The environmental factors, and the actions taken to provide sensemaking and sensegiving are essential components of strategic change. Through their ethnographic study of strategic change at a large public university, Gioia and Chittipeddi (1991) utilize the concept of sensemaking to frame the actions of upper administrators and their ability to assign meaning to the strategic activities in their environment to make sense of the roles they served. This sensemaking, or the ability of the leaders to make sense of the complex strategic change process, was essential to facilitating the complementary component of strategic change, which was the sensegiving process.
Published in Chapter:
Interim Presidents: Stabilizing the Precarious Perch
Amy S. Diaz (GateWay Community College, USA), Lori M. Berquam (Mesa Community College, USA), Clyne G. H. Namuo (Phoenix College, USA), and Christina Haines (Scottsdale Community College, USA)
Copyright: © 2022
|Pages: 25
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-6684-4235-7.ch011
Abstract
This chapter shares the lived experiences of four interim presidents serving at one of the 10 independently accredited community colleges in the Maricopa County Community College District, one of the largest community college systems in the country. The concepts of sensemaking and sensegiving are used as the theoretical framework for each of the four interim presidents to share their stories. Each story provides a context, circumstances of the appointment, the culture of the institution, what has been accomplished while they have served, and specific lessons learned by each person. Ultimately, a collection of lessons learned is provided to the reader to inform an approach to serving as an interim president should that opportunity arise.