Robert Birnbaum.
How Colleges Work: the cybernetics of academic organization and leadership.
Jossey-Bass. 1988
In this publication of the National Center for Postsecondary Governance and Finance,
Robert Birnbaum provides a new way of thinking about the leadership of colleges and universities.
He examines in depth four distinct models of how colleges work
and then integrates the best features of each into a flexible new model
of college and university organization based
on cybernetics—self-regulating systems of control guided by formal and informal rules,
campus debate and discussion, and ongoing feedback among faculty, students, and staff.