This book examines faculty mobility in the 1980s from the perspective of process and market environment, and makes comparisons between current research findings and those reported by Theodore Caplow and Reece McGee in 1958 in The Academic Marketplace. The present study, like the earlier one, encompasses faculty recruitment, including search and selection procedures and effect, and the circumstances of termination, such as denial of tenure, voluntary resignation, retirement, and death. The research findings are based on data obtained from 306 faculty members in personal and telephone interviews conducted during the period from December 1985 to April 1986 and mail response; the sample universities were six of those used in the earlier survey. The findings are discussed in comparison to human resource management in the nonacademic sector and implications for the practice of human resource management in academic settings, contributing to an organizational culture. An important feature of this book is the introduction of management techniques and management thinking at the departmental level that did not exist in the 1950s. The author contends, however, that new management strategies appear to have little effect on the recruitment and termination processes, and that these processes have remained traditionally based while the organization is changing under environmental influences. This unique and timely work will be of interest to a broad academic population, providing new insights into the academic world for anyone interested in the present state of higher eduation, and will be a welcome addition in the research and study of sociology, nonprofit management, and university organization.

The mobility of medical school faculty has never before been the topic of a book or comprehensive article. In this seminal study, Dolores L. Burke explores medical faculty recruitment and termination policies and procedures. Her findings are based on personal interviews with 300 faculty members and mail responses from 49 others. She provides detailed information on constraining factors in the medical academic marketplace, the impact of public accountability on medical school faculty, and the essential character of medical schools as research institutions and providers of important services to the larger community. Burke concludes that recruitment policies must be formulated more strategically, that administrative structures need to be revised, and that the clinical base of medical research needs to be supported and maintained. Burke begins her study with an historical overview of medical education and the labor market for medical school faculty. She then considers the factors that shape the professional lives of medical faculty, including the choice of an academic career, the selection of a medical specialization, and the decision to change institutions. Useful appendixes discuss her research methodology in detail, and the numerous excerpts from interviews exemplify current concerns and opinions of medical school faculty. University administrators, policymakers, and those interested in medical education will find this volume an insightful contribution to a previously neglected area.