A Self-Care Guide for Leaders in Higher Education: Building Your Plan for Professional Sustainability

This self-care action plan is written for today’s higher education professionals regardless of rank, tenure, or stature.

Being a successful professional takes stamina, and successful individuals can only sustain their momentum for as long as they maintain their well-being. Approached in a thoughtful and personal way, this book identifies self-care challenges faced by professionals in higher education and provides strategies for building a rewarding, long-term career.

The authors identify the root cause of issues that impact well-being to achieve professional sustainability. Each chapter provides background information on a topic, engaging activities to explore the topic in greater depth, and reflective questions for self-evaluation, and the final chapter offers guidance to help readers design their own self-care plan. Chapter topics were selected based on the authors’ interactions with professionals, information from the field, and trends in higher education. The topics include communication complexities; role clarity; lack of control; the need for meaningful recognition; lack of confidence in leadership; the need to trust others; building personalized professional growth opportunities; recognizing “job creep”; and the inherent challenges of high-achieving professionals.

Book Features:

• Recognizes the unique challenges faced by those working in colleges and universities, guiding readers through the process of creating a self-care plan.
• Inspires readers to consider the root causes impacting their professional sustainability in higher education and assess where there might be room for self-care growth.
• Includes activities and reflection questions to prompt and guide introspection and engagement with each topic.
• Useful for anyone working on a college or university campus, including community colleges, 4-year institutions, or specialized educational organizations.

Gretchen Oltman is an associate professor of interdisciplinary studies at Creighton University, an attorney, and author. Vicki Bautista is the doctor of education program director at Clarkson College, and a board-certified health and wellness coach.