Abstract:

In today’s disrupted higher education landscape, leaders at every level are under pressure to make decisions in response to emergent challenges while also seeking to sustain their institution’s future^[1]. Given the urgency and multiple lines of attack, many leaders seem to default to approaches they relied upon when crises hit^[2]. However, old strategies are not enough and the complexity of the moment demands something different from leaders. They need to learn their way through this new situation. This may require them to test whether legacy structures are fit-for-purpose, deepen their understanding of changing stakeholder needs and wants, and revisit outdated success metrics.

In this context we explore how coaching can support leaders to navigate complexity and lead from their wise mind. “When the winds are howling and the storms are raging,” leaders can leverage coaching as a practical, high impact resource to sharpen timely decision-making and strengthen their inner compass. This allows space for them to build judgment, discernment, and wisdom that offers clarity now and creates value for the long-term.

For those tasked with steering institutions through uncertainty, coaching isn’t a luxury, nor something used to fix a poor leader. It’s not therapy or consulting^[3]. Rather it’s a pragmatic leadership tool to expand the leader’s impact – helping to strengthen judgment, avoid legacy thinking, and help ensure decisions made today reflect both the needs of the moment and those of the future. It’s about building a leader’s capacity to navigate uncertainty with greater ease and driven by purpose and clarity. For those leaders drowning under the weight of decisions to be made and the expectations of others, partnership with a coach can be a lifeline. Coaching rewards the naturally curious and those open to learning, and helps leaders to question assumptions, sense new possibilities, and lead from the inside out.

With practical examples and accessible frameworks, we offer a compelling case for why coaching is an essential tool for higher education leaders navigating the volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity of these times in the global higher education sector.

The Weight of Today’s Decisions

In the early 1950s, higher education leaders in the U.S. found themselves leading under quiet siege, navigating the invisible pressures of McCarthyism. Robert Oppenheimer comes to mind. He led the Manhattan Project with great notoriety but was unmoored by political scrutiny and short-term decision-making that crept into the heart of academic life. A generation later, during the Vietnam War, leaders faced a new wave of unrest. Decisions were made in the face of campus protests, draft resistance, and calls to reimagine the role of higher education in society.

Like their predecessors, today’s university leaders at every level face both political and cultural firestorms that are emerging with less clarity and more stakeholder scrutiny, each demanding outcome that may collectively have contradictory outcomes. So, how might a leader strengthen both their ability to learn from the complexity to fuel wise decision-making capacity and lead with the vision, courage, and discernment necessary to inspire meaningful and timely change, sustaining institutional mission in the fierce intensity of today’s moments?

When Strengths Become Blind Spots

What is true is that higher education leaders today, for the most part, are incredibly competent. They are deeply analytical, expert communicators, and operationally skilled. They know how to navigate governance structures, budget constraints, and the ever-present tension between tradition and innovation in advancing education, research, and community engagement.

Yet, competence isn’t the same as wisdom. Being wise is to elevate beyond one’s knowledge, skills, and abilities and call on a more expansive level of thinking. Wisdom is not influenced by the urgent matter of the day, but rather it relies on leveraging a higher perspective, seeing the entire playing field, and evaluating decisions consciously. Psychologist Marsha Linehan, the creator of Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, calls it having a “wise mind,” or the synthesis of one’s emotional and reasonable self.

Most leaders are rewarded for precision and steadiness, strengths essential for decision-making in more stable environments. These strengths can, paradoxically, become liabilities in times of accelerating change and complexity. Over time, familiar strategies, relationships, and routines can calcify into blind spots. Whether through well-worn narratives, over-attachment to cherished processes, or the sheer momentum of habit, the instinct to protect what leaders build can overshadow the imperative to reimagine or release them. Simply put, navigating complexity relies upon learning new leadership habits and behaviors.

Compounding the challenge, leaders today are often inundated by competing datasets, stakeholder demands, and consultant frameworks, alongside conflicting expectations from trustees, accreditors, donors, politicians, and governance bodies, not to mention public and media interest, and legal challenges. Seeking to deepen their understanding, what may start out as due diligence can quickly become a fog of inputs, obscuring the leader’s ability to see clearly. This blindness can lead to inertia and stalled or sub-optimal decisions. The new context for higher education leaders demands that they make wise decisions in a timely manner – decisions that challenge the status quo and embrace innovation. So, what might leaders do? What does it take to move from blind spot to breakthrough?

It takes more than smarts to lead wisely. It takes discernment, trust in oneself, and a deeper form of knowing. As Carly Fiorina, former CEO of Hewlett-Packard said^[4]:

“I think leadership takes what I call a strong internal compass… When the winds are howling, and the storms are raging, and the sky is cloudy, so you have nothing to navigate by, a compass tells you where true North is... you have to rely on that compass.”

Coaching as a Catalyst for Wise Decision-Making

Higher education leaders are stepping down or being ousted for failing to meet the moment, while others are choosing not to step up to senior roles or switch institutions. In the midst of the relentless storms, how might these leaders enhance their capacity, capability, and courage to lead by drawing on what coaching can offer? Unlike traditional advisory or consulting roles, coaching can create a pause in the chaos, a space for the wise mind to surface. A coach is a strategic thinking partner who enhances the quality of a leader's reflection and decision-making, helping them achieve better outcomes than they could reach on their own. In doing so, coaching can become a catalyst for wise decision-making.

Coaching’s return on investment is clear, reaching impacts of more than seven times the outlay investment^[5]. Professional coaching helps leaders produce better results and clearer decisions that are aligned with both their internal compass and the institutional mission. The process includes offering thoughtful questions, keen observations, and strategic insights, helping the leader “see” through the competing priorities, access their wisdom, and make better decisions; it provides greater focus and awareness of choices available to the leader.^[6]

Coaching in Practice

Coaching is a highly validated process that maximizes performance and results by helping people focus, discover, and/or clarify:

1. where they are today, including hidden assumptions, emotional drivers, and blind spots;
2. where they want to go, with a vision rooted in today’s world and not yesterday’s metrics;
3. and how to get there ^[7] with thoughtful, intentional actions.

For example, amid stakeholder pressure a coach may ask, “What needs your attention? How can you separate the truly important from the noisy urgent?”

Or, when leaders lean into default strengths a coach could invite curiosity, “What if that assumption no longer held true?”

A coach can be a gentle provocateur. “What are you protecting and at what cost?” Through this process, coaching helps leaders access their wise mind by

• Spotting patterns they hadn’t detected earlier.
• Challenging default strengths that no longer serve.
• Discerning meaningful signals amid a flood of inputs.

In a world where leaders are pulled toward noise, coaching helps them listen for signals, enabling the leader to reflect, analyze, make choices and plans, follow through and evaluate, and provide feedback. For those leaders who are already asking deeper questions, coaching meets them at that very edge. It doesn't hand over answers. It cultivates the kind of inner spaciousness where better questions, and wiser answers, can emerge.

Next Steps: Identifying and Selecting a Coach

Like any important resource, finding the right leadership coach is vital. A common process is to ask trusted colleagues for a referral, then review the coach’s LinkedIn profile or website to assess relevant experience. It’s wise to meet with two or three candidates to gauge alignment in style, temperament, and goals.

A second option is to check with the institution’s faculty affairs office and/or human resources department. It is becoming more commonplace that these offices will have vetted and endorsed a handful of coaching providers for the university. Additionally, the leader’s professional associations may have recommendations. With a list of potential coaches in hand, it is still recommended to meet them first before making a choice.

Lastly, the internet is an option, albeit one that can be overwhelming. If going this route, look for providers that have extensive experience working within higher education and/or with clients from the sector. When conducting a search, focus on coaches who have graduated from an accredited coaching program and/or are accredited by a major coaching body to ensure quality and professionalism, such as the International Coaching Federation (ICF) or the European Mentoring and Coaching Council (EMCC).

Summary: Coaching as a Leadership Asset

Higher education leaders are navigating complexity unlike any generation before them. The stakes are high, timelines constrained, and the outcomes have a lasting impact. The need for wise decision-making is constant in the new normal of higher education. Coaching is more than a nice-to-have or a professional benefit, it is a strategic leadership support system. A space for the wise mind to emerge, a catalyst for wiser decisions that align the needs of the moment with institutional goals, and a way for leaders to stay true to their internal compass in these turbulent times.

Authors:

- Archana Bharathan, Director of Outcomes, Columbia Business School
- Rob Kramer, Senior Advisor to the Provost, Southern Oregon University
- Megan Akatu, Founder, Megan Akatu Coaching & Culture
- Wendy M. Purcell, Rutgers School of Public Health, Rutgers University

^[1] Deloitte. (2024). 2025 US higher education trends: Navigating disruption while shaping the future. Deloitte Insights. https://www2.deloitte.com/us/en/insights/industry/public-sector/2025-us-higher-education-trends.html

^[2] Pucciarelli, F., & Kaplan, A. (2016). Competition and strategy in higher education: Managing complexity and uncertainty. Business Horizons, 59(3), 311–320. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bushor.2016.01.003

^[3] Maltbia, T. E., Marsick, V. J., & Ghosh, R. (2014). Executive and Organizational Coaching: A Review of Insights Drawn From Literature to Inform HRD Practice. Advances in Developing Human Resources, 16(2), 161-183. https://doi-org.ezproxy.cul.columbia.edu/10.1177/1523422313520474 (Original work published 2014)

^[4] Fiorina, C. (2003, February 11). Technology, business and our way of life: What’s next? Hewlett-Packard. https://www.hp.com/hpinfo/execteam/speeches/fiorina/churchill03.html

^[5] Retrieved from https://coachhub.io/en/, October 2021; Florko, L. (2022, June 29). Coaching Employees Like It’s a Sport: Lessons from original coaches. Psychology Today; Joesten, N. (2012, January 30). Forbes.com reports on huge ROI’s for executive coaching [Web blog post].

^[6] Adapted from International Coach Federation. Retrieved from http://www.coachfederation.org/

^[7] Kramer, Rob. Stealth Coaching: A Roadmap to develop Independent Thinkers, Proactive Problem Solvers, and Exceptional Leaders. (Luminare Press: Eugene, OR). 2020.