Contemporary Expectations for Entrepreneurship - Lessons to Be Learned from a Case About the Shift in Canadian Decanal Responsibilities

Oct 15, 2026

This paper presents a case narrative centered on a Canadian university dean charged with instituting organizational change to resolve escalating faculty financial issues. The narrative examines academic conceptualizations of entrepreneurship and frames the dean’s context through executive leadership dynamics, funding pressures and disputes, legal complexities, programmatic and marketing dimensions, weak academic cultures, and the intensification of work. Teaching notes accompany the case with five leadership development activities designed to spur student brainstorming, mind-mapping, placemat, jigsaw, and reflective engagement.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages14

Reading Time35 min

AccessFree to download

Abstract

The Case Narrative

The Underpinning Evidence and Purpose of the Case Narrative

Introduction

Entrepreneurship in Educational Settings

Contemporary Expectations for Entrepreneurship: Lessons tobe Learned from a Case About the Shift in Canadian Decanal Responsibilities Donald E. Scotta, Shelleyanne Scotta, Abdoulaye Anneb, Stacy Crosbya, Linda Dudarc, Elaine Fournierd, & David Litze a University of Calgary, bUniversity of Laval, cSt. Mary’s University, dWestern University, e Emirates College for Advanced Education Abstract This paper presents a case narrative of a university dean who is charged with instituting change within her faculty in order to resolve the faculty’s financial issues. The case narrative explores academic conceptualizations of entrepreneurship and describes the dean’s context in terms of: her executive leadership team, the financial issues she was facing, the financial contentions in instituting change, legal complexities, programmatic and marketing dimensions, poor academic cultures, and work intensification implications. The teaching notes present five leadership development activities that span these issues and encourage students to engage in a brainstorming, a mind-mapping, a placemat, a jigsaw, and a leadership reflection activities. Keywords: deans, university leaders, entrepreneurship, finance, quality, marketing, programs, academic cultures, work intensification, teaching activities The Case Narrative The Underpinning Evidence and Purpose of the Case Narrative This case was developed from the insights shared by 21 senior university leaders (including the topranked research intensive and comprehensive universities) across Canada in in-depth interviews. This narrative is not drawn directly from one cited senior leader, rather it represents an aggregation of many themes, garnered through iterative thematic coding, that emerged from these interviews for the purposes of developing an engaging but realistic teaching case. The purpose of this case narrative is to provide an interesting and controversial case that students (many of whom are either aspiring or current leaders within post-secondary contexts) in leadership development programs can explore both the literature and the complexities of leading in contemporary universities in Canada. The case narrative is purposefully open-ended to develop students’ critical and creative thinking capacities with the view to offering potential solutions and engagement with many of the contentious issues that they may or do encounter in their own leadership situations. At the conclusion of the case narrative, a series of teaching notes and activities are provided which are designed to be a resource for instructors to stimulate students’in-depth exploration of the case narrative, the trends and issues in the context of leading in higher education, and the literature in the field of higher education leadership. With an express purpose to offer opportunities for students to explore the literature, we have included citations within the case narrative that link various papers to a current theme in the narrative. Introduction Monica Destrier is a full professor with an impressive research history, having engaged in large and small research projects, and has been successful in obtaining competitive grants from both government granting agencies and private funded research organizations. She has been a full professor for over a decade and recently moved into administration where she held the role of head of a small department for two years ina large research-intensive university. She enjoyed administration and felt she was effective in managing people and working to support her faculty. In her role as department head, she had eight faculty members who directly reported to her and supported over 50 sessional faculty as they worked in the department’s programs. Monica had rarely had a problem with her academic staff members, as most were easy going and she had been very successful in managing all the paperwork that had the potential to interfere with her academics’teaching and research activi

FAQs

What problem does the university dean in the case narrative need to address?

She must introduce change in her faculty to resolve serious financial issues and demonstrate an entrepreneurial spirit to return the faculty to financial viability within a year.

How does the case frame the dean’s broader responsibilities beyond finances?

It highlights executive leadership team dynamics, legal complexities, and programmatic and marketing dimensions, alongside the challenges of poor academic cultures and work intensification.

What learning activities are included with the teaching notes?

The teaching notes propose five leadership development activities that guide students through brainstorming, mind-mapping, placemat, jigsaw, and leadership reflection focused on the case’s issues.

Oct 15, 2026

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