2023 COACHE Survey of Faculty Job Satisfaction
September 15, 2023
The Office of the Provost is pleased to share the results of the 2023 COACHE survey of faculty job satisfaction with the college community. Receipt of the COACHE report is timely as it coincides with the launch of the new strategic plan. Many of the points evaluated by COACHE are areas the College will focus on as part of that plan. Some examples are:
- Professional development for faculty
- Mentoring
- Clarifying tenure expectations
- Improving the environment for interdisciplinary research and teaching
Thirty-seven percent of full-time faculty participated in the survey. There are 25 areas of measurement, and in 18 of them, faculty satisfaction improved over 2019, two were the same and five showed some decline. Given that we all went through the pandemic in the intervening years, this is an especially positive result in my view.
Areas where there was improvement in faculty satisfaction over the last report (2019):
- Nature of work: research
- Nature of work: teaching
- Facilities and work resources
- Health and Retirement benefits
- Interdisciplinary work
- Collaboration
- Tenure policies
- Leadership: senior
- Leadership: divisional
- Governance: trust
- Governance: shared sense of purpose
- Governance: understanding issues
- Governance: adaptability
- Governance: productivity
- Governance: collegiality
- Department engagement
- Department quality
- Appreciation and recognition
Areas where faculty satisfaction remained the same include:
- Personal and family policies
- Promotion to full
Areas where there was a decline in faculty satisfaction include:
- Nature of work: service
- Mentoring
- Tenure expectations: clarity
- Leadership: Departmental
- Leadership: Faculty
The report flags two of these areas as ones we should address because of the scale of change: Clarity of Tenure Expectations and Faculty Leadership. The first of these is in the process of being addressed by the faculty through department, school, and eventually college P&B committees.
The other relates to the faculty governance body. The average response was roughly in the middle of the scale, but satisfaction did decline relative to the last survey. We have two faculty governance bodies: the General Faculty (or “GenFac”) and the Baruch Faculty Senate. The reduced satisfaction may be a reflection on the structure of the governance. One of the goals of the strategic plan is to review and revise that structure.
The Senate executive committee, as an elected group of faculty leaders, has agreed to serve as the “COACHE task group,” working with the team in academic affairs to carefully review the results and develop an action plan to continually improve faculty job satisfaction.
You can download the report here.