UC president’s post not easy to fill

In recent job postings published nationwide, ideal candidates for president of the University of California system are described like this:

“An individual of uncommon wisdom” to head “the best public research university system in the world.” Someone who can provide “visionary and dynamic leadership” to more than 220,000 students and 170,000 professors and staff at 10 campuses, five medical centers and three national energy and weapons labs. Will control a $17-billion annual operating budget.

But the ad, not surprisingly, leaves some uncomfortable things out. A truly candid one also would mention skills required to:

Navigate a state budget crisis that threatens to take a nasty bite out of spending; cope with sometimes cranky faculty who jealously guard their academic freedoms, a student body angry about rising fees and parents worried about admissions standards; deal with a restive Board of Regents that helped nudge out the last president in a controversy over executive compensation policies.

Of course, public notices would never be so upfront in the recently launched search to replace President Robert C. Dynes, who said he intends to step down by June after nearly five years for personal reasons.

But UC officials and higher education experts say the position’s challenges are known around the nation and could make it tougher than in the past to find a willing person with the right scholarly, managerial and political talents.

“It’s not an impossible job but just a very hard, demanding job. It’s a job that really requires a particular kind of skill and particular kind of commitment,” said Patrick M. Callan, president of the nonprofit National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education in San Jose. “You’ve got to have the academic authority to know how to deal with a very strong faculty. And it’s a highly political job obviously in a state where politics are volatile and the monies are short.”

Yet, he stressed, it is such an influential job nationally that it still is sure to attract many candidates and “for the right person, it will certainly bring out the best in them.”

The search is in a very early stage, without even a semi-finalist pool of names, according to Richard Blum, chairman of the Board of Regents and head of the 10-member hiring-advisory committee composed of regents, including the student and alumni representatives. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, an ex-officio regent, is on the panel but has not attended any of its closed-door sessions yet, a UC spokesman said.

Blum said the group hopes to start focusing on potential candidates soon with the goal of hiring by June.

“We all think the person ought to be bright, articulate and able to create a vision. We also need somebody who knows how to manage, since this place is not well managed,” said Blum, a San Francisco businessman and philanthropist who is married to U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein.

One of the biggest issues is whether the 19th president should be someone from outside the university system or, as has been more traditional, from inside.

Dynes and his predecessor, Richard Atkinson, both served as chancellor at UC San Diego before taking on the presidency, and Jack Peltason, UC president before Atkinson, had been UC Irvine chief.

Since Dynes announced his resignation in August, UC’s provost and executive vice president, Wyatt “Rory” Hume, has been the system’s chief operating officer and making many day-to-day decisions. Hume, a former executive vice chancellor of UCLA and president of the University of New South Wales in Sydney, has said he is not seeking the presidency.

However, many faculty and administrators admire the Australian-born Hume and think he would be the leading inside candidate unless his age, 63, argues against him should the regents want a long-term presidency.

Blum said “a lot of people would like to find someone from the outside.” He added that he believes Hume is not in the running, but “that doesn’t mean that at some point we won’t turn to him and say: Do you want to be a candidate?”

In October, UC signed Dallas-based executive search firm R. William Funk and Associates to a yearlong contract paying $90,000 plus expenses to help with the hiring.

Funk recently placed ads in the Chronicle of Higher Education and is casting a wide net for names. Funk did not return phone calls seeking comment.

Many people knowledgeable about the search would not talk about it, citing confidentiality rules or fear of harming a delicate process, and some who agreed to be interviewed requested anonymity.

No matter what the ads proclaim about “visionary” leadership, many officials say the UC system president’s power is limited -- sandwiched between the regents and the campus chancellors.

A recent report by the Western Assn. of Schools and Colleges accrediting agency found that structure too murky and said that “perhaps the most fundamental of the issues now facing the university is clarifying and strengthening the role of the university president.”

Otherwise, UC’s vaunted reputation could be harmed, the report warned.

Some officials said they are worried that strong candidates may be reluctant to deal with a newly aggressive regents’ board. In the wake of the politically damaging controversy two years ago over secret executive raises, the regents have showed a stronger hand in demanding reforms and reducing the budget of the president’s office.

Many observers said that regents’ dissatisfaction with Dynes’ handling of the compensation furor contributed to his resignation. And the accrediting agency study found that the regents “are sometimes unnecessarily harsh in their treatment of UC administrators, faculty, and staff.”

Claire Van Ummersen, who heads the American Council on Education’s Center for Effective Leadership, said any outside candidate will want to be sure the regents will be supportive.

“There has to be a trust level between the board and the president that allows the president to lead the institution and the regents to be the policy board that assists in that,” said Van Ummersen, who was chancellor of the University System of New Hampshire.

Schwarzenegger’s budget proposal to cut state funding to higher education by about 10% also may make some possible candidates think twice about the UC presidency.

On the other hand, others insist the state budget will not be a deal-breaker because other universities face similar reductions.

Another issue may be the salary, which is unspecified and up for negotiation. Although Dynes’ current $405,000 base salary and $29,000 in other compensation sounds enormous for a public institution, leaders of some large public universities earn nearly double that -- and some heads of prestigious private schools receive triple that.

Then there is the very-California question about real estate. UC owns lots of gorgeous property in San Diego, Santa Barbara, Santa Cruz and elsewhere.

But, the president’s office will remain -- sorry, Mr. or Ms. Candidate -- in downtown Oakland.

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larry.gordon@latimes.com