For many years, tenure has been a popular target for critics outside of higher education. What's different today is that even some leaders of academe are calling for radical changes in tenure, and even for its abolition. As president of one of the nation's major research universities, I disagree.
Tenure is indispensable.
Opponents of tenure will find my position preposterous. Corporations don't grant tenure. They downsize periodically to react to changing markets and changing times. If corporations are right, universities must be wrong to cling to tenure. Their missions are fundamentally different, as are their strategies for managing personnel.