However, it is also the case that I do not think of myself as a potted plant. I cannot agree with those members of a university faculty who seem to resent it when presidents, provosts, or deans remind them that they are their colleagues, that they have special responsibilities, and that they, too, have views on curricular and scholarly issues. If presidents express such views in anything other than a mealy-mouthed way and, God forbid, do something about implementing them, in some quarters they will readily be accused of being autocratic. And, both inside and outside the university, people are only too ready to jump to conclusions about the university, its direction, and its leadership on the basis of little, or even no, information and knowledge. In the end, all of us play necessary roles, for universities are built by many and they are built to last.
Great universities are exactly that, visionary institutions, built, stone after stone, to last.
Indeed, universities have been extraordinarily durable as institutions and in terms of the functions they have performed in Western societies. This puts some universities in such company as the Roman Catholic Church, the Bank of Siena, and the Royal Mint. They are not there because of charismatic leaders. Of course, I am not suggesting that there is no need for leadership at universities. The university's vision is not a crystal to be slipped into one's pocket.