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The paper develops the metaphorical concept of the "concertina" career to describe ways in which academic staff, across a diversifying workforce, modulate their interactions with institutional career frameworks, which tend to be unilinear and to be characterised by detailed progression criteria and milestones. In doing this, they are guided by Internal career scripts, providing an additional dimension to the dichotomy of boundaried and boundaryless careers found in the literature. Drawing on a longitudinal study between 2017 and 2020, of forty-nine mid-career academic staff across eight UK universities, consideration is given to individuals' spatial movements, for instance, between academic activities, and professional and personal commitments; and the manipulation of timescales to accelerate or decelerate career progress in relation to opportunities and constraints. The study shows ways in which the spatial parameters of a career are being stretched in order to accommodate new forms of academic work supplementing disciplinary activity, such as online learning, employability initiatives and public engagement, as well as work-life considerations. In addition, individuals are adapting timescales to accommodate professional activities such as health practice or community outreach, as well as personal commitments such as caring responsibilities. Thus, in the concertina career, individuals expand and contract activity, as well as extending and compressing timescales. As a result, it is concluded that institutional career models do not entirely reflect the reality of career-making by individuals, which is likely to involve detours (therefore a spatial dimension) and a disruption of assumed timelines (therefore a temporal dimension).

The paper develops the metaphorical concept of the 'concertina' career to describe ways in which academic staff, across a diversifying workforce, modulate their interactions with institutional career frameworks, which tend to be unilinear and to be characterised by detailed progression criteria and milestones. In doing this, they are guided by Internal career scripts, providing an additional dimension to the dichotomy of boundaried and boundaryless careers found in the literature. Drawing on a longitudinal study between 2017 and 2020, of forty-nine mid-career academic staff across eight UK universities, consideration is given to individuals' spatial movements, for instance, between academic activities, and professional and personal commitments; and the manipulation of timescales to accelerate or decelerate career progress in relation to opportunities and constraints. The study shows ways in which the spatial parameters of a career are being stretched in order to accommodate new forms of academic work supplementing disciplinary activity, such as online learning, employability initiatives and public engagement, as well as work-life considerations. In addition, individuals are adapting timescales to accommodate professional activities such as health practice or community outreach, as well as personal commitments such as caring responsibilities. Thus, in the concertina career, individuals expand and contract activity, as well as extending and compressing timescales. As a result, it is concluded that institutional career models do not entirely reflect the reality of career-making by individuals, which is likely to involve detours (therefore a spatial dimension) and a disruption of assumed timelines (therefore a temporal dimension)., Author(s): Celia Whitchurch [sup.1] , William Locke [sup.2] , Giulio Marini [sup.3] Author Affiliations: (1) grid.83440.3b, 0000000121901201, Centre for Global Higher Education, UCL Institute of Education, , 20 Bedford Way, [...]

The literature on the diversification of the higher education workforce has tended to focus on broad brush changes to patterns of employment and working conditions. What has been less remarked is ways in which individuals are negotiating the structures and stretching the parameters within which they work, including experience outside higher education. Thus, academic work is also seen in the context of broader opportunities, for instance extended networks that enable individuals to construct new forms of professional capital. Arising from these conditions, two empirical studies, on which this paper draws, demonstrate the emergence of what might be termed itinerant identities. The triggers for these are seen as arising, on the one hand, from a spirit of exploration, that is an intrinsic interest in entering new areas of activity, and, on the other, from a desire for a greater sense of security by keeping a range of options open. The two motivations are not mutually exclusive and are likely to depend on individual circumstances and career stages. It would also appear that, in space outside higher education, individuals may find some of the freedom and autonomy they may feel that they have lost as a result of increased structural requirements including, for instance, workload models and performance assessment.

This paper reviews three developments relating to professional staff in UK higher education. The first of these is a major report undertaken for the Leadership Foundation for Higher Education (LFHE), which has re-conceptualised the activities of professional staff within a theoretical framework of identity (Whitchurch, 2008a). The other two projects seek practical ways forward for this group of staff, the first via a Continuing Professional Development Framework developed by the Association of University Administrators (AUA); and the second via the publication of case material on career pathways, prepared on behalf of the association of Heads of University Administration (AHUA) and the LFHE.

Higher education managers are under increasing pressure from governments to reduce costs by adopting more flexible staffing practices and tensions can arise as institutions seek to sustain motivation and morale across a diversifying workforce. This paper considers how institutional management and governance practices facilitate innovative developments whilst also providing a supportive and inclusive environment. It draws on interviews in seven institutions to describe three models that reflect integrated, private-sector and partnership approaches, exploring the implications of these for the psychological contract between institutions and their staff, including different interpretations of the employment package; the establishment of processes that are seen as equitable and transparent, although not necessary identical; and the adoption of a range of communication channels, both at the level of the individual and collectively. (Contains 2 tables.)

This paper draws on qualitative data gathered from two studies funded by the UK Leadership Foundation for Higher Education to examine the expansion of academic identities in higher education. It builds on Whitchurch's earlier work, which focused primarily on professional staff, to suggest that the emergence of broadly based projects such as widening participation, learning support and community partnership is also impacting on academic identities. Thus, academic as well as professional staff are increasingly likely to work in multi-professional teams across a variety of constituencies, as well as with external partners, and the binary distinction between "academic" and "non-academic" roles and activities is no longer clear-cut. Moreover, there is evidence from the studies of an intentionality about deviations from mainstream academic career routes among respondents who could have gone either way. Consideration is therefore given to factors that influence individuals to work in more project-oriented areas, as well as to variables that affect ways in which these roles and identities develop. Finally, three models of academically oriented project activity are identified, and the implications of an expansion of academic identities are reviewed.

This paper suggests that as university missions have adapted to accommodate major developments associated with, for instance, mass higher education and internationalisation agendas, university workforces have diversified. They now, for instance, incorporate practitioners in areas such as health and social care, and professional staff who support activities as diverse as widening participation, e-learning, and business partnership. This in turn has implications for higher education governance and management structures and processes. Consideration is given to variables likely to affect institutional responses to such changes, and some suggestions are made as to possible ways forward in addressing the interests of an expanding range of professional groupings and stakeholders, as well as those of institutions as a whole. These are likely to involve the development of more flexible organisational frameworks in relation to, for instance, reward and incentive mechanisms and career pathways. (Contains 1 figure and 1 table.)

The interplay of public and private sector dynamics in higher education has impacted not only on the roles and identities of academic staff, but also on those of professional staff, who often have the task of bringing together, and achieving congruence between, activities that are geared towards the public good and also towards more commercially oriented enterprise. In this context, a new cadre of "blended professionals" has emerged, whose roles include initiatives associated with the social responsibilities of institutions to their communities, as well as more market-oriented, income generating projects (Whitchurch "2008", "2009"). This paper reports on case material relating to a sub-set of these staff, working specifically in the area of Community and Business Partnership, and on the impact of their work for traditional management structures and relationships. It will be argued that, although unlikely to be acknowledged in formal accounts of the university such as organisation charts or institutional plans, these staff are responsible for providing and maintaining a framework that holds together more publicly oriented strands of activity, such as widening participation, with more privately oriented strands, such as enterprise. In so doing, they make extensive use of multi-professional team- and networking with a range of colleagues, both inside and outside the university, not only helping to re-balance their institutions, but also to protect them against undue organisational fragmentation and bureaucracy. They therefore contribute to an increasingly "mixed economy" of broadly based portfolios of activity. The implications of these "public/private" spaces and activities for professional identities are explored in the context of institutional management.

This article arises out of responses to a survey of three management trainee schemes, analysed by the author in response to a request by the scheme organisers, and builds on the work of Bolton (2008). Based on four responses from two pre-1992 institutions, and three responses from one post-1992 institution, some clear themes emerged from the survey. It confirmed the sense of university management as an "accidental" profession, although individuals for the most part knew that they wanted to work in the public or not-for-profit sectors. Overall, there was a strong sense of satisfaction with, and a desire to stay in, higher education, with appreciation of the opportunities offered by the trainee schemes. In fact a majority of respondents mentioned strong competition to get onto their scheme, and a desire to make the most of the opportunities it provided.

This paper draws on an international study of the management challenges arising from diversifying academic and professional identities in higher education. These challenges include, for instance, the introduction of practice-based disciplines with different traditions such as health and social care, the changing aspirations and expectations of younger generations of staff, a diffusion of management responsibilities and structures, and imperatives for a more holistic approach to the "employment package", including new forms of recognition and reward. It is suggested that while academic and professional identities have become increasingly dynamic and multi-faceted, change is occurring at different rates in different contexts. A model is offered, therefore, that relates approaches to "people management" to different organisational environments, against the general background of increasing resource constraint arising from the global economic downturn. (Contains 1 table.)

This paper builds on earlier work by the author to explore the international dimensions of a study of the changing roles and identities of professional staff in higher education (Whitchurch 2008a, b). It further develops the concept of the "blended professional," characterising individuals with identities drawn from both professional and academic domains, and examines the institutional spaces, knowledges, relationships and legitimacies that they construct. Comparisons between the United Kingdom, Australia and the United States are used to provide indicators of possible futures for this group of staff, including their positioning in the university community, the challenges they face, and the potentials that they offer to their institutions.

This paper arises out of a study conducted for the Leadership Foundation for Higher Education on "Professional Managers in UK Higher Education: Preparing for Complex Futures," and focuses on those aspects relating to professional and career development. The author reviewed understandings in the literature about the roles and identities of professional staff in higher education, and of movements that were occurring in relation to these. The second, empirical part of the study involved interviews with twenty-nine middle and senior managers in three case institutions, and also seven heads of administration from institutions across the UK. This showed how individuals were not only interpreting their given roles in a more active way, but were also moving laterally across functional and organisational boundaries. This paper offers discussion and analysis of study implications for career and professional development. (Contains 3 figures.)

This paper describes an empirical study associated with earlier reviews of the changing roles and identities of contemporary professional staff in UK higher education (Whitchurch, 2004; 2006a; 2006b). The study draws on the narratives of 24 individuals to illustrate that identity movements cannot be captured solely in terms of a shift from "administration" to "management", or of a collective process of professionalisation. Contemporary ideas about the fluidity of identity (Delanty, 2008; Taylor, 2008) are used to theorise the empirical data, and to develop a conceptual framework that describes emerging identities by means of three categories of "bounded", "cross-boundary", and "unbounded professionals". This framework demonstrates that professional staff are not only interpreting their given roles more actively, but that they are also moving laterally across functional and institutional boundaries to create new professional spaces, knowledges, relationships and legitimacies. It is suggested, therefore, that the roles and identities of professional staff are more complex and dynamic than organisation charts or job descriptions might suggest. (Contains 2 tables and 1 figure.)

This paper adds to earlier reviews by the author of the changing roles and identities of contemporary professional staff in UK higher education, and builds on a categorisation of professional staff identities as having "bounded", "cross-boundary" and "unbounded" characteristics. Drawing on a study of 54 professional managers in the United Kingdom, Australia and the United States, it describes a further category of 'blended professionals", who have mixed backgrounds and portfolios, comprising elements of both professional and academic activity. The paper goes on to introduce the concept of "third space" as an emergent territory between academic and professional domains, which is colonised primarily by less "bounded" forms of professional. The implications of these developments for institutions and for individuals are considered, and some international comparisons drawn. Finally, it is suggested that "third space" working may be indicative of future trends in professional identities, which may increasingly coalesce with those of academic colleagues who undertake project- and management-oriented roles, so that new forms of "third space" professional are likely to continue to emerge.

Professional managers in UK universities represent an increasingly diverse grouping of staff. As boundaries blur between academic activity and the contributory functions required to deliver that activity in mass higher education systems and markets, their roles have become more fluid. Quasi-academic territories are developing in which professional managers' activities converge and overlap with those of academic and other colleagues. As a result, existing definitions and descriptors, based on outmoded concepts of "administration" and "management", no longer provide clear understandings of professional identities and potentials. As the university is transformed from a community of scholars into a "community of professionals" (AUT 2001), the concept of knowledge management may assist in explaining the changes that are occurring, and in preparing professional staff for uncertain and complex futures. This paper describes the various roles that may be taken on by professional managers in a higher education environment, how they interact with their academic colleagues, and how the blending of management and academic roles has changed the university community. It is based on an interim report undertaken for the UK Leadership Foundation for Higher Education (LFHE) in relation to a research project entitled "Professional Managers in UK Higher Education: Preparing for Complex Futures."

Human resource capacity has become a critical issue for contemporary universities as a result of increasing pressures from governments and global markets. As a consequence, particularly where the institution is the employer, changes are occurring in the expectations of staff and institutions about employment terms and conditions, as well as the broader aspects of working life, and this is affecting academic and professional identities. Even under different regimes, for instance, in Europe, with the government in effect as the employer, institutions are giving greater attention to ways in which they might respond to these developments. This paper considers key issues and challenges in human resource management in higher education, and some of the implications of these changes.

Contemporary universities, serving mass higher education markets, find themselves delivering complex, broadly based projects such as student support and welfare, human resource development, and business enterprise. Established concepts of academic administration and devolved management have been overlaid by more fluid institutional structures and cultures, with a softening of internal and external boundaries (Whitchurch, 2004, 2005). These developments have caused major shifts in the identities of professional administrators and managers as they adopt more project-oriented roles crossing functional and organisational boundaries. This paper considers the dynamics of these changes, in terms that move beyond conventional assumptions about administration and management. While identities have been defined traditionally via structured domains such as professional knowledges, institutional boundaries, and the policy requirements of the higher education sector, an emergent "project domain" has fostered the development of an increasingly multi-professional grouping of staff, with implications for career futures. (Contains 1 figure.)

This paper updates earlier work by the author (2008, 2013, 2018) to consider ways in which better recognition might be achieved for people working in third space environments, suggesting that an acceptance of Mode 3 knowledge in higher education, alongside disciplinary and professional knowledge, could provide a way forward in promoting their work. It considers how such knowledge is co-created between individuals and groups, often as a result of activity across the informal institutional economy, and how this might be used by institutions to re-evaluate third space activity within the formal institutional economy. This process is illustrated via a case study of a wildlife garden, which acts as a boundary object linking disciplinary teaching in ecology to engagement with local communities, the development of woodland management skills for students, and a social environment for both. Finally, the paper develops ideas about how organisational processes and structures, representing the formal institutional economy, might be adapted to reflect third space activity in parallel with disciplines and professional specialisms, including specific initiatives relating to promotion, progression, and career development. By contextualising third space activity in Mode 3 knowledge theory, therefore, it makes practical suggestions as to how individuals might be better recognised within institutional systems, thereby increasing the perceived value of their work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Institutional responses to changes in the higher education environment have caused movements in the roles and identities of administrative managers in UK universities. These shifts have highlighted the problem for individuals of balancing traditional public service considerations of administration with institutional innovation and development. Administrative managers find themselves not only acting as independent arbiters, giving impartial advice on the basis of professional expertise, but also becoming involved in political judgements about institutional futures. They increasingly undertake an interpretive function between the various communities of the university and its external partners. As the boundaries of the university have become more permeable, administrative and academic management have inter-digitated, and hybrid roles have developed. In undertaking increasingly complex functions, therefore, administrative managers play a critical role in linking the academic and executive arms of governance in the university.

Draws on discussion with leaders of organizations at the interface of the health and university sectors on the current and future direction of relationships between service, research, and education. Outlines some challenges for those managing the tripartite mission and suggestions for ways to approach these. (EV)