2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

As Michigan Engineering (the University of Michigan College of Engineering) moved forward after the tumultuous pandemic years, College leaders recognized the need for concerted professional development in positive leadership. This evidenced-based practice paper discusses a year-long positive leadership development program for engineering faculty and staff members, which was grounded in research from the University of Michigan Center for Positive Organizations and a “learn-experiment-reflect” framework. The program was delivered through six in-person cohort sessions, self-paced learning via videos and articles, and weekly emails to boost learning. Core concepts in the program included abundance gaps, positive emotions, gratitude, purpose-finding, the fundamental state of leadership, generalized reciprocity, positive energizers, and high-quality connections. An analysis of data from end-of-program surveys, budget narrative statements, and retrospective interviews revealed that faculty participants valued the program design; experimented frequently with gratitude, high-quality connections, and generalized reciprocity; and wrestled with the challenges of authentically enacting positive leadership principles in academia. The paper closes with recommendations for implementing positive leadership programs in other engineering higher education contexts. Examples of faculty experiments are supplied, as well as a program timeline and interview protocol.

Preferred presentation mode is traditional lecture.