I had been looking at a number of deanships, but when I visited UF, everything just clicked. I loved the place from my first day here. What I saw was the opportunity to build something in a rapidly growing state. I naively expected to have everything done in 5 years. Now it's true that the budget difficulties of the early 1990s threw off all timetables, but in retrospect 10 years would have been a more reasonable target.
Universities can be richly counteractive to change.
That's a question I'd best defer to others. I am happy about the significant improvement in many academic programs, the success in recovering UF's historic buildings, and the sharp increase in research and private funding. Either they were bad ideas or I didn't market them well, or both. My philosophy is to surround myself with the best possible people, then delegate heavily in responsibility and the attendant authority. I have been very fortunate that outstanding faculty have been willing to join the CLAS team, and they have made enormous contributions to the success of this college.