The presidency requires the broadest vision on any college or university campus. New presidents comment frequently that they came from a specialized area and did not fully realize the difference until they had already assumed the office. The first few months on a new campus can be overwhelming. Missteps at this time are critical. Recognizing these special needs and concerns, the Council of Independent Colleges offers a New Presidents Program on January 3 and 4 each year, immediately preceding the Presidents Institute (January 4–7).

Since 1989, some 470 college presidents have completed the 1½ day program, which offers opportunities for new presidents and their spouses to meet and exchange ideas with other newcomers. The presenters are experienced presidents, many of them alumni of the program.

Marylouise Fennell, RSM, former president of Carlow University (PA) and now senior counsel to CIC, has directed the program since its second year. Program topics are driven by evaluations from the preceding year. “We want to be as responsive as possible to the issues facing new presidents,” Fennell said. “It is, after all, one thing to recognize the challenges of a presidency intellectually, but quite another to actually confront them.”

Each participating president is provided with a confidential presidential partner who serves in an advisory capacity through his or her first year, a critical component of the New Presidents Program. “These experienced campus leaders can help the new president successfully negotiate the perils and pitfalls while capitalizing on the opportunities that the first year represents,” Fennell said.

At times, a mentor’s role will be primarily to help the new president reach clarity, said John F. Brennan, president of Green Mountain College (VT). “A president may need only to speak to a mentor by telephone or conversely, to spend a half-day or entire day talking an issue through, exploring options and consequences of various courses of action.”

Point Park University (PA) President Katherine U. Henderson said, “The role of a mentor is not to tell a new president what to think. Rather, it is to help focus him or her on what to think about. For example, the mentor might ask, ‘What are your burning issues, and how are you handling them?’ The entire process opens up the give and take that enables a president to consider crucial issues from new, and more productive, perspectives.” Instead of being pressed to make major decisions under time pressure, Henderson added, a president can be helped by a mentor who offers sound advice in an unhurried manner, helping a new CEO to sort through multiple priorities.

“The New Presidents Program was very beneficial because it gave me the opportunity to know and listen to the advice of seasoned presidents. It helped me to begin to establish a network of relationships during the first year,” said Earl D. Brooks, who became president of Tri-State University (IN) in 2000.

Subjects typically covered in the program include financial fundamentals, board/volunteer leadership relations, balancing priorities, responding to controversial issues, balancing attention among constituencies, and responding to ad hoc needs. “We hope to save new presidents the anxiety of worrying about the wrong things while possibly overlooking major issues that they should be addressing,” Fennell said. “A solid sounding board, an independent set of eyes and ears—these advantages of a mentoring program are absolutely indispensable to the long-term effectiveness of a new president. Expectations for new presidents are very high, and the 24/7 nature of the position offers little or no opportunity for learning on the job. The CIC New Presidents Program fills that need. It provides both the ‘need to know’ tools and the counsel that will get that all-important presidential transition off to a running start,” she added.

CIC sponsors a parallel program for spouses that runs concurrently with the New Presidents Program. One participant praised the workshop as helpful in “finding out and understanding that all of us have similar challenges and getting some varied ideas on how to handle them.”