Creating competitive academic leadership by implementing alternative promotion tracks

Abstract Staff members in academia are expected to meet a diverse range of simultaneous expectations: responding to students' scholastic needs, pursuing high‐quality, ongoing research and being involved in their institutions. Those who successfully bear this multifaceted burden are found worthy of promotion. This 5‐year study followed the activity of two parallel staff promotion committees in a large Israeli teachers' college: a researcher track and an ‘other’ track. The findings show two opposing trends, which continued until reaching an equilibrium: a decrease in portfolios presented and an increase of portfolios approved for promotion in the researcher track , and—in the ‘other’ track— an increase in the submitted and a decline in the approved. These tendencies signal a gradual establishment of the new ‘other’ track's status and speak to a distinctive added value for high‐quality academic innovation in the new era—lecturers' involvement in teamwork and partnership on the campus.