Middle-management engagement
How managers influence access to assignments, feedback, development, and visibility within an institution.
← Writing
Research & scholarship
Opportunity shapes careers.
Exploring how leadership, relationships, and technology influence recruitment, retention, and advancement in higher education IT.
The inquiry
Who gets access to what comes next?
Leon’s research focuses on the experiences of higher education IT professionals and the organizational practices that shape their careers. It brings an executive practitioner’s perspective to questions of opportunity, visibility, and advancement.
The work examines middle-management engagement, mentorship and sponsorship, and AI-enabled tools used in hiring, evaluation, or advancement decisions. It asks how these mechanisms affect people whose experiences are often overlooked.
The research is presented here as scholarship, with its own questions and source material.
Three areas of inquiry
The everyday systems of opportunity.
Mentorship and sponsorship
How guidance and advocacy shape professional growth, access to networks, and the possibility of advancement.
AI-enabled talent decisions
How automated or AI-assisted tools enter hiring, evaluation, and advancement processes, and how those decisions are experienced by professionals.
Approach
Begin with lived experience.
The public research description identifies a qualitative inquiry into career experiences in higher education IT. Listening to professionals makes it possible to examine how institutional practices are understood and experienced, beyond the language of a policy or strategy.
The central question connects three levels: the decisions managers make, the relationships that create access, and the tools institutions use to support or filter opportunity.
Connect about the researchFrom the archive
Research in public conversation.
These articles retain their original publication dates. The recruitment invitation is an archived publication.
Call for Participants: Higher Education IT Career Experiences Study
A call for participants exploring higher education IT career pathways, lived experience, and leadership development.
Read articleThe Role of IT in Higher Education: Exploring Strategic Leadership and Innovation Through Research
A research-forward article on the evolving role of IT in higher education leadership and institutional innovation.
Read articleStudy overview
Explore the scholarly work.
Fostering Inclusive IT Leadership in U.S. Higher Education
A qualitative phenomenological study of opportunity, visibility, sponsorship, and AI-enabled HR tools in higher education IT careers.
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