COMMITTEE CHAIR: Dr. Donald Collins
TITLE: LEADERSHIP BEHAVIOR IN INSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT AND ITS INFLUENCE ON ALUMNI GIVING BEHAVIOR: A GROUNDED THEORY STUDY
ABSTRACT: The title for this dissertation was Understanding Leadership in Institutional Development and its Influence on Alumni Giving Behavior: A Grounded Theory Study. Many questions were raised about leadership when it came to alumni giving and higher education, especially in terms of viability and sustainability of campus budgets. Therefore, the purpose of this qualitative study was to explore the transformative leadership qualities needed for college administrators to impact giving behavior of student alumni at small, private colleges. The concept of alumni giving had been well-defined in the research, and there were many studies about alumni giving at major universities. However, research that intersected alumni giving and small colleges had been scant. This dissertation research intended to fill this gap. A qualitative methodology with a grounded theory approach permitted an understanding of alumni giving behavior by being able to describe individual experiences and explain decision-making processes carried out by participants when they were contemplating donating funds to their alma mater. The research questions were: Which leadership behaviors influenced alumni students to participate in alumni giving? How was institutional messaging about alumni giving communicated to alumni students? To what extent did leadership opportunities influence alumni giving decisions? How did relationship-building impact alumni-giving behavior?
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