o much starts with the personal qualities of the individual. You know, there are things you can't change, if they're really unpleasant people, you're wasting your time. And unpleasant people often get into jobs where they can be very destructive and, you know, there is absolutely a correlation between good leadership and performance of the institution, even under adverse circumstances.

However, let's start from the proposition that the people that we're trying to encourage to take on these roles, good, solid, intellectually able people because they are able to establish with your community that you have an understanding of the academic mission. I think because, number one, you don't have to come from that community. But I have seen very few cases where people have come from outside academia who have been good university leaders.

It's possible, but they have to be exceptional. I think secondly, in preparation for it, one needs to understand the entire panoply of the university and at different levels, different layers. So first of all, what is the intellectual breadth of the university? What are all the disciplines in the university? How do they interact? What's occupying the minds of the neuroscientists, and what's occupying the minds of the historians?

And have you got the intellectual capability not to understand them in depth, but to understand what is the level of aspiration? What are the funding sources that would allow them to develop and prevail? I think thirdly, it's of course, essential to understand the back office, where all the funding comes from and how it's allocated. But you would hope that you had a very well-prepared team who could help you on that.

And some universities you go into the team with are outstanding, some universities, it's hopelessly weak. And the leader has to be able to understand how that works. The next point, and I'm not doing this in an order of priority. But the next point obviously is the students. Can you talk to students? Can you really talk to students even if they're shouting at you?

Can you actually spend time and get to know them? You know, a student body that isn't protesting is not a lively student body, same with faculty. If ever I came to a university where the faculty were quiescent, I knew it was a dead duck. So you've got very lively, active people, and the president, you don't have to keep ahead of them, but you have to be able to understand what it is that drives them, how you manage the organization in such a way that you give people hope that that, to me, is the definition of leadership.

We've got hope because this is where we think we can take this university. You are part of that. We're working together to try to achieve it. Don't leave people in a state of uncertainty and confusion, which often happens in the gap between one president and the other, or maybe an interim president trying to hold it together. I think giving people hope is the critical message so far.