Perhaps university leaders don’t feel like a wheel-spinning hamster as much as some of our colleagues, but if we are not careful we can certainly at times feel like another type of rodent in a race. Somewhere in the last few decades, universities and their leaders have seemingly shifted from being driven by the sense of societal responsibility and impact on the local or global population, to being in a race for some bigger prize and being in competition with each other for that prize (arguably higher education policy has contributed to this, but that can’t be used as an excuse).

And by “we” I mean vice-chancellors and presidents, and other people in leadership positions in universities, everywhere in the world. I believe there are problems with the way we are defining success and rewarding certain behaviours. “I don’t think we are asking ourselves frequently enough whether our goals are still the right ones.” So why are so many colleagues in universities not satisfied? Feeling that you contribute to something worthwhile and bigger than yourself is a hugely important factor in job satisfaction for every worker, as it certainly is for me.

Being able to contribute to research, and thereby to finding novel solutions to truly important issues helping students become the next generation of global citizens and leaders contributing to society at large and being part of the development of the local community there is hardly a more fulfilling way to spend your working days and your working life. And on the face of it, there is no better place for that than where we are. The majority of us are in higher education because we want to make a difference and we want to contribute to changing the world. It is safe to assume that none of us signed up for anything remotely like that when we started our university careers. It pains me that, increasingly, I hear colleagues in universities describe their work lives as being in a hamster wheel, since the metaphor encapsulates very little agency, let alone satisfaction and joy.

Hamster wheel of life