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The Head of School/Department Questionnaire

The Head of School/Department questionnaire is a survey designed to gauge the perception of academic staff regarding the performance of the Head of a School or Department.  It is a formative questionnaire which Heads may use to provide constructive feedback in order to help them in monitoring and improving their leadership of the School or Department.

The questionnaire comprises 32 items describing seven dimensions.  There is also an overall or global question and the opportunity to provide open-ended response on strengths, areas for improvement and additional comment.  The seven dimensions in the questionnaire are shown in Table 1.

Table 1: Dimensions of the Head of School/Department Questionnaire

Dimension

No of Items

Description

Item example
Leadership for Teaching 4 Perceived effectiveness of the person's leadership of teaching and teachers.
 Rewards excellence in teaching.
Leadership for Research 4 Perceived effectiveness of the person's leadership of research and researchers. Inspires respect for her/his own ability as a researcher.
Fair and Efficient Management 5 Perceived efficiency and fairness of human and other resource management. Treats members of the staff equally.
Strategy and Vision 5 Perceived emphasis on future direction of work unit and positioning for future advantage.
 Serves as an advocate for the school/department.
Transformational and Collaborative Leadership 5 Perceived inspirational qualities; capacity to motivate and to promote cooperation between colleagues.
 Trusts in the ability of staff.
Development and Recognition 5 Perceived support for career development and recognition of colleagues' achievements.
 Assigns responsibilities to staff.
Interpersonal Skills 3 Perceived openness, concern, and capacity to work effectively with colleagues. Considers staff members' points of view.

 

The survey is initiated by the Head of School/Department.  Heads wishing to utilise the questionnaire should contact the Evaluation administrator.  The Centre for Higher Education Quality (CHEQ) requires:

  • at least two weeks notice to set up the online questionnaire;
  • dates between which the online questionnaire will remain activated for access by staff;
  • the Head to advise staff of the activation period for this survey;
  • the Head to advise staff of the URL to access the survey (provided to Head by CHEQ);

and;

  • The Head or a designated individual to contact CHEQ if staff have problems accessing the online questionnaire.

Once the survey has been set up on the website, CHEQ will confirm with the Head that the online evaluation is ready for access by staff in the School/Department and will provide the access URL to the Head for distribution.

How to Interpret the Results

After conducting and processing the evaluation, the Centre for Higher Education Quality (CHEQ) will analyse the data and provide the Head with a report.  You will receive in the report:

  • bar charts, percentages, means and standard deviations (SD) for each item, coded as follows:

Numeric Figure

Response
4 Very Satisfied
3 Satisfied
2 Dissatisfied
1 Very Dissatisfied
6 Unable to Comment

 

Questions with responses in the range of 4-3 indicate satisfaction; responses in the range of 2-1 indicate dissatisfaction, and responses with a numeric figure of 6 indicate that the respondent was unable to comment.

You will also receive the response to open-ended questions, typed so as to preserve anonymity.

How to utilize the Feedback Information

Using both the quantitative and qualitative responses you may wish to make a list of what are your strong and your weak points, as perceived by staff.  You may then want to construct an action plan identifying what you could do differently (e.g., what will you do, how, when, how will you judge success). Advice from a colleague is often very useful in designing an action plan.

FAQs

How long does it take?

The questionnaire is likely to require about 10 minutes to complete.

How often should the survey be used?

As a guide, this survey could be administered about every two years.

Is there a limitation to use the survey?

To give good, reliable and interpretable results, it is advisable to use this survey when there are at least 12 staff members in the School/Department.