Getting people involved: Leadership for change as an occupation professionalises

There are many concurrent political, technological and professional pressures on university staff to change their learning and teaching practices. Teaching and learning have shifted from private, often undervalued concerns to high-stakes work. The tensions created by this shift are exacerbated in the context of emerging professions where a number of taken-for-granted assumptions are routinely being questioned and challenged. This chapter focuses on leadership in a School of Policing Studies at an Australian university, which employs staff from a wide range of professional backgrounds: from those with 'traditional' university backgrounds to those from a practice background with little (or no) direct experience in teaching or university work. This variety in backgrounds leads to mutual challenging of preconceptions about academic identity and therefore quality teaching and learning and leadership. By considering the serendipity-based genesis and growth of a group focused on academic identity in this School, the chapter seeks to identify the types of leadership which are important for generating and sustaining change in university learning and teaching as an occupation professionalises, and the contexts in which this might emerge.