for example, might elicit broad agreement in a committee. One individual, however, might assume that the reform pertains to increasing faculty salaries, a second believes that a post-tenure review system needs to be created, and a third wants to place an emphasis on teaching rather than research. The assumption that individuals agree about the nature of a problem without full discussion leads to a decision-making process with skewed perspectives.
The different premises with which individuals begin problem solving naturally leads to a second point of disagreement. Individuals will have different assumptions about the kind of information that is needed to reach a decision. The individuals who hope to raise faculty salaries may seek information from other institutions that demonstrates how low salaries are at their own institution. The post-tenure review advocate will seek models that are being utilized elsewhere and try to prove that some tenured faculty are not adequately reviewed. The teaching reformer might call upon Ernest Boyer’s ideas about the scholarship of teaching (1990). The reformer will then seek to convince others that the institution is tilted toward research and away from teaching, and that such a bias is wrong.
The third area of disagreement is often the most crucial one, and it pertains to who makes the decision about a particular issue. Individuals operate with quite different expectations. The faculty, for example, may assume that when they make a decision about how a problem should be solved, their decision will be honored. However, a dean may have an entirely different idea and assume that the faculties’ role is entirely advisory. Faculty members in an Academic Senate may think of themselves as a legislative body, but the provost may see the Senate as a group that merely conveys information to the rest of the faculty. One individual may consult with numerous others about a particular innovation that he wants to implement, but may ultimately face a roadblock when another group raises objections because it has not been consulted.
Each problem, as an abstraction, does not necessarily doom an innovation. Ultimately, one perception about an issue may be more successful than another. Some pieces of information that are gathered will be less compelling than others. The actors who make a decision may evoke controversy, but nevertheless a decision may still be reached. However, the lack of agreement about the nature of the problem, the information that needs to be collected, and who makes decisions are only the initial dilemmas that innovators face, and this initial stumbling block makes implementation harder, not easier.