Collegiality as a Fundamental Professional Value in an Academic Setting: A Case Study in a Teacher Education Institution in a Small Island Developing State

Abstract

Collegiality is believed to entail “always acting in good faith, [...], in concert with one’shonest judgment as to the best interests of one’s institution” (Siegel, 2004, p. 411). Thisunderstanding of collegiality is deemed to be output-oriented and missing out on importantunderlying concepts and values related to the construct. While research shows thatcollegiality as a concept and a practice is well anchored in corporate jargon and settingswhere collaborative efforts among employees are capitalised upon for the optimisation ofoutput, there seems to be a dearth of literature on the importance of collegiality in relationto personal well-being in the professional set-up. Moreover, in academic settings, collegialityas a concept has been extensively researched in relation to teacher collegiality, but there isvery little mention of how collegiality influences well-being in work life among academics inhigher education institutions. This paper seeks to explore the understanding that academicsin a teacher education institution have of the concept of collegiality and its impact on theirprofessional stance and job-related personal well-being. It addresses the question of whethercollegiality should be incorporated as a fundamental professional value within a teachereducation institution as this is deemed to have implications for human capital development.The study shows that though the corporate logic of the use of collegiality for enhanced performance is the most prevalent practice even in an academic set up, academics have alsoappropriated the concept to include a strong element of social and emotional intelligence.