulations are insufficient to determine every choice a scientist will need to make. Moreover, scientists must always interpret regulations in their scientific practice. Treating human subjects responsibly involves more than just knowing regulations, and so too with other issues of RCR. This point is sometimes expressed by saying that RCR is more about conscience than it is about mere compliance. Additionally, many scientific practices are not directly covered by regulations, and scientists need to know how to proceed responsibly and with integrity in the absence of regulatory guidance.

    Scientists already learn how to do research—doesn’t that mean they’re learning how to do it responsibly?

    Where trainees learn by example, they must discern which features are important and which are not. For instance, they might learn that the reagents used are more critical than the style of music played in the lab. Even if they are trained to do research responsibly, then, they may or may not distinguish the elements that are matters of responsibility and integrity from those that are matters of style or manners. Explicit instruction in RCR can serve as an adjunct to and reinforce learning by example, by making trainees reflective about where and when issues of responsibility impinge on their research. Also, scientists who are not prepared to face ethical dilemmas may not have the presence of mind to do the right thing or the time to figure out what the right thing is. RCR education encourages scientists to think through ethical problems before they arise before matters are clouded by demands for immediate resolution.

    RCR instruction won’t make anyone do the right thing— so what’s the point?

    It is rarely the case that people are intent on doing wrong. Failures of research integrity that result from ignorance or carelessness might be averted by even a modicum of attention to RCR issues. Furthermore, even though a course in research ethics may not set straight a scientist who is intent on falsifying data or mistreating research subjects, such a scientist will interact with peers and coauthors who will be in a position to recognize misconduct. A course in research ethics may be enough to make them more reflective and mindful of ethical issues.

    Won’t ethical considerations of “good” and “bad” get in the way of scientific considerations of true and false?

    It’s wrong to think that RCR is distinct from the demand to do good science. Promoting the integrity of science is one of the demands of responsible conduct. There may be times when it would be possible to learn something new only by acting irresponsibly, and that knowledge would then come at too high a price. Science is not a disembodied pursuit of truth; it is also a human project.

    Can’t science take care of itself?

    Since science is self-policing, it may be tempting to think that the scientific community can handle any matters of responsibility by its own methods. This is already rebutted by the creation of regulations to govern scientific research due to past failures of the scientific community to minimize and mitigate misconduct by some scientists. Moreover, RCR education raises issues for scientists in a way that will promote reflection and consciousness of their roles as members of the scientific community. Thus, RCR education can help science take care of itself. —- By Carole Roth, 2002, with contributions from Dena Plemmons and Michael Kalichman, 2005-2010.

    More Information

    Originally published 1999-2013 at Resources for Research Ethics Education, a web project directed by Michael Kalichman, Ph.D., and Dena Plemmons, Ph.D., from the University of California-San Diego Research Ethics Program and the San Diego Research Ethics Consortium. Republished with permission.
    See Also: Teaching Research Ethics: Why Teach? and Teaching Research Ethics: Getting Started
    Research Ethics is defined here to be the ethics of the planning, conduct, and reporting of research. It is clear that research ethics should include:
    • Protections of human and animal subjects
    However, not all researchers use human or animal subjects, nor are the ethical dimensions of research confined solely to protections for research subjects. Other ethical challenges are rooted in many dimensions of research, including the:
    • Collection, use, and interpretation of research data
    • Methods for reporting and reviewing research plans or findings
    • Relationships among researchers with one another
    • Relationships between researchers and those that will be affected by their research
    • Means for responding to misunderstandings, disputes, or misconduct
    • Options for promoting ethical conduct in research
    For the purpose of this online resource, the domain of research ethics is intended to include nothing less than the fostering of research that protects the interests of the public, the subjects of research, and the researchers themselves.

    Important Ethical Distinctions

    In discussing or teaching research ethics, it is important to keep some basic distinctions in mind.

    Prescriptive vs. descriptive claims

    It is important not to confuse moral claims about how people ought to behave with descriptive claims about how they in fact do behave. From the fact that gift authorship or signing off on unreviewed data may be “common practice” in some contexts, it doesn’t follow that they are morally or professionally justified. Nor is morality to be confused with the moral beliefs or ethical codes that a given group or society holds (how some group thinks people should live). A belief in segregation is not morally justified simply because it is widely held by a group of people or given society. Philosophers term this distinction between prescriptive and descriptive claims the “is-ought distinction.”

    Law vs. morality

    A second important distinction is that between morality and the law. The law may or may not conform to the demands of ethics (Kagan, 1998). To take a contemporary example: many believe that the law prohibiting federally funded stem cell research is objectionable on moral (as well as scientific) grounds, i.e., that such research can save lives and prevent much human misery. History is full of examples of bad laws, that is laws now regarded as morally unjustifiable, e.g., the laws of apartheid, laws prohibiting women from voting or inter-racial couples from marrying. It is also helpful to distinguish between two different levels of discussion (or two different kinds of ethical questions): first-order or “ground-level” questions and second-order questions.

    First-order questions

    First-order moral questions concern what we should do. Such questions may be very general or quite specific. One might ask whether the tradition of “senior” authorship should be defended and preserved or, more generally, what are the principles that should go into deciding the issue of senior authorship. Such questions and the substantive proposals regarding how to answer them belong to the domain of what moral philosophers call “normative ethics.”

    Second-order questions

    Second-order moral questions concern the nature and purpose of morality itself. When someone claims that falsifying data is wrong, what exactly is the standing of this claim? What exactly does the word “wrong” mean in the conduct of scientific research? And what are we doing when we make claims about right and wrong, scientific integrity and research misconduct? These second-order questions are quite different from the ground-level questions about how to conduct one’s private or professional life raised above. They concern the nature of morality rather than its content, i.e., what acts are required, permitted or prohibited. This is the domain of what moral philosophers call “metaethics” (Kagan, 1998).

    Ways to Approach Ethics

    Each of these approaches provides moral principles and ways of thinking about the responsibilities, duties and obligations of moral life. Individually and jointly, they can provide practical guidance in ethical decision-making.

    Deontological ethics

    One of the most influential and familiar approaches to ethics is deontological ethics, associated with Immanuel Kant (1742-1804). Deontological ethics hold certain acts as right or wrong in themselves, e.g., promise breaking or lying. So, for example, in the context of research, fraud, plagiarism and misrepresentation are regarded as morally wrong in themselves, not simply because they (tend to) have bad consequences. The deontological approach is generally grounded in a single fundamental principle: Act as you would wish others to act towards you OR always treat persons as an end, never as a means to an end. From such central principles are derived rules or guidelines for what is permitted, required and prohibited. Objections to principle-based or deontological ethics include the difficulty of applying highly general principles to specific cases, e.g.: Does treating persons as ends rule out physician-assisted suicide, or require it? Deontological ethics is generally contrasted to consequentialist ethics (Honderich, 1995).

    Consequentialist ethics

    According to consequentialist approaches, the rightness or wrongness of an action depends solely on its consequences. One should act in such a way as to bring about the best state of affairs, where the best state of affairs may be understood in various ways, e.g., as the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people, maximizing pleasure and minimizing pain or maximizing the satisfaction of preferences. A theory such as Utilitarianism (with its roots in the work of Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill) is generally taken as the paradigm example of consequentialism. Objections to consequentialist ethics tend to focus on its willingness to regard individual rights and values as “negotiable.” So, for example, most people would regard murder as wrong independently of the fact that killing one person might allow several others to be saved (the infamous sacrifice of an ailing patient to provide organs for several other needy patients). Similarly, widespread moral opinion holds certain values important (integrity, justice) not only because they generally lead to good outcomes, but in and of themselves.

    Virtue ethics

    Virtue ethics focuses on moral character rather than action and behavior considered in isolation. Central to this approach is the question what ought we (as individuals, as scientists, as physicians) to be rather than simply what we ought to do. The emphasis here is on inner states, that is, moral dispositions and habits such as courage or a developed sense of personal integrity. Virtue ethics can be a useful approach in the context of RCR and professional ethics, emphasizing the importance of moral virtues such as compassion, honesty, and respect. This approach has also a great deal to offer in discussions of bioethical issues where a traditional emphasis on rights and abstract principles frequently results in polarized, stalled discussions (e.g., abortion debates contrasting the rights of the mother against the rights of the fetus).

    An ethics of care

    The term “ethics of care” grows out of the work of Carol Gilligan, whose empirical work in moral psychology claimed to discover a “different voice,” a mode of moral thinking distinct from principle-based moral thinking (e.g., the theories of Kant and Mill). An ethics of care stresses compassion and empathetic understanding, virtues Gilligan associated with traditional care-giving roles, especially those of women. This approach differs from traditional moral theories in two important ways. First, it assumes that it is the connections between persons, e.g., lab teams, colleagues, parents and children, student and mentor, not merely the rights and obligations of discrete individuals that matter. The moral world, on this view, is best seen not as the interaction of discrete individuals, each with his or her own interests and rights, but as an interrelated web of obligations and commitment. We interact, much of the time, not as private individuals, but as members of families, couples, institutions, research groups, a given profession and so on. Second, these human relationships, including relationships of dependency, play a crucial role on this account in determining what our moral obligations and responsibilities are. So, for example, individuals have special responsibilities to care for their children, students, patients, and research subjects. An ethics of care is thus particularly useful in discussing human and animal subjects research, issues of informed consent, and the treatment of vulnerable populations such as children, the infirm or the ill.

    Casuistry or case study approaches

    The case study approach begins from real or hypothetical cases. Its objective is to identify the intuitively plausible principles that should be taken into account in resolving the issues at hand. The case study approach then proceeds to critically evaluate those principles. In discussing whistle-blowing, for example, a good starting point is with recent cases of research misconduct, seeking to identify and evaluate principles such as a commitment to the integrity of science, protecting privacy, or avoiding false or unsubstantiated charges. In the context of RCR instruction, case studies provide one of the most interesting and effective approaches to developing sensitivity to ethical issues and to honing ethical decision-making skills. Strictly speaking, casuistry is more properly understood as a method for doing ethics rather than as itself an ethical theory. However, casuistry is not wholly unconnected to ethical theory. The need for a basis upon which to evaluate competing principles, e.g., the importance of the well-being of an individual patient vs. a concern for just allocation of scarce medical resources, makes ethical theory relevant even with case study approaches.

    Applied ethics

    Applied ethics is a branch of normative ethics. It deals with practical questions particularly in relation to the professions. Perhaps the best known area of applied ethics is bioethics, which deals with ethical questions arising in medicine and the biological sciences, e.g., questions concerning the application of new areas of technology (stem cells, cloning, genetic screening, nanotechnology, etc.), end of life issues, organ transplants, and just distribution of healthcare. Training in responsible conduct of research or “research ethics” is merely one among various forms of professional ethics that have come to prominence since the 1960s. Worth noting, however, is that concern with professional ethics is not new, as ancient codes such as the Hippocratic Oath and guild standards attest (Singer, 1986).

    Resources

    Research Ethics

    • Adams, D., Pimple, K.D. (2005). Research Misconduct and Crime: Lessons from Criminal Science on Preventing Misconduct and Promoting Integrity. Accountability in Research, 12(3): 225-240.
    • Anderson, M.S., Horn, A.S., Risbey, K.R., Ronning, E.A., De Vries, R., Martinson, B.C. (2007). What Do Mentoring and Training in the Responsible Conduct of Research Have To Do with Scientists’ Misbehavior? Findings from a National Survey of NIH-Funded Scientists. Academic Medicine, 82(9): 853-860.
    • Bulger, R.E. & Heitman, E. (2007). Expanding Responsible Conduct of Research Instruction across the University. Academic Medicine, 82(9): 876-878.
    • Kalichman, M.W. (2006). Ethics and Science: A 0.1% solution. Issues in Science and Technology, 23: 34-36.
    • Kalichman, M.W. (2007). Responding to Challenges in Educating for the Responsible Conduct of Research. Academic Medicine, 82(9): 870-875.
    • Kalichman, M.W., Plemmons, D.K. (2007). Reported Goals for Responsible Conduct of Research Courses. Academic Medicine, 82(9): 846-852.
    • Kalichman, M.W. (2009). Evidence-based research ethics. The American Journal of Bioethics, 9(6&7): 85-87.
    • Pimple, K.D. (2002). Six Domains of Research Ethics: A Heuristic Framework for the Responsible Conduct of Research. Science and Engineering Ethics, 8(2): 191-205.
    • Steneck, N.H. (2006). Fostering Integrity in Research: Definitions, Current Knowledge, and Future Directions. Science and Engineering Ethics, 12: 53-74.
    • Steneck, N.H., Bulger, R.E. (2007). The History, Purpose, and Future of Instruction in the Responsible Conduct of Research. Academic Medicine, 82(9): 829-834.
    • Vasgird, D.R. (2007). Prevention over Cure: The Administrative Rationale for Education in the Responsible Conduct of Research. Academic Medicine, 82(9): 835-837.

    Ethics

    • Aristotle. The Nichomachean Ethics.
    • Beauchamp, R.L. & Childress, J.F. (2001). Principles of Biomedical Ethics, 5th edition. NY: Oxford University Press.
    • Bentham, J. (1781). An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation.
    • Gilligan, C. (1993). In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women’s Development. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
    • Glover, Jonathan. (1977). Causing Death and Saving Lives. Penguin Books.
    • Honderich, T, ed. (1995). The Oxford Companion to Philosophy. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.
    • Kagan, S. (1998). Normative Ethics. Westview Press.
    • Kant, I. (1785). Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals.
    • Kant, I. (1788). Critique of Practical Reason.
    • Kant, I. (1797). The Metaphysics of Morals.
    • Kant, I. (1797). On a Supposed right to Lie from Benevolent Motives.
    • Kuhse, H. & Singer, P. (1999). Bioethics: An Anthology. Blackwell Publishers.
    • Mill, J.S. (1861). Utilitarianism.
    • Rachels, J. (1999). The Elements of Moral Philosophy, 3rd edition. Boston: McGraw-Hill.
    • Regan, T. (1993). Matters of Life and Death: New Introductory Essays in Moral Philosophy, 3rd edition. New York: McGraw-Hill. The history of ethics
    • Singer, P (1993). Practical Ethics, 2nd ed. Cambridge University Press

    NCPRE active learning exercises

    The collection of role-play scenarios for the teaching of central topics in the responsible conduct of research to graduate students and Two-Minute Challenge (2MC) Exercises developed by NCPRE.

    Professional Ethics Engineering

    A ten-part series of lectures on various topics in ethics and engineering by Michael Loui, professor emeritus at the University of Illinois Champaign-Urbana.

    Other Resources

    The National Center for Principled Leadership & Research Ethics (NCPRE) creates and shares resources to support the development of better ethics and leadership practices in academic and other professional contexts. In our model, leadership—and particularly ethical leadership—is a key component of setting an institutional tone and promoting healthy and productive professional interactions. Intentional leadership development and institutional integrity are linked. We create tools and resources to support both.

    Some featured resources

    Teaching Ethics: Instructional Models, Methods, and Modalities for University Studies Teaching Ethics: Instructional Models, Methods, and Modalities for University Studies encourages teachers and students to approach their work with a deep awareness that people, not as disinterested reasoners devoid of or effectively cut-off from passions, make ethical judgments. An individual’s social and emotional constitution should be taken into account. This collaborative publication offers salient instructional models, methods and modalities centered on the whole person.

    Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) Education

    Our perspective on RCR education encompasses roles and responsibilities (who does what); best practice (essential elements of and common challenges to effective RCR training); resources to support faculty in delivering high-quality RCR education; and recommended formats and frequency.

    Articles and Talks

    Research Integrity materials

    • Fostering Integrity in Research (2017). A report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine that stresses the important role played by institutions, environments, and individual researchers in supporting scientific integrity (Free PDF available).
    • On Being a Scientist: A Guide to Responsible Conduct in Research (third edition, 2009). Written for beginning researchers, this guide sought to describe the ethical foundations of scientific practices and some of the personal and professional issues that researchers encounter in their work (Free PDF available).

    Where Do I Start?

    Get started with the article What is Research Ethics? to get a broad overview of research ethics and ethical distinctions. If you are interested in Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) education, see our Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) Education Materials and Institutional Research Integrity page. If you are an educator, see our Resources for Instructors that features a variety of information and resources on teaching research ethics. Our curriculum resources include Two-Minute Challenges and Role-Playing Scenarios which will challenge you and your students with issues based on real-world situations. Our Educational Materials include featured and contributed resources for teaching and learning about research ethics, including resources focused on specific Research Ethics by Topic. From there, you can dig deeper to browse the Role-specific resources that are relevant to you, where you will find research articles, position papers, and training materials most relevant to you.   NCPRE develops, hosts and curates resources on research ethics, particularly for educating about research ethics, and institutional research integrity. We host materials with the permission or at the request of the authors/developers of those materials. Please consult the license with each item (generally a Creative Commons license). We do not claim ownership and credit for materials we did not develop ourselves.

    Joan Dubinsky on Organizational Ethics (4:05)

    Joan Dubinsky on the Effects or Leaders on Team Ethics (3:24)

    Resources

    Self-Awareness: Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) Self-Awareness and Self-Reflection Executive Briefing  (Reading time: 9 minutes) Two Assessments – VAT and REAL (Reading time: 1 minute)
    We are pleased to offer two self-assessment tools as part of the NCPRE Leadership Collection.
    1. Value Assessment Tool, or VAT What are your professional values? Professional values are usually the critical factors determining satisfaction and dissatisfaction with any particular job. We identify and clarify our professional values as we mature and gain experience, so occasional reflection is helpful. This tool helps you ask the question, “are your professional values a match for your current role?”
    2. REflection for Academic Leaders, or REAL This tool is designed to help you reflect on leadership behaviors and strategies important for your development and success as an academic leader. This is not an assessment; it is designed for your own personal development, to help you focus on areas for personal and professional growth.

    Self-Awareness and Hidden Assumptions (Expert Video) (17:12)

    Nicholas Burbules, Professor in the Department of Educational Policy Studies at the University of Illinois, discusses the importance of self-awareness and evaluating and checking one’s own assumptions.

    Self-Awareness (Expert Video) (2:45)

    Barb Wilson, Executive Vice President and Vice President for Academic Affairs at the University of Illinois, explains how self-awareness promotes adaptive leadership.
    The National Center for Professional & Research Ethics (NCPRE) creates and shares resources to support the development of better ethics and leadership practices. We focus on leadership in a variety of institutional settings, from academia to business.

    Negotiation – Quick Tips

    How often do you find yourself negotiating? More often than you might realize. Whether you’re deciding where to go to lunch with colleagues or working on a major policy discussion, you are in a kind of negotiation. Here are five quick tips to aid you in recognizing, understanding, and navigating negotiations at work, and elsewhere.

    Different Kinds of Negotiation

    • Knowing what form various negotiations will take can help you in preparing for them and understanding what outcomes you can expect. In general, negotiations typically fall into one of two categories:
      • Distributive negotiations (sometimes called Win-Lose negotiations)
        • Usually one time, not involving an on-going relationship
        • Usually focused on one issue, typically money
        • No side deals
      • Integrative negotiations (called Win-Win, or interest-based negotiations)
        • Often involve long-term relationships
        • Usually have multiple issues at stake
        • Because there are multiple issues at stake there is a greater possibility for trade-offs by focusing on the differing interests of each party and seeking to leave each party with something of value
    • If you think about life in an academic institution, what kind of negotiations are you most likely to be conducting? Commonplace negotiations include things like salary requests, securing and allocating space; teaching assignments; hiring and working out joint appointment parameters; etc.
    • Some of the less-commonly recognized negotiations include equipment usage, timing, or placement; meeting protocols; unit service obligations; research support; delegation and asking for help within work groups; etc.

    Cultivate Curiosity!

    • Asking questions is generally the single most effective way to add value to the negotiation table and potentially increase the size of the pie for everyone. More information allows you to understand when there might be multiple issues at stake — allowing for trade-offs rather than zero-sum negotiations.
    • The central element in developing outcomes that leave you with solid relationships and a strong professional reputation is to consider your own interests—can you name what you really seek?—and then spend at least as much time trying to consider or understand those of your colleagues.
    • It is common in negotiations for valuable information to go undisclosed at the table, simply because the questions that might have raised them were never asked. It often turns out that the key to a reasonable outcome for all involves elements you have not considered, that may be of little value to you (but of great value to others), or that are simple for you to provide. Asking questions is often the only way to find out about them.
    • Remember that your relationship with most of those you deal with in academic settings are people you will deal with over and over, and so the relationship you cultivate will affect future interactions, not just the one in the current moment. They will affect your reputation and your effectiveness. The more curious you are about what drives other’s interests in each interaction, the more successful your negotiations will be.

    Stages of Negotiation

    • Negotiations generally go through several distinct stages. Knowing this and recognizing the function of each can make you more effective in your own negotiations.
    • Negotiation experts have their own take on how many stages there are, and what each encompasses. We have found this particular conceptualization to be helpful*:
      • Stage One: Establishing rapport; getting to know each other and setting the tone
      • Stage Two: Information gathering; listening & asking questions to understand issues and interests
      • Stage Three: Creating value; trying to make the deal better for both parties
      • Stage Four: Claiming value; dividing the pie
      • Stage Five: Consolidating the deal; repeating each important element of the agreement to confirm understanding from both parties. This may lead to circling back to a previous stage.
    • The stages of negotiations are not necessarily linear. As you move from one to another, misunderstandings may be exposed. When that happens, it can be helpful to loop back to an earlier stage in the process.
    • For example, if an interaction is becoming contentious, working to re-build rapport or asking more questions about the point of disagreement can help establish a more constructive tone.

    Preventing Escalation

    • Some negotiations get emotional. This can cause the focus of the negotiation to shift from interests, to rights, and eventually power**.
      • Interests – the things people care about. At the heart of every difference or dispute lie people’s interests
      • Rights – independent standards that have perceived legitimacy: e.g., seniority, reciprocity, fairness
      • Power – the ability to coerce people to do things they otherwise wouldn’t: e.g., ridicule, threats, insults
    • When negotiations escalate from interests to rights and eventually power, the satisfaction level with the outcome decreases. The likelihood of recurrence goes up, and ultimately the relationship between the parties erodes.
    • Asking questions to seek information on the interests of the other party and managing your own conduct to be able to keep a professional tone are key.

    Cognitive Biases are the Bane of Successful Negotiation

    • We are all susceptible to various forms of cognitive bias – learning about the most common types of bias that infect negotiations is an effective means of inoculating yourself from their negative effects.
    • This understanding can hep you to identify and sidestep them, to keep the focus of discussions on the interests of all involved. Here are a few of the more common kinds of cognitive biases or irrational lines of thought to watch out for in negotiations:
      • Overconfidence: don’t assume you know more than you do.
      • Unrealistic expectations: don’t set yourself up for failure by seeking the impossible.
      • Framing: being overly affected by the way something is presented – is the glass half empty or half full? (It’s the same quantity either way, but how it’s framed affects perceptions.)
      • Engaging in non-rational escalation: allowing your ego to drive the negotiation more than your interests. (Have you ever seen someone pay more at an auction than an item was worth by focusing on “winning” over someone else more than the actual item on sale? That’s non-rational escalation.)
      • Assuming the other party’s gains must come at your expense: are you missing opportunities for mutually beneficial tradeoffs? Are there things you care about more, and other parties less? Vice versa?
      • Fixating on irrelevant information: i.e., the past, the other party’s starting place, etc. Many people start by asking for far more than they seek, thinking that’s an effective technique. Ask questions to understand true interests, and stay focused on what you really seek as well.
    © C.K. Gunsalus. Licensed through the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois, 2017 Negotiation: Quick Tips (Reading time: 5 minutes)
    When academic units face challenges of internal conduct and governance, it can undermine their abilities to fulfill their missions of teaching, research, and service. Assessing and assisting these units to return to vibrancy and vigor can be complex. We have developed the AUDiT to help academic leaders identify elements of healthy units, as well as to spot warning signs and assess serious problems. Use the AUDiT table to score a given unit. Start by putting a check next to elements that characterize the unit – green, yellow, or red. Then go back and give a positive score to elements in the green column, and a negative score to elements in the other columns. Add up your score to get a sense of how your department is doing. We have two versions for faculty/administrators to evaluate their own unit: one for research-oriented institutions and one for teaching-oriented institutions. We also have an alternate form to evaluate public media or professional workplaces. The Alternate AUDiT for Public Media/Professional Workplace was developed in collaboration with Peter Fretwell, Member and General Manager, KHSU/Humboldt State University. AUDiT Manual AUDiT for Research-oriented Institutions AUDiT for Teaching-Oriented Institutions AUDiT for Public Media/Professional Workplace Work with peers and academic leaders to develop solutions for a troubled department at your institution: contact us to attend our next Confronting Challenges in Academic Units Conference. Consortium members are eligible to send a team as part of their annual membership fee; all academic institutions are welcome to apply.  
    Creative Commons License
    Creative Commons License
    The AUDiT tool is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. NCPRE would strongly prefer you consult with us if you would like to make changes and use this tool for another purpose. Please reach out to us at ncpre-source@illinois.edu to customize the AUDiT tool or to discuss commercial licensing options. To learn more about handling troubled units, check out ‘Solving Problems and Issues’ in our Leadership Collection.

    Resources

    Decision Making Framework – Quick Guide (Reading time: 5 minutes) Cognitive Bias: Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) One possible framework for developing good decision-making habits Cognitive Biases – Executive Briefing (Reading time: 17 minutes)

    Nick Burbules on Data and Statistics (14:26)

    Nicholas Burbules, Professor in the Department of Educational Policy Studies at the University of Illinois, speaks about the power and pitfalls of using statistics.

    Rob Rutenbar on Data and Evidence-Based Decisions (5:40)

    Rob Rutenbar, Senior Vice Chancellor of Research, University of Pittsburgh, discusses the power of using data in making effective and influential decisions.

    Critical Thinking (Expert Video) (17:02)

    Nicholas Burbules, Professor in the Department of Educational Policy Studies at the University of Illinois, explains critical thinking and its importance.  

    Resources

    Emotional Intelligence – Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) Combining Departments – Quick Tips (Reading time: 6 minutes) Choosing Subordinate Leaders – Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) Ethical Challenges of Leadership – Quick Tips (Reading time: 6 minutes) Emotional Intelligence – Executive Briefing (Reading time: 12 minutes) Emotional Intelligence – Annotated Bibliography (Reading time: 2 minutes) A Brief Introduction to Leadership Essentials (Reading time: 4 minutes) Leadership Essentials Part 1: Executive Briefing, part I (Reading time: 14 minutes) Leadership Essentials:  Executive Briefing, part II (Reading time: 14 minutes) Tools for Leadership – Annotated Bibliography (Reading time: 16 minutes)

    Andrew Alleyne on Effective Leaders (4:51)

    Michael Loui on Leading Groups and Projects (5:04)

    Micheal Loui on the Use of Humor (1:04)

    BrandE Faupell on Skill Sets (3:12)

    Ruth Watkins on Challenges of Leadership (2:56)

    Sonya Stephens on Challenges of Leadership (3:06)

    Joan Dubinsky on What Makes a Good Leader (5:55)

    Bob Easter on Critical Leadership Skills (11:07)

    Bob Easter, President Emeritus of the University of Illinois, discusses foundational skills and strategies for becoming an effective leader, including how to deliver difficult news to individuals and groups.

    Jump to section: Relating to Your Team, Delivering Bad News, Others’ Reactions to Difficult News, Where to Look for Support, Seeking Advice, Real Examples – Abraham Lincoln: Choosing Advisers

    Nick Burbules on Language in Leadership (16:42)

    Ed Feser on Challenges of Leadership (3:07) Edward Feser, Provost & Executive Vice President of the Oregon State University, describes challenges he faced as an administrator.

    Richard Wheeler on Challenges of Leadership (3:52)

    Richard Wheeler on Key Aspects of Leadership (3:50)

    Richard Wheeler, former Provost at the University of Illinois, talks about key aspects of leadership that he learned over his career.  

    Resources

    Giving Performance Feedback:  Quick Tips (Reading time: 2 minutes) Just-in-time advice for conducting an effective faculty performance review. Building Effective Units:  Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) Understanding and Managing Teams:  Quick Tips (Reading time: 6 minutes) Just-in-time advice for working effectively with teams. Practical Performance Feedback Tips (Reading time: 9 minutes – Executive Briefing) Tips and hints for conducting evaluations and providing feedback that will be honest, constructive, and most likely to be heard by those within your scope of responsibility. Performance Management:  Annotated Bibliography (Reading time: 6 minutes – Resources for Further Reading) Selected books, research articles, and popular literature for those seeking deeper knowledge on the topic of performance management.

    Giving Performance Feedback (scenario one) (4:48)

    A department head conducts an annual performance review with a faculty member. The department head demonstrates some effectiveness in addressing goals and strategies for performance improvement. The head’s approach also highlights opportunities for improvement to his performance review process.

    Giving Performance Feedback (scenario two) (7:51)

    A department head talks to a staff member about her performance review.  He has to navigate some unexpected developments, and creates a constructive outcome.

    Michael Loui on Using Annual Reviews (2:53)

    Michael Loui on Giving Negative Feedback (1:20)

    Ruth Watkins on Giving Feedback (2:31)

    Sonya Stephens on Giving Feedback (3:10)

    Joan Dubinsky on Giving Feedback (5:27)

    Rob Rutenbar on Giving Performance Feedback (4:32)

    Rob Rutenbar, Senior Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Pittsburgh, discusses the effective transmission of feedback to a faculty member.

    Ed Feser on Giving Feedback (1:28)

    Edward Feser, Provost & Executive Vice President at Oregon State University, talks about his approach giving feedback.

    Richard Wheeler on Giving Feedback (4:13)

    Richard Wheeler, former Provost at the University of Illinois, talks about working with people across campus to get feedback in solving a major crisis he faced as provost.

    Kendall Zoller on Effective Use of Meetings (8:18)

    Resources

    Managing Up:  Quick Tips (Reading time: 3 minutes) Managing Up: Annotated Bibliography (Reading time: 5 minutes) Succession Planning: Quick Tips (Reading time: 5 minutes) Tips to help you think about how to identify, foster, and encourage potential young leaders and build institutional leadership capacity. Change Management: Quick Tips (Reading time: 8 minutes) Organizational Agility: Quick Tips (Reading time: 5 minutes)

    Data and Managing Up (3:14)

    Rob Rutenbar, Senior Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Pittsburgh, talks about the use of data in discussions with decision-makers.

    Managing Up (5:47)

    Resources

    Complaint Handling: Quick Tips (Reading time: 3 minutes) Conflict and Dispute: Quick Tips (Reading time: 7 minutes) Confidentiality and Transparency:  Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) Personal Scripts:  Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) Delivering Difficult News: Quick Tips (Reading time: 5 minutes) Delivering Difficult News: Annotated Bibliography  (Reading time: 7 minutes) Complaint Handling Guidelines (Reading time: 19 minutes) Complaints from External Constituents (Reading time: 4 minutes) Crisis Management: Quick Tips (Reading time: 6 minutes)

    Andrew Alleyne on Handling Complaints (5:14)

    Andrew Alleyne on Personal Scripts (6:39)

    Andrew Alleyne on Delivering Difficult News (8:28)

    BrandE Faupell on Having Difficult Conversations (4:41)

    BrandE Faupell Lessons from a Troubled Unit (2:53)

    Michael Loui on Having Difficult Conversations (2:39)

    Rob Rutenbar on Personal Scripts (2:28)

    Rob Rutenbar, Senior Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Pittsburgh, describes how he uses this important leadership tool.

    Rob Rutenbar on Delivering Difficult News (3:06)

    Rob Rutenbar, Senior Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Pittsburgh, offers his views on how to give someone news that may be hard to hear.

    Richard Wheeler on Personal Scripts (3:08)

    Richard Wheeler, former Provost for the University of Illinois, describes his experience in using personal scripts in leadership.

    Barb Wilson on Difficult Conversations (3:47)

    Barb Wilson, Executive Vice President and Vice President for Academic Affairs at the University of Illinois, provides advice on how to handle a difficult subject.

    Kendall Zoller on Third Point, Video 1: The Method (9:51)

    Kendall Zoller on Third Point, Video 2: Roleplay (6:27)

    Kendall Zoller on Third Point, Video 3: Exploring the Application (6:21)

     

    Complaint Handling (6:15)

    A department head hears a complaint from a staff member regarding a high-profile professor. The department head demonstrates effective intake of a complaint.

    Difficult Conversations – Troubled Waters (3:43)

    Difficult Conversations – Mixed Reactions (4:31)

    Difficult Conversations – Good Practice (4:29)

    Critical Friends (11:35)

    How to use critical friends to assess your ability to handle difficult situations and conversations.

    Delivering Difficult News (7:46)

    Delivering Difficult News Techniques (6:33)

    Choosing Subunit Leaders – Quick Tips (Reading time: 5 minutes) Effect of Leader’s Conduct – Annotated Bibliography (Reading time: 6 minutes)

    Andrew Alleyne on Building Trust and Effecting Change (4:08)

    The Difference a Good Leader Makes (2:36)

    Barb Wilson, Executive Vice President and Vice President for Academic Affairs at the University of Illinois, discusses communication, trust, and rapport.

    Should You Become an Administrator? (3:41)

    Barb Wilson, Executive Vice President and Vice President for Academic Affairs at the University of Illinois, gives advice on what to think about when considering an academic leadership role.

    Joan Dubinsky on the Effects of Leaders on Team Ethics (3:24)

    Resources

    Mentoring and Coaching – Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) Mentoring in Higher Education – An Overview (Reading time: 11 minutes) Mentoring and Coaching: Annotated Bibliography (Reading time: 6 minutes) Mentoring and Coaching: Additional References (Reading time: 7 minutes)

    Michael Loui on Mentoring for Tenure (5:05)

    Ruth Watkins on Mentoring and Coaching (3:50)

    Sonya Stephens on Mentoring for Leadership (2:36)

    Rob Rutenbar on Mentoring Part I (5:36)

    Rob Rutenbar on Mentoring Part II (2:45)

    Rob Rutenbar, Senior Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Pittsburgh, explains the importance of mentoring in an academic unit.

    Ed Feser on Mentoring for Leadership (6:31)

    Ed Feser on Mentoring for Tenure (4:41)

    Edward Feser, Provost & Executive Vice President at Oregon State University, talks about mentoring people for both tenure and leadership.

    Barb Wilson on Promotion and Tenure Mentoring (4:29)

    Barb Wilson, Executive Vice President and Vice President for Academic Affairs at the University of Illinois, discusses this important aspect of leadership in academia.

    Richard Wheeler on Mentoring for Tenure (3:03)

    Richard Wheeler on Mentoring for Leadership (2:50)

    Richard Wheeler, former Provost at the University of Illinois, discusses this important aspect of leadership in academia.

    Resources

    Strategic Planning – Quick Tips (Reading time: 5 minutes) Strategic Planning – Executive Briefing (Reading time: 12 minutes) Strategic Planning – Annotated Bibliography (Reading time: 6 minutes) Setting Goals – Quick Tips (Reading time: 3 minutes) Effective Use of Committees:  Quick Tips (Reading time: 5 minutes) General advice for working effectively with committees.

    Michael Loui on the Effective Use of Committees (3:08)

    Ed Feser on Prioritizing (3:17)

    Edward Feser, Provost & Executive Vice President of Oregon State University, discusses how to prioritize projects and discusses using a workplan to ensure other projects don’t interfere with your larger goals.

    Fundraising and Partnerships (Expert Video) (4:12)

    Barb Wilson, Executive Vice President and Vice President for Academic Affairs at the University of Illinois, explains some of her strategies for developing effective fundraising partnerships.

    Resources

    Role Transition: Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) Preparing For Your New Position: Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) Becoming an Authority Figure: Quick Tips (Reading time: 3 minutes) Becoming an Authority Figure: Annotated Bibliography (Reading time: 6 minutes) We’ve summarized key resources here. Challenges for Women in Senior Positions: Quick Tips (Reading time: 10 minutes) Role Transition: Check List (Reading time: 4 minutes) Role Transition: Annotated Bibliography (Reading time: 6 minutes) We’ve summarized key resources here. Dealing With a Disruptive Predecessor – Quick Tips (Reading time: 5 minutes) Taking Over a Troubled Unit – Quick Tips (Reading time: 5 minutes) Academic Leadership Development (Reading time: 50 minutes) Critical Capabilities at the Department Level

    Bob Easter on Role Transition: Faculty to Administrator (9:01)

    Jump to section:Working with a Coach or Mentor, Who Should Become a Leader?, Accountability as a Leader, Developing Your Style of Leadership

    Becoming an Authority Figure, and the Difference a Good Leader Makes (18:17)

    Bob Easter, President Emeritus of the University of Illinois, discusses the importance of establishing authority as a leader in academia. Jump to section: Leading With and Without AuthorityWeak LeadersExercising InfluenceDealing with BulliesReal Examples of Effective LeadersPresenting Yourself as a LeaderCombining DepartmentsInspiring Debate in Your TeamEncouraging Mentorship in Your DepartmentReal Examples: Higher-Level Leadership Transitions

    Rob Rutenbar on Role Transition: From Faculty to Administrator (5:21)

    Rob Rutenbar, Senior Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Pittsburgh, gives his view of key aspects of this transition.

    Becoming an Authority Figure – Clarity of Intention (6:33)

    Rob Rutenbar, Senior Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Pittsburgh, describes key skills that help emerging leaders.

    Robert Jones on Role Transition: Coming in from the outside (8:47)

    Barb Wilson, Executive Vice President and Vice President for Academic Affairs at the University of Illinois, provides advice on becoming an administrator.

    Becoming an Authority Figure – Continuing to Grow and Learn (3:27)

    Barb Wilson, Executive Vice President and Vice President for Academic Affairs at the University of Illinois, describes the importance of learning about new units, new institutions, and oneself.

    Ed Feser on Role Transition (2:51)

    Ruth Watkins on Role Transition (3:47)

    Ed Feser on Corporate to Academia (2:34)

    Edward Feser, Provost & Executive Vice President of the Oregon State University, talks about transitioning to academic administration and lessons we can learn from the corporate world.

    Rob Rutenbar on Role Transition: Common Pitfalls (2:56)

    Rob Rutenbar, Senior Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Pittsburgh, highlights areas to look out for in becoming a leader.

    Richard Wheeler on Role Transitions and Difficult Conversations (2:18)

    Richard Wheeler, former Provost at the University of Illinois, offers his advice on being a leader, transitioning roles and having difficult conversations.

    Becoming an Authority Figure (2:31)

    Richard Wheeler, former Provost at the University of Illinois, describes the challenges he faced in becoming a university administrator.

    Sonya Stephens on Role Transition (1:16)

    Becoming an Authority Figure (4:29)

    BrandE Faupell Taking on Department Head Role (3:39)

    Joan Dubinsky on Organizational Hierarchy (3:22)

    From Faculty to Administrator, scenario 1 (4:45)

    From Faculty to Administrator, scenario 2 (6:19)

    Two approaches to the same situation with a member of faculty.

    Role Transition Self Evaluation (4:05)

    Role Transition Identity (4:05)

     

    Resources

    Time Management: Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) Time To Go: Quick Tips (Reading time: 3 minutes) Conducting An Effective Committee Meeting: Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) Time Management AB (Reading time: 4 minutes) Social Media: Quick Tips (Reading time: 6 minutes)

    Time Management: Part I (Expert Video) (2:45)

    Time Management: Part II (Expert Video) (5:23)

    Rob Rutenbar, Senior Vice Chancellor of Research, University of Pittsburgh, explains his strategies for time management in this two-part selection.

    Managing Time and Resources (Expert Video) (3:28)

    Barb Wilson, Executive Vice President and Vice President for Academic Affairs at the University of Illinois, provides advice on the effective management of time and one’s own energy.

    Balancing Commitments (Expert Video) (3:13)

    Edward Feser, Provost and Executive Vice President at Oregon State University, provides advice on the balancing the commitments one faces as an academic administrator.

    Balancing Commitments (Expert Video) (1:19)

    Richard Wheeler, former Provost at the University of Illinois, describes his experience in balancing work and life.  

    Resources

    Incivility and Bullying:  Quick Tips (Reading time: 7 minutes) Knowing When to Escalate:  Quick Tips (Reading time: 2 minutes) Incivility and Bullying:  Annotated Bibliography (Reading time: 10 minutes – Resources for Further Reading) Selected books, research articles, and popular literature for those seeking deeper knowledge on the topics of incivility and bullying.

    Knowing When to Escalate (4:22)

    A department head hears a complaint from a staff member regarding a professor who may be displaying concerning behavior. The head understands this situation will likely require a formal process for handling the complaint; he demonstrates care in how he engages with the staff member, focusing on the facts and remaining calm to defuse her emotional reactions. 

    Michael Loui on Dealing with Academic Misconduct (4:53)

    Michael Loui on Knowing When to Escalate (3:40)

    Andrew Alleyne on Incivility and Bullying (4:12)

    Resources

    Issue Spotting:  Quick Tips (Reading time: 2 minutes)

    Issue Spotting (5:33)

    A school chair meets with an adjunct professor and research team member from another department. They discuss a dispute between the adjunct and a professor in the school chair’s department. The chair identifies the key issues from the adjunct’s perspective and repeats them back to ensure understanding before she gets the other professor’s side of the story.

    Ed Feser on Learning from your Mistakes (4:58)

    Edward Feser, Provost & Executive Vice President at Oregon State University, discusses times when he has learned from his mistakes and how he uses that information going forward.

    Richard Wheeler on Learning from your Mistakes (4:50)

    Richard Wheeler, former Provost at the University of Illinois, talks about mistakes he made and how he tried to learn from them over his career.

    Ruth Watkins on Learning from your Mistakes (3:56)

    Sonya Stephens on Learning from you Mistakes (3:33)

    Resources

    Listening and Asking Questions:  Quick Tips (Reading time: 5 minutes) And Stance: Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) Clarity of Intent:  Quick Tips (Reading time: 3 minutes)

    Communicating Effectively via Email (Expert Video) (3:54)

    Barb Wilson, Executive Vice President and Vice President for Academic Affairs at the University of Illinois, describes good practices in email communication.

    Quality in Presentations (Expert Video) (5:24)

    Rob Rutenbar, Senior Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Pittsburgh, gives advice on putting together an effective presentation.

    Listening to Students (Expert Video) (0:42)

    Barb Wilson, Executive Vice President and Vice President for Academic Affairs at the University of Illinois, explains the importance of active listening in receiving feedback, specifically in the case of students.

    One of the World’s Best Listeners (3:12)

    Andrew Alleyne on the Use of Humor (1:42)

    Credibility (7:35)

    Kendall Zoller, President of Sierra Training Associates, Inc., talks about subtle things we can do to establish credibility among our peers in the moment.

    Building Rapport (3:15)

    Kendall Zoller, President of Sierra Training Associates, Inc., discusses rapport, how to build it and the consequences of breaking it.

    Delivering Difficult News (Demonstration Video) (5:46)

    Kendall Zoller, President of Sierra Training Associates, Inc., demonstrates good techniques and bad techniques for delivering bad news.

    Communication Building Rapport and Trust (6:53)

    Communication Systematic Use of Voice (2:49)

    Communication Cultural Relevance and Specificity (5:52)

    Resources

    Setting Boundaries: Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes)

    Soyna Stephens on Authority and Boundaries (3:02)

    Setting Boundaries (2:49)

    Rob Rutenbar, Senior Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Pittsburgh, discusses the challenges of setting and keeping boundaries in your leadership role.

    Boundaries and Communication (4:59)

    Edward Feser, Provost & Executive Vice President at Oregon State University, on communicating as a leader and setting boundaries.

    Resources

    Understanding Generational Shifts: Quick Tips (Reading time: 6 minutes) Understanding Generational Shifts: Annotated Bibliography (Reading time: 5 minutes) Culture and Diversity – Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) Understanding and Influencing Culture – Executive Briefing (Reading time: 9 minutes) Culture is a complex social reality that is difficult to change, hard to define, multi-layered, and a major influence of behavior and performance. Leaders must attend to their unit cultures, especially guarding against movement towards toxicity. Cultural intelligence is critical for the leader of an academic unit. Understanding and Influencing Culture – Quick Tips (Reading time: 4 minutes) Culture is a complex social reality that is difficult to change, hard to define, multi-layered, and a major influence of behavior and performance. Leaders must attend to their unit cultures, especially guarding against movement towards toxicity. Cultural intelligence is critical for the leader of an academic unit. Creating & Sustaining a Culture of Excellence – Quick Tips (Reading time: 5 minutes) Highly ranked units are almost always characterized by a culture that fosters excellence in student mentoring, instruction, research and service to the university and beyond. Such a culture usually doesn’t occur by accident: it is the product of deliberate actions and cultivation of a particular mindset by both administrative and  faculty leaders.

    Andrew Alleyne on Why Diversity Matters (4:41)

    Andrew Alleyne on Diversity and Productivity (3:57)

    Andrew Alleyne on Making the Case for Diversity (2:34)

    Robert Jones on Managing for Diversity and Inclusion (7:15)

    Robert Jones, the tenth Chancellor of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, talks about Diversity and Inclusion.

    Andrew Alleyne on Managing for Diversity and Inclusion (7:40)

    Andrew Alleyne on Creating a Shared Vision of Excellence (4:50)

    Michael Loui on Creating a Shared Vision of Excellence (3:30)

    Joan Dubinsky on Organizational Culture (4:47)

    NCPRE Illinois/NTU Leadership Retreat

    Leading the Research University of the Future

    20-21 November 2014

    Retreat Themes:

    Data-informed decision making

    Anticipating and managing change

    Strategic Leadership


     
    Thursday 20 November Kavita and Lalit Bahl Meeting Room, 3002 ECEB
    6:00-8:00p Welcome Phyllis Wise, Chancellor, Illinois
    Group Discussion Developing Global Leaderships. Short Remarks and Conversation with Mary Sue Coleman, President Emerita, University of Michigan
    Friday 21 November Kavita and Lalit Bahl Meeting Room, 3002 ECEB
    8:30-9:30a Opening Session Leadership Challenges (group discussion and plenary)
    9:30-10:30a Working Groups Data-Informed Decision Making
    10:30-10:45a Break
    10:45-12:00p Plenary Institutional Integrity. Short Remarks and Conversation with Larry R. Faulkner, President Emeritus, University of Texas
    12:00-1:00p Lunch Open opportunity to interact with colleagues
    1:00-1:15p Background Burst Systematic Factors: The Environment in Which We Operate Brian C. Martinson
    1:15-2:00p Working Groups Anticipating and Managing Change
    2:00-2:15p Plenary Working Group Reports
    2:15-2:30p Break
    2:30-3:00p Plenary Discussion Trends Shaping the Research University of the Future Discussing with Chancellor Wise
    3:00-3:45p Working Groups Strategic Leadership: Implementing Improvement
    3:45-4:00p Plenary Working Group Reports
    4:00-4:15p Background Burst The Changing Role of Universities in Society Mark S. Frankel
    4:15-5:15p Plenary Discussion Strategic Leadershi for Global Research Universities A conversation with leaders: President Coleman, President Faulkner, and Chancellor Wise
    Participants list Biographies of participants Full text of President Larry Faukner’s Speech Full text of Mark Frankel’s Speech

    UNDER CONSTRUCTION … keep checking back for new resources

    Research Ethics

    Research Ethics Best Practices Evaluating Publication Integrity Peer-review Standards for Research Integrity Investigation Reports How to blow the Whistle and still have a career afterwards Available for a limited time.  This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of an article published in Science and Engineering Ethics volume 4, pages 51–64 (1998). The final authenticated version is available online at: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11948-998-0007-0. Preventing the need for Whistleblowing Available for a limited time.  This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of an article published in Science and Engineering Ethics volume 4, pages 75–94 (1998). The final authenticated version is available online at https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11948-998-0010-5.

    Two-Minute Challenges

    Illinois 2 Minute Challange Approach Authorship Research Samples Smoking Gun

    Books

    The Young Professional’s Survival Guide: From Cab Fares to Moral Snares

    Planning Ethically Responsible Research

    National Academy of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine Resources

    Fostering Integrity in Research On Being a Scientist: A Guide to Responsible Conduct in Research

    Talks

    Plenary: Challenges for Institutions and the Public – Advancing Research Integrity by C. K. Gunsalus “Systems Matter: Research Environments and Institutional Integrity” by  C. K. Gunsalus

    About the Leadership Collection

    The Leadership Collection was inspired by, and initiated with support and in collaboration with Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. It is a multi-media library of management and leadership materials curated for academic leaders. The Collection is accessible via the Internet, and is updated regularly. The Collection can be used on a “just in time” basis or as a platform for personal study and reflection. Categories of materials in the collection include:

    Just-in-Time Collection (I need to know now!)

    • Quick Tips
    • Checklists
    • Videos: how to “do it right”

    Leadership Bookcase

    • Resources for the longer-term, travel, and reflection

    Deep-Dive Collection (I am looking for deeper knowledge.)

    • Videos: interviews with, and presentations by, experts and authorities
    • Executive Briefings
    • Curated Articles
    • Annotated Bibliographies
    • Case Studies
    • Self-Assessments
    Leadership Collection resources are research and evidence-based; tailored for the academic environment; and practical. They are built around four leadership competencies Ethical: An ethical leader models, requires, and rewards appropriate professional conduct in personal, interpersonal, and organizational settings. He or she makes principle- and fact-based decisions, seeking consistency among ethical beliefs, values, and conduct. Such a leader encourages exploration of and discussion about the ethical challenges inherent in work life. Strategic: A strategic leader develops and implements long-term goals tied to the organization’s mission. A strategic leader sets SMART (specific, measurable, agreed-upon, realistic, and time-based) goals and aims at achieving long-term goals. Competencies include anticipation of pitfalls, management of budget and resources, prioritizing, use of data to inform decisions, and risk assessment. Influential: An influential leader is a strong communicator, motivating, energizing, and facilitating effective interactions. This leader delegates thoughtfully, provides constructive coaching and mentoring, and conducts meaningful performance evaluations. Influential leaders build strong relationships and use skills of persuasion and negotiation effectively. Adaptive: An adaptive leader uses a range of approaches based on situational needs. Adaptive leaders anticipate, identify, and manage change with flexibility rooted in principled approaches. Adaptive leaders devise creative solutions, implement initiatives, maintain and update their skills and knowledge, and manage stress to be effective leaders of others. © 2016 NCPRE

    Additional Material

    Leadership Collection Overview (PDF) A Brief Introduction to Leadership Essentials (PDF) Leadership Essentials Part 1: Executive Briefing, part I (PDF) Leadership Essentials:  Executive Briefing, part II (PDF) Tools for Leadership – Annotated Bibliography (PDF)

    Videos

    Meet Andrew Alleyne

    Meet Michael Loui

    Meet Rob Rutenbar

    Meet Barb Wilson

    Meet Edward Feser

    Meet Ruth Watkins

    Meet Joan Dubinsky

    Meet BrandE Faupell

    Meet Kendall Zoller

     

    Ethics Awareness Week has changed to Ethics@Illinois Seminar Series. 

    Since 2012 the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has delivered programming to highlight the importance of issues surrounding the responsible conduct of research and contributing to the campus dialog on a topic that involves all students, staff, and faculty who participate in the research enterprise. Starting in 2015, the format changed to offer opportunities throughout the year for units to sponsor events of interest to their communities on Ethics Awareness. The Ethics@Illinois Seminar Series is an initiative of the National Center for Principled Leadership & Research Ethics and is sponsored by the Graduate College and the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research, with support from the Center for Professional Responsibility in Business and Society. View Past Event Programs

    Guidelines on Funding of Ethics Awareness Week activities:

    • The Ethics Awareness Week Fund will pay travel for guests approved by the committee. NCPRE must book the travel.
    • The Ethics Awareness Week Fund will pay lodging for those guests for the nights they are on campus for Ethics Awareness Week events.
    • The Ethics Awareness Week Fund will pay for primary host’s meals and the EAW guests meals on days they are on campus for EAW events.
    • If an event for EAW is planned with student participants and that event includes food, the Ethics Awareness Week Fund could pay for it with prior approval from the committee.
    • The Ethics Awareness Week Fund can/will NOT pay for any alcohol.

    To apply for funding:

    • Submit an anticipated budget to include travel and lodging, meals, honorarium and other miscellaneous expenses
    • Submit a proposed schedule of activities for guest. Include those activities committed to and those proposed. Host must provide avenues for promoting the event and handle distribution of EAW Committee produced promotional material at least one week before the event.
    • NCPRE can provide planning and logistics support for the Ethics Awareness Week event (i.e. room reservations) but the rest of the schedule must be handled by the hosting unit and the guests schedule must be reasonably full. EAW Week Committee members can help with suggestions on cross campus opportunities.
    Proposals should be submitted to NCPRE at: ncpre-source@illinois.edu or 217-333-1416.

    2014 Program

    Monday, March 3 12:00 p.m. – 1:00 p.m. Dr. Linda L.  Layne, Program Director, Ethics Education in Science and Engineering, NSF Cultivating Cultures of Integrity: A New Approach to Ethics Education at NSF Why do students cheat? Are these the same reasons that STEM researchers sometimes engage in research misconduct? How large a problem is this? Why do college honor codes apply to students but not post docs, or faculty, or staff? Why are academic and research integrity treated differently? Are there other ethical dimensions to STEM learning and practice? What kinds of environments promote integrity? Can the lessons of social psychology and anthropology be of use here? Which social norms are communicated to students, faculty and staff about integrity and how? Are there ways they might be communicated more effectively? After funding research and curricular development in ethics education in science and engineering from 2007-2013, the EESE program is changing the focus from funding projects that try to change individual behavior to changing the environment in which STEM education and practice take place.  During this presentation Layne will discuss the context for this change and NSF’s plans for this new cross-directorate initiative. Thursday, March 6 4:00 p.m. – 5:30 p.m. Dr. Dale Jamieson, Professor of Environmental Studies and Philosophy, Affiliated Professor of Law and Director of the Animal Studies Initiative New York University Grass fed environmentalism: Living responsibly in the Anhropocene A critical modern assumption is that humans are the only species to possess moral value. Is this morally defensible? We’ll explore the considerable differences between animal-welfare and ecological modes of thought, while paying attention generally to the many ways we benefit from other life forms and how we might best think about them. As we’ll see, our varied reasons for wanting to conserve other life forms can lead to widely differing policies and actions In conjunction with the Campus Series on the Scholarship of Sustainability.
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    banner-at-Jamieson_web
         
    Jamieson-McKim
    Jamieson-McKim

    2013 Program

    Monday, October 14 11:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m., Class lectures for CMN 280 and CEE 595S Sarah Pfatteicher, University of Wisconsin-Madison Author of “Lessons amid the Rubble: An Introduction to Post-Disaster Engineering and Ethics” 4:00 p.m. Ethical Issues that Teachers Face in the Classroom – Panel Discussion Panelists:
    • Lorenzo Baber, College of Education
    • Michael Robson Graduate TA, Computer Science
    • Genevieve Hendricks, Graduate TA, Psychology
    7:00 p.m. Movie – “Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room” Tuesday, October 15 3:30 p.m. – 5:00 p.m. Conflict of Ethics Issues Surrounding Open Access – Panel Discussion Panelists:
    • John Wilkin, University Librarian/Dean of Libraries
    • Alex Scheeline, Emeriti Faculty, Chemistry
    • Roy Campbell, Computer Science
    Wednesday, October 16 11:30 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. UI Faculty Ethics Summit Thursday, October 17 5:00 p.m. – 6:30 p.m. Ask the Expert – Panel Discussion Panelists:
    • C.K. Gunsalus, Director, NCPRE
    • Gretchen Winter, Director, CPRBS
    • E.J. Donaghey, President/CEO, UIECU
    Friday, October 18 8:45 a.m. – 11:50 a.m. Class Lecture for Business 101 Jared Harris, Associate Professor, UVA Darden School of Business 1:30 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. COB Seminar Jared Harris, Associate Professor, UVA Darden School of Business _______________________________________________________________________________________

    2012 Program

    Monday, October 8 12:15 PM Getting from Regulatory Compliance to Genuine Integrity: Have You Looked Upstream? Brian Martinson, Health Partners Sr. Research Investigator and Director of Science Programs. Openings remarks by Debasish Dutta, Dean of the Graduate College Much of the discourse on research integrity has been driven by a narrative focused on individual researchers who have acted in bad faith, consistent with a conception of research integrity as a property inherent to, or lacking in, the individual. In contrast to this very down-stream looking perspective, Dr. Martinson has been interested in looking upstream, considering research integrity as a function of the ways in which individual researchers interact with one another, with the institutions that employ them, and with the systems of regulation, resource allocation and publication that define the science enterprise. Just as an engineer may be concerned with threats to the “structural integrity” of a building, Dr. Martinson has been concerned with understanding threats to the structural integrity of the science enterprise. In this talk, Dr. Martinson will present some alternative ways of thinking about research integrity, and how to foster and sustain it. In doing so, he will touch on some of the ways he sees current enterprises as being deficient in maintaining the structural integrity of science. Dr. Martinson will also describe some of his own ongoing work to help institutions do what they can to address some of these deficiencies. Specifically, he will discuss his group’s recently validated tool, the Survey of Organizational Research climates, which allows research institutions to collect reliable, valid, and actionable data to stimulate internal discussions, education, training and other initiatives to promote research integrity. 4:00 PM Being Good, Doing Good, and Feeling Good: What It Means to be a Socially Responsible Scientist Mark Frankel, Director of Scientific Responsibility, Human Rights and Law Program, American Association for the Advancement of Science. Opening remarks by Peter Schiffer, Vice Chancellor for Research. There is still some debate about the place of “social responsibility” in the context of research ethics. There are those who believe it should remain outside the realm of research ethics because the latter should focus only on the conduct of research and not on its application. This talk addresses why social responsibility belongs under the umbrella of research ethics and the Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR), and goes further to argue that researchers MUST embrace social responsibility as part of their training and ethos. It will offer concrete examples of how scientists can usefully discharge those responsibilities. Tuesday, October 9 12:00 PM The Practice of Ethics in Classroom Teaching Illinois faculty instructors from a variety of disciplines will share strategic and practical strategies for creating classroom atmosphere that result from ethical behavior on the part of instructors. Questions will be answered about the connection between teacher behaviors that promote academic behaviors on the part of students. It is the goal of the panel to begin ongoing campus-wide dialogues on issues of faculty responsibilities for demonstrating basic ethical behaviors that promote learning. Panelists:
    • Lucas Anderson, Center for Teaching Excellence
    • Joseph Hinchcliffe, Political Science
    • Celia Mathews Elliott, Physics
    • Gretchen Winter, J.D., Center for Professional Responsibility in Business and Society
    1:00 PM Academic Integrity: Values and Vision for a Modern University Panel led by Charles Tucker, Associate Dean, College of Engineering Cheating and plagiarism are time-honored (or dis-honored) activities on virtually every campus, but technology and shifting societal norms seem to be changing the game. Computers have made some forms of cheating as easy as point-and-click, at the same time that they have offered the prospect of automating the detection of cheating. Students in many disciplines are routinely encouraged to study in groups – and may subsequently be punished for turning in homework that is too similar to that of another student. Traditional notions about citing sources in written work may seem passé to students whose media world blurs the boundaries between facts, opinion, and entertainment. Against this background, members of the panel will discuss the meaning and value of student academic integrity. They will explore the viewpoints and experiences of students and faculty on our campus; speak to the reasons for having academic integrity standards; and ask how this should inform our approach to teaching and learning in today’s world. Panelists will be challenged to articulate a vision for what academic integrity can be, and should be, on our campus. Panelists:
    • Charles Tucker III, Mechanical Science and Engineering
    • Cinda Hereen, Computer Science
    • Paul Prior, Center for Writing Studies and Department of English
    • Steven Michael, Business Administration
    • Jenny Roderick, Aerospace Engineering
    4:00 PM When is Reproducibility an Ethical Issue? Genomics, Personalized Medicine, and Human Error Keith Baggerly, Professor of Bioinformatics and Computational Biology, Univ. Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center Modern high-throughput biological assays let us ask detailed questions about how diseases operate, and promise to let us personalize therapy. Careful data processing is essential, because our intuition about what the answers “should” look like is very poor when we have to juggle thousands of things at once. Unfortunately, documentation of precisely what was done is often lacking. When such documentation is absent, we must apply “forensic bioinformatics” to infer from the raw data and reported results what the methods must have been. The issues are basic, but the implications are far from trivial. Dr. Baggerly will examine several related papers purporting to use microarray-based signatures of drug sensitivity derived from cell lines to predict patient response. Patients in clinical trials were allocated to treatment arms on the basis of these results. However, in several case studies, the results incorporate several simple errors that may have put patients at risk. One theme that emerges is that the most common errors are simple (e.g., row or column offsets); conversely, it is Dr. Baggerly and his colleagues’ experience that the most simple errors are common. Dr. Baggerly will briefly discuss steps they are taking to avoid such errors in their own investigations, and discuss reproducible research efforts more broadly. Wednesday, October 10 1:00 PM When IRBs Do Not Agree: On Campus, Across Universities, Internationally Panel led by Nicholas Burbules, Professor of Educational Policy Studies Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval is a requirement for virtually all research involving human subjects. But there are challenges confronting IRB review in three types of collaborative settings: interdisciplinary research within an institution, research that spans different institutions with multiple IRBs, and international research that involves other countries with different research traditions. How can researchers navigate these tricky waters? Panelists:
    • Nicholas Burbules, Education
    • Anita Balgopal, Director of University of Illinois Institutional Review Board
    • Virgil Varvel, Center for Informatics Research in Science and Scholarship
    • John Laughlin, Communication
    4:00 PM Ethics and the Welfare of the Physics Profession Kate Kirby, Executive Officer of the American Physical Society In 2002, several prominent cases of data falsification were discovered in physics papers published in leading journals. The situation prompted the American Physical Society (APS) to form a Task Force on Ethics to understand better how ethics education takes place in the physics community. By surveying the APS community, in particular the junior members, the Task Force received a lot of information on ethics concerns. Dr. Kirby will report on APS Ethics activities since 2004 and describe some of the resources which are available. 6:00 PM (Pre-Performance Reception); 7:00PM Performance Staged reading of Oleanna, with post-performance discussion led by Richard Wheeler, Visiting Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs, and Kathleen Conlin, Professor of Theater A compelling and thought-provoking play by David Mamet about interactions between a faculty member and student. A student comes to her professor with questions about the course material, but misunderstandings and misjudgments lead to rising conflict between them. Dick Wheeler and Professor Kathleen will lead discussion of the play immediately after the reading. Thursday, October 11 12:00 PM The University Ethics Office: How It Works and What It Does Donna McNeely, Ethics Officer for the University of Illinois On a shoestring budget and with only two employees, the University Ethics Office is responsible for management of the University-wide Help Line, annual ethics training for the nine public universities in Illinois, and internal ethics related investigations. This is your opportunity to learn more and ask some of the questions that you’ve always wondered about but never had the opportunity to ask. 1:00 PM Ethics of Animal Research: Rights-Based and Care-Based Perspectives Panel discussion with Professors Janeen Johnson and Matt Wheeler, and moderated by Nicholas Burbules Animal welfare proponents believe “that animals are sentient and that humans are their stewards.” Animals can be harmed but they can be benefited as well. Ethics demands that we attempt to achieve a balance of humans’ and animals’ benefits and harms. Animal rights activists believe that animals have basic moral rights and therefore cannot be treated as simple entities to serve the ends of others. These opposing sides of the ethical spectrum will be discussed. Panelists:
    • Janeen L. Salak-Johnson, Animal Sciences
    • Matt Wheeler, Animal Sciences, Institute for Genomic Biology, and Beckman Institute
    • Nicholas Burbules, Education
    6:00 PM Ask an Expert Panel: Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire: Honest Answers to All Your Ethical Dilemmas Sponsored by the Ethics CORE Student Advisory Committee Have you ever encountered a problem that made you uncomfortable, that you felt just wasn’t right, and that weren’t sure how to handle? Have you ever been put on the spot by a boss or friend asking you to do something you weren’t comfortable doing? Watched people around you take actions you weren’t sure were right, but not been sure what to do? What if you get up the courage to say something and the response to your objections is “everybody does it”? What if everybody else is doing it? We want this event to be as useful as possible for real-world problems and are thus hoping to collect a wide range of dilemmas for discussion. At the panel, we will discuss representative dilemmas and our panel of experts will talk about ways to handle each one, including resources that can help students work through the issues. To make the panel directly relevant to students on our campus, we are seeking submissions of real ethical dilemmas experienced by students. The submission form is confidential and the dilemmas will be kept anonymous in the panel discussion. Friday, October 12 10:00 AM It’s Not Just Privacy, Porn, and Pipe-bombs: Libraries and the Ethics of Service Lane Wilkinson, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga As professionals, librarians have developed robust codes of ethics that, paradoxically, have little to do with professionalism; our professional codes of ethics function as broad values that are largely silent when it comes to moral decision-making at the point of service. Conversely, most extant discussions of ethical library service tend to focus strictly on extreme examples such as bomb-making, suicide, or pornography, despite the fact that the vast majority of our professional dilemmas are rather mundane: whether or not to give out the wireless password, whether to waive a fine, or when to withhold information in pursuit of a teachable moment. Drawing on the nature of the professional-client relationship, this talk will provide a framework for ethical library service based on the principles of respect for autonomy, fiduciary responsibility, and justice. 11:00 AM Rotten Apples or a Rotting Barrel: Challenging the Orthodoxy of Liberal and Methodological Individualism Susan S. Silbey, Professor of Humanities and Sociology & Anthropology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Crises of corporate and professional responsibility have been endemic to American society, at least since the last quarter of the nineteenth century. With each chapter of professional misconduct, the explanation has been the same: Professional and corporate misconduct are problems caused by some few weak, uninformed, or misguided individuals making poor choices. A few rotten apples are giving the barrel a bad name. In contrast to the traditional conception, I suggest that professional and corporate misconduct derives, at least in part, from features of the organizations and social settings in which they take place. Those situations and settings provide both the opportunities and incentives for misconduct. The barrels have particular shapes and not all barrels produce the same kind or amount of rot. A more empirically derived approach to understanding ethics and corporate, social and professional responsibility analyzes those settings, the opportunities, incentives, and constraints they provide for conforming or norm violating behavior. This talk identifies cultural and structural features of contemporary American society that undermines ethical behavior and fosters professional misconduct. 12:00 PM Fundamentals of Scholarly and Research Integrity Ken Pimple, Director of Teaching Research Ethics Program at the Poynter Center, Indiana University. Sponsored by the NCPRE Student Advisory Committee
    The National Center for Principled Leadership & Research Ethics (NCPRE) at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is offering a post-doctoral fellowship for Ph.Ds in a range of fields, as we build leadership development programs focusing on those in research environments, with some emphasis on STEM fields. Full description here.. We are always interested in hearing from graduate students at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign with relevant backgrounds. If you are interested in joining us, please email us, ethicsctr@illinois.edu.
    The National Center for Principled Leadership & Research Ethics (NCPRE) at the University of Illinois is collaborating with Nanyang Technological University (NTU) to conduct research, develop and deliver curricula, provide guidance and create tools with the goal of preparing future University leaders who are prepared to deal with complex issues, drawing on evidence-based practices. As part of this effort, we have developed the Leadership Collection, a curated collection of quick tips, briefings, videos, bibliographies and more to help you learn to become a leader or train future leaders for your organization. It includes resources when you need something right now and resources for reflection and personal study. We have also recently completed a white paper on how to develop academic leaders for your unit. The document, entitled Academic Leadership Development, Critical Capabilities at the Department Level, comes out of the Confronting Challenges in Academic Units (CCAU) Consortium and was developed by NCPRE for the CCAU consortium to help departments critical capabilities in developing leadership for their units. NTU and Illinois aim to establish collaboration on NTU’s signature NTU Leadership Academy (NTULA) to make it the premiere program in Asia for the leaders of global research universities of the future. The program incorporates an evidence-based approach that includes the skills of data analysis and interpretation to support university decision-making, a capacity to operate in diverse national and international contexts across a global scale with ethical sensitivity and integrity, and leadership competencies that can lead a university through issues of strategic planning, research and professional integrity, curricular and pedagogical innovation, and cooperative, collegial governance.

    The 2014 Curriculum Conference was held May 28-29, 2014, and focused on exploring success stories in industry and academia, with the idea of cross-fertilizing where applicable. The conference was held at the Coordinated Science Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the administrative home of NCPRE.

    2014 Planning Committee

    Brock Barry, USMA Stephanie Bird, MIT Douglas Harper, Deloitte Kelly Laas, Illinois Institute of Technology Justin Louder, Texas Tech Terry May, Michigan Sate University Lyn Scrine, Allstate Wallace Wood, Tina Wyder, Accenture

    2014 Agenda (tentative)

    Theme: Factors that Influence Individual and Organizational Choices: What Changes Can We Make to Support the Integrity of our Work? Day One: Wednesday, May 28th 10:00 – 11:45 a.m. – Welcome/Introductions/Icebreaker  11:45 – Noon – Break 11:45 – 1:30 p.m. – Lunch & Keynote: James Lang Presentation Title: “What We Know About Cheating: What We Can Learn From It” 1:45 – 3:45 p.m. – Group Book Discussion: Learning from Dishonesty Application/extrapolation of Lang’s work to individual experience, sector, area 3:45 – 4:00 p.m. – Break (snacks provided) 4:00 – 5:00 p.m. – Sharing our Work
    • Justin Louder – TTU project: peer groups/academic integrity survey
    • Doug Adams – Criminology ethics aspect
    • E.J. Donaghey/training staff – Financial literacy
    • C.K. Gunsalus/G. Winter – Peer Leadership & SORC as ways to influence choices and support organizational integrity
    6:00 – 8:00 p.m. – Dinner & Keynote (Illini Union): Kathleen Edmond Presentation Title: “The Importance of Culture to Sustaining Organizational Integrity” Day Two: Thursday, May 29th 8:30 – 10:30 a.m. – In-Depth Discussion with Keynote Speakers – J. Lang & K. Edmond:
    • Can we apply “Cheating Lessons” insights to the research and corporate environments?
    • How can we nudge people towards individual and organizational integrity with environments/systems?
    • How can we use social media to enhance individual and organizational integrity?
    10:30 – 10:45 a.m. – Break 10:45 – Noon – Connecting Silos: How can research and our experiences help us help people be their best selves? What did we learn? What research and/or information is needed to build on these ideas? Noon – 1:00 p.m. – Lunch  (Beckman Institute) 1:00 – 3:15 p.m. – Participant Roundtable Forum (8-10 participant presentations; 10-15-min each, including discussion) 3:15 – 4:00 p.m. – Closing/Evaluation/Adjournment

    2014 Planning Committee

    Brock Barry, USMA Stephanie Bird, MIT Douglas Harper, Deloitte Kelly Laas, Illinois Institute of Technology Justin Louder, Texas Tech Terry May, Michigan Sate University Lyn Scrine, Allstate Wallace Wood, Tina Wyder, Accenture

    2014 Agenda (tentative)

    Theme: Factors that Influence Individual and Organizational Choices: What Changes Can We Make to Support the Integrity of our Work? Day One: Wednesday, May 28th 10:00 – 11:45 a.m. – Welcome/Introductions/Icebreaker 11:45 – Noon – Break 11:45 – 1:30 p.m. – Lunch & Keynote: James Lang Presentation Title: “What We Know About Cheating: What We Can Learn From It” 1:45 – 3:45 p.m. – Group Book Discussion: Learning from Dishonesty Application/extrapolation of Lang’s work to individual experience, sector, area 3:45 – 4:00 p.m. – Break (snacks provided) 4:00 – 5:00 p.m. – Sharing our Work
    • Justin Louder – TTU project: peer groups/academic integrity survey
    • Doug Adams – Criminology ethics aspect
    • E.J. Donaghey/training staff – Financial literacy
    • C.K. Gunsalus/G. Winter – Peer Leadership & SORC as ways to influence choices and support organizational integrity
    6:00 – 8:00 p.m. – Dinner & Keynote (Illini Union): Kathleen Edmond Presentation Title: “The Importance of Culture to Sustaining Organizational Integrity” Day Two: Thursday, May 29th 8:30 – 10:30 a.m. – In-Depth Discussion with Keynote Speakers – J. Lang & K. Edmond:
    • Can we apply “Cheating Lessons” insights to the research and corporate environments?
    • How can we nudge people towards individual and organizational integrity with environments/systems?
    • How can we use social media to enhance individual and organizational integrity?
    10:30 – 10:45 a.m. – Break 10:45 – Noon – Connecting Silos: How can research and our experiences help us help people be their best selves? What did we learn? What research and/or information is needed to build on these ideas? Noon – 1:00 p.m. – Lunch  (Beckman Institute) 1:00 – 3:15 p.m. – Participant Roundtable Forum (8-10 participant presentations; 10-15-min each, including discussion) 3:15 – 4:00 p.m. – Closing/Evaluation/Adjournment

    Connecting Silos: Sharing Ideas and Best Practices in the Teaching of Professional & Research Ethics

    A conference to explore innovative ways to educate about ethical and professional responsibility

    The annual Connecting Silos conference is designed to bring together a small, balanced group of researchers and practitioners from across disciplines to share best approaches for teaching ethics. All too often, we tend to be isolated in our own silos, talking only to those from our own disciplines and backgrounds. This conference aims to bridge disciplines and bring together an array of professionals devoted to teaching responsible professional best practice across fields.  From ethics faculty in business and law to faculty who teach research ethics, and including practitioners from the corporate world, this annual invitational event is interactive, focused on sharing expertise, techniques, perspectives, and curricular materials. Our experience is that this participatory model allows attendees to learn from one another and take away new ideas for use in teaching,  enriching all of our approaches to teaching approaches in the areas of ethics and professional responsibility.

    Our sixth Connecting Silos Curriculum Conference took place on Wednesday, May 29 and Thursday, May 30, 2019, at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.  Through our discussions and keynote addresses, we explored innovative ways to educate university students about ethical and professional responsibility matters. Our goal in 2019 was to explore environmental and climate issues related to power abuses, bullying, and sexual harassment—and how those of us who teach or exhort for ethics, whether in research or in professional schools, should incorporate these topics more effectively in our curricula and programs. Click here to see the 2019 conference report. The conference is jointly sponsored by the Center for Professional Responsibility in Business and Society (CPRBS) and NCPREFor more information, please contact NCPRE at: ethicsctr@illinois.edu or 217-333-1416.
    The NCPRE Confronting Challenges in Academic Units (CCAU) consortium offers support for institutions in dealing with units that are troubled or challenged in their ability to function effectively.  Consortium resources help identify the features that characterize flourishing academic units and the ways in which academic units can develop these difficulties. The CCAU consortium offers, among other resources, early-warning indicators for identifying challenges before they become incapacitating, as well as approaches and solutions for addressing those challenges. Building on our experience in academic administration and leadership, NCPRE supports the Consortium in developing concepts, labels, tools, and approaches for dealing with challenges in a principled, pragmatic, and effective manner. Through membership, institutions gain access to NCPRE resources and strategies, as well as the opportunity to work with NCPRE staff and affiliated experts in invitation-only working conferences for institutional leaders who are dealing with challenged units and who want effective strategies for tackling these challenges. Each conference includes a limited number of selected attendees who bring their experience and wisdom to collaborative discussions on the challenges faced.  Participants are guided through the development of problem-focused strategies based on our experience with effective practices, tailored to the particulars of each case. Our collective aim is for participants to leave with actionable strategies for the problems they face. The cornerstone of our work with challenged academic units is the Academic Unit Diagnostic Tool, or AUDiT.  For a snapshot view of the AUDiT, click here. Conferences take place in Chicago in the spring.  For more information, please contact us at ncpre-source@illinois.edu or 217-333-1416, or follow us on Twitter, @ncprenews. Check out our new TRAGEDIES video:
    NCPRE offers programs and events to help current and emerging university leaders develop effective leadership strategies and respond to the common challenges faced by academic units. Select a page from the menu above to learn more.
    NCPRE is pleased to offer a number of programs and events that enhance ethics education and awareness for students and researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, along with other academic institutions and companies.

    Become a Certified Instructor of RCR for your Institution

    The Teaching Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) Certificate program features hands-on, high-quality instruction in best teaching practices, and will produce a cohort of qualified faculty of the future with RCR expertise and enrich RCR offerings on our campuses. NCPRE intends that the TRCR certificate will become a mark of distinction for those completing the program, contributing to changing the dynamic for faculty development. To learn more about the Teaching RCR Certificate program, please contact us at: ncpre-source@illinois.edu or 217-333-1416.

    Excellence in Academic Leadership

    The National Center for Principled Leadership & Research Ethics (NCPRE) administers cohorts for online leadership programs tailored to the needs of academic leaders and other participants. We have offered workshops with a number of academic institutions and we also welcome applications from cohorts based in disciplinary societies. Participants have reported acquiring knowledge, mastering practical skills, gaining confidence, and building sustaining networks. Academic Leadership in Challenging Times is a professional development program focused on leadership skills for the special challenges of the contemporary academic environment. We promote individual and group problem-solving skills, and we foster the development of community. Over the course of an academic year, we hold synchronous sessions online, using a cohort model, as well as asynchronous activities that can be completed within a flexible time schedule. This model, with defined groups participating over an extended period, builds skills and provides ongoing opportunities for learning and practicing those skills. It fosters the development of trust and connections among cohort members.

    Academic Leadership Development

    Within the framework of the Grainger College of Engineering Professional Development series, NCPRE is offering its acclaimed Academic Leadership workshop in Chicago (date TBC).  Intentional and Thoughtful Professional Development is a two-day interactive workshop that any academic leader will find valuable.  Participants will leave with new insight into the fundamental skills required for effective leadership in an academic context; with improved leadership abilities; and with a clear understanding of their individual strengths and areas for action. For more details, please contact NCPRE at ethicsctr@illinois.edu.

    Professional IQ: Preventing and Solving Problems at Work

    NCPRE is proud to offer online instruction for professionals interested in ethics and leadership. The 4-course series, “Professional IQ: Preventing and Solving Problems at Work,” is targeted towards people who are seeking or starting new jobs; who are facing dilemmas in their current job; who have just been promoted or who want to be more marketable for a promotion; or who possesses strong technical skills and want to develop leadership skills. The course series is available now as a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) through Coursera. In the series, learners use real-world dilemmas and ethical problems experienced by professionals around the world to clarify and articulate their personal values as a foundation for the issues they face. Successful people use these skills every day: making strong decisions; recognizing and avoiding career-damaging pitfalls; preventing and resolving conflicts so as to be value-added members of teams; knowing how and when to apologize effectively; knowing how to ask constructive questions that advance work; and honing leadership skills—whether for being influential at work or holding a position of authority. Our position is that these are essential skills for succeeding at work. They are skills that employers value, while often being underemphasized in standard professional curricula. Furthermore, who you are, how you do things, how you interact with others, and how you lead are all underpinned by your personal ethics. In short, ethics are necessary, not just nice; smart ethics, as we define them, are integral to success. The lectures and course materials focus on familiar, ordinary situations that any person might encounter in the workplace and how to cope with them. As learners work through the course materials, they will explore their values and personal “brands” and reflect on how their personal commitments and convictions prepare them for workplace success. Learners will be exposed to—and learn to avoid or prevent—career pitfalls that lead to the firing of as much as forty percent of new college hires. Learners will practice communication and other skills that will position them as value-added team members and collaborators, preparing them not only for workplace encounters, but similar problems arising in other areas of life. The course is open to any learner and accepts new learners on a rolling basis. More information on the course and on how to enroll is available at this link.

    Courses in the Series

    Course 1: Foundations of Professional Identity

    Many find themselves frustrated in their careers by lack of preparation for dealing with predictable dilemmas that regularly arise in the world of work. Two in five professionals fired in their jobs after college are terminated for lying or misuse of technology. Easy to avoid! Or is it? What if you find you have to compromise your values to keep your job? What if they ask you to lie or cheat, even though you know if you are found out you will be fired? What if you find out the company is breaking the law? Successful people know about and have the skills taught in this specialization.

    Course 2: Shaping Your Professional Brand

    You’ve thought about who you are and how you want your career to be. You have some skills to deal with situations that could cause problems. What about the team around you? How do you build functional and constructive professional relationships? How can you add value? What do employers look for when they are promoting? Skill-building in this course will include asking questions, listening, developing likeability (you’d better be stellar if you’re difficult), identifying cognitive bias, apologizing, receiving apologies, and the basics of whistleblowing.

    Course 3: Leadership and Influence

    The only thing you get to change is yourself, and in the prerequisites to this course we’ve given you real tools to do that. Now, use those tools to influence the course of your future, your team’s future, and your organization’s future. Make a plan for yourself that will help you help others, while learning skills to make it happen. Listening and being sure of your values underpins all leadership skills and being a professional influencer. We’ll go on to look at self-assessment and leadership planning, negotiation, addressing and resolving conflict, and successfully identifying and promoting circumstances you want.

    Course 4: Professional IQ Capstone

    The capstone project, for those wishing to earn a certificate, is to design a Personal Leadership Credo: personal values, quotes and beliefs; a personal dilemma in 2-Minute Challenge style that gets worked through using the Decision-Making Framework (DMF) and TRAGEDIES model; some personal scripts; and a personal leadership development plan.

    High School Ethics Education Outreach Program

    A recent national survey finds one in three American high school students stealing from a store in the past year; two in five lying to save money; and eight out of ten lying to their parents. A majority (59%) admit cheating on a test, with one in three acknowledging using the Internet to plagiarize an assignment (Josephson Institute of Ethics, 2011). The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is the home of the National Center for Professional and Research Ethics (NCPRE), which serves as a national resource for best practices, educational materials, scholarly literature and other tools for ethics education. The High School Ethics Education Outreach Program connects, engages and embeds University of Illinois undergraduates with local high school students. Under faculty guidance, undergraduates lead workshops on key ethical issues facing high schoolers, providing tools to articulate values and act ethically even in the face of conflicting messages and peer pressure. It provides opportunities for NCPRE to collaborate with and engage local schools in the development of effective ethics education. The most recent report on the program can be found here. The program is conducted over the course of the Fall & Spring semesters each year. Area sophomores/junior high school students attend one ethics education session per month during each semester (Fall – September, October, November: Spring – February, March, April); these 6 sessions focus on practical approaches to ethical consequences, rules and character. NCPRE Certificates of Completion are offered to high school students (for use as part of their college admissions packet). The curriculum is tailored to high school students and is adapted with permission from courses on campus such as Business 101: An Introduction to Professional Responsibility and ECE 316: Ethics and Engineering. The focus with high school students is on tools and takeaways, and is designed to be highly interactive. Every session will begin with a “Two-Minute Challenge” (2MC), a pedagogy developed to be effective with this age group. Each 2MC explores issues students encounter in real life (i.e., a friend calling at midnight asking to see a paper or homework due the next morning…) Below is the general outline of the high school sessions (they will include the ethical areas that affect teenagers – lying, cheating at school, telling on a friend, and peer pressure):

    • September: What is an ethical issue? Why does it matter? Introduce 2MCs, student leaders, and the purpose of the program

    • October: Values exercise – what do you value, and why?

    • November: Communities – in which communities do we live and operate (school,family, friends, soccer team, etc.) What are the rules and responsibilities for each?

    • February: Never list (what would you NEVER do); introduce personal scripts.  (Students practice responses and have them “at the ready” for when ethical issues arise.)

    • March: Practice more personal scripts; begin discussion of defining moments in life; and brainstorm ideas for final projects.

    • April: Practice Final Project and plan (The Capstone Project will have high school students taking what they’ve learned to design/perform skits based on 2MCs at middle schools, coached by the undergraduate leaders.)

    This project has short–term and long-term potential in: 1) working with teenagers who often ask for help in determining how to navigate ethically in their world; 2) disseminating and sharing learning strategies for ethics education; 3) using “supplemental instruction” (students learning by teaching) as high school students working with middle-school students; and 4) tapping into university faculty ethics expertise and experience – collecting views, information and ideas that may contribute to the process of improving ethics education for both undergraduate and high school students.

    Illinois Ethics Leadership – Presented by C. K. Gunsalus, January 6, 2018

    See the Prezi

    World Conference on Research Integrity, May 28-31, 2017

    Read a Storify by Matt Hodgkinson here

    National Academy of Sciences Arthur M. Sackler Colloquium, March 8-10, 2017

    Watch C. K. Gunsalus’ presentation here Other highlights from the event are here

    insidehighered.com – Dealing with Dysfunctional Departments, March 22, 2017

    Read the essay here

    Leading the Research University of the Future Leadership Retreat, November 20-21, 2014

    2014 Program

    Undergraduate Ethics Curriculum Conference, May 28-29, 2014

    2014 Program

    Ethics@Illinois Seminar Series

    2014 News Release Agendas from Previous Years

    Confronting Challenges In Academic Units Conference (March 2022: Chicago, IL)

    Our CCAU consortium provides resources and a framework for university leaders and faculty from universities across the country to address and work through specific issues or difficulties in a challenged academic unit. Our 2022 workshop will be held in Chicago this upcoming March 30-31st. At the conference, we provide context on dealing with challenged academic units, a data- and evidence-based framework, and extended sessions moderated by experienced leaders to help each attending group work through their own situation in a confidential setting with guidance available to develop clear, actionable strategies for restoring academic units to health and vibrancy. Please contact us at ethicsctr@illinois.edu or 217-333-1416 to learn more and reserve your space.

    “Connecting Silos” Conference (May 2019: Urbana, IL)

    On May 29 and 30, the Center for Professional Responsibility in Business and Society, together with the National Center for Professional and Research Ethics will host the sixth “Connecting Silos” conference on campus. Please join us as we share approaches to teaching and managing ethical and professional responsibilities with faculty and business leaders from institutions from across the country. This year’s theme is the interrelationship between organizational culture and power abuses, with a focus on bullying and sexual harassment. Contact us to register: ethicsctr@illinois.edu.

    Goals and Features of the online Ethics portal

    Online Forums

    Ethics CORE features interlocking social networking communities, including those for journal editors, principal investigators, research integrity officers, ethics instructors, students, administrators, researchers and more. The forums enable users to network with peers who face similar challenges and to solicit advice on best practices. The purpose is to arm professionals and researchers with the support they need to make the right decisions every day.

    Library

    Ethics CORE is an online library that gathers information on ethics from academic journals, news articles, curricula and other sources in one place. In addition, the site will utilize sophisticated tools, including federated search technologies, digital preservation software, user ratings and metrics, natural language search and discovery functions and an online document delivery system to provide users with licensed materials available through the University of Illinois Library system.

    Encyclopedia

    In collaboration with its partners, NCPRE is creating a collection of peer-reviewed encyclopedia articles on central topics in professional and research ethics and ethics pedagogy. The articles are revised periodically and are posted on Ethics CORE.

    Best Practices

    The Center will provide examples of best practices for researchers, administrators and instructors, such as sample informed consent forms for different kinds of research projects, model procedures for handling allegations of research misconduct, recommended policies for handling plagiarism and duplicate publication in journals, and examples of effective instructional methods. These are available on Ethics CORE, or you may contact NCPRE for more information.

    Instructional Materials

    NCPRE, through Ethics CORE, enables contributors to share materials for teaching professional and research ethics, such as course syllabi, text cases with instructors’ guides, video cases with commentaries and assignments for students.

    NCPRE is located in the University of Illinois Coordinated Science Laboratory.

    1308 West Main Street Urbana, IL 61801  
    The Leadership Collection was inspired by, and initiated with support from and in collaboration with Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. The Collection is a multi-media library of management and leadership materials curated for academic leaders, and is updated regularly with new resources. It can be used on a “just in time” basis (“I need to know now!”) or as a platform for personal study and reflection. Some photos on this page courtesy of the Jopwell collection Follow us on Twitter @ncprenews or check out #leadershipcollection to stay informed about our monthly updates.
    The Survey of Organizational Research Climate (SOURCE) is the only validated instrument specifically designed to measure empirically the climate of research integrity in academic organizations. It collects confidential responses from participants; responses have been shown to correlate with self-reported behavior in the conduct of research, so the SOURCE provides a snapshot of program and unit microclimates through the aggregated perspectives of their members. Its use also contributes to the overall climate for research integrity by contributing de-identified data to a national comparison database. For an insight into how SOURCE results relate to institutional research integrity, please see this Nature article on the subject. For our newest white paper on developing academic leaders, see Academic Leadership Development, Critical Capabilities at the Department Level. Results can help individual academic and research institutions:
    • characterize and compare departmental research integrity climates,
    • assess the efficacy of educational and mentoring approaches,
    • detect where research policies or practices (e.g., concerning data management, etc.) might need attention through responsible conduct of research (RCR) instruction,
    • document and demonstrate for research sponsors institutional commitment to research integrity and RCR education,
    • and justify enhanced efforts to foster a climate of integrity education and quality research.
    Running the SOURCE at intervals of two to four years will demonstrate a commitment to improving the research integrity climate and provide data to assess its effectiveness over time. The survey contains 32 items (5 point Likert scales) plus classification information about respondents (rank, departmental affiliation, type of highest degree). It takes 10-15 minutes to complete online. In addition to enabling confidential institution-specific reports on units and the campus as a whole, de-identified data will be compiled in a national comparison database so that the community as a whole may benefit. The norming initiative will permit home institution departments to be appropriately assessed with respect to other comparable units in the same discipline or endeavors.

    How can you and your university run the SOURCE?

    An organization that wishes to run the SOURCE can make arrangements to do so with the University of Illinois’ National Center for Professional and Research Ethics (NCPRE). The license fee is based on the number of proposed organizational units and level of support desired in interpretation and analysis. Once the license with NCPRE is in place, an institution provides emails and names of participants with departmental affiliations and status (graduate student, post-doc, faculty member). NCPRE manages the survey administration. The NCPRE SOURCE team sends emails via institutional email addresses seeking survey participation and follows up with reminders over a 4 week period.  Response rates during previous studies have ranged from 15-50%. The NCPRE SOURCE team provides analyses used to generate the summary reports for the contracting institution. As part of building a national “norming” database for providing comparative data, NCPRE retains de-identified information with limited demographics for comparison and benchmark purposes. More detailed information on the procedures involved in implementing SOURCE at your institution can be found here. If we can answer any questions for you, please contact us at: ncpre-source@illinois.edu or 217-333-1416.
    Developing values-driven, effective leaders and advancing institutional integrity through intentional professional development The National Center for Principled Leadership & Research Ethics (NCPRE) is dedicated to creating and supporting academic cultures of excellence: excellence in mission quality; excellence in exemplary leadership; and excellence in ethical and responsible conduct. NCPRE is housed in the Coordinated Science Laboratory in the College of Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. We started with an NSF-funded project in scientific research ethics, and have come to see that fostering an ethical climate is inseparable from a wider culture of institutional integrity and principled, effective leadership. For us, leadership—and particularly ethical leadership—is a key component of setting institutional tone and promoting excellence in professional interactions and achievements. While this scope could still be called “ethical,” it is well beyond traditional conceptions of research ethics per se. For us, intentional leadership development, institutional integrity, and cultures of academic excellence are linked. We create tools and resources to inspire, support and evaluate them all. Our premise is that excellence is about more than what is achieved; it also encompasses how work is done, and by whom. This means that exceptional scholarship, done ethically, is done in inclusive working environments, with positive interpersonal dynamics, and in ways that develop, mentor, and support lab members to build productive, meaningful careers. Research groups and academic units do not only produce data and results: they also reproduce and sustain themselves as effective ongoing collaborations, which in turn builds and contributes to the talent pool of the wider research community. The underlying values and norms that create this kind of institutional culture are set by institutional leaders:  their communication, their tone, the models of professional conduct they exemplify, the expectations they set, and the inclusiveness they foster. Cultures of excellence are ones that operate with rigor, reproducibility, inclusion, and integrity. Leaders recognize that responsible conduct of research does not occur in a vacuum, and that environments shape individual actions. Working effectively with others to produce quality research requires fostering professional skills and dispositions that are not always provided in the course of discipline-focused education, nor are they addressed in compliance-based Responsible Conduct of Research training.  Developing these broader skills and dispositions is at the core of what we do. We are fortunate to be able to draw on the expertise of a broad range of consultants, and together with them the NCPRE team draws on a number of previously developed, evidence-based, and time-tested strategies, tools, and skills. In all its activities, NCPRE is committed to forming, developing, and supporting academic cultures of excellence.
    • We recognize that no one seeks disaster, and few people knowingly act unethically; small choices are important in setting personal and ethical pathways.
    • Institutional context, organizational culture, peer influences, and setting an example at the top all contribute to promoting an ethical professional climate—or its opposite.
    • We create tools, systems, and resources to help universities and other institutions educate their members about ethics, including the responsible conduct of research.
    • We define professional and research ethics as the smart choice, not just the right choice; they promote effectiveness and productivity in the long run.
    • We help institutions assess the integrity of their environments, and develop strategies for improving them.
    • We develop leaders using evidence-based, practical, applied strategies that include self-reflection and ethical values.
    • When things go wrong, we provide strategies for improving matters and setting a better course of action.
    • We help emerging professionals, from high school on, to understand the importance of their ethical and professional choices, and to view themselves as responsible leaders.