Nursing education is facing a leadership readiness crisis, one that is less about a shortage of talent and more about how nurse educators are prepared, developed, and supported to assume academic leadership roles. While nurse educators are expertly trained in teaching, clinical reasoning, and student evaluation, research consistently shows that they enter academic leadership positions with limited preparation in higher education administration, organizational leadership, and systems-level decision-making.

For decades, nursing education has acknowledged a persistent and consequential gap between how new graduate nurses are prepared and the realities of contemporary practice. Research documenting transition shock, burnout, and early attrition among new graduates has driven widespread adoption of nurse residency programs, structured orientation, and competency-based education models designed to ensure readiness, patient safety, and workforce retention (Benner et al., 2010; National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine [NASEM], 2021).

Yet within our own academic systems, we continue to replicate the very problem we critique, with a strikingly parallel gap within academic nursing. Nurse educators are routinely appointed to leadership roles such as program director, department chair, and assistant dean without intentional preparation for the scope, complexity, and accountability inherent to these positions. As a result, academic nursing continues to rely on informal learning, trial-and-error leadership development, and crisis-driven succession. These approaches have long been recognized as inadequate in clinical practice.

Nursing education would never accept a model in which new graduate nurses are placed into high-acuity environments without orientation, mentorship, or competency validation. And yet, we routinely accept this model for academic leadership. We justify it as tradition, assume leadership skills are transferable by default, or rely on informal mentoring to fill structural gaps. The result is predictable and preventable. Research consistently shows that new academic leaders report role ambiguity, workload strain, and limited preparation for administrative and systems-level responsibilities (Birkhead et al., 2023). These experiences closely mirror the role shock described by new graduate nurses entering high-acuity clinical environments without adequate transition support. And this is not an individual failure; it is a systemic one.

Contemporary academic nurse leaders are expected to oversee accreditation processes, manage academic budgets, lead curricular redesign, evaluate faculty performance, navigate shared governance, and respond to institutional and regulatory demands, often simultaneously (Greenway & Acai, 2024). These responsibilities require competencies that extend well beyond teaching expertise or scholarly productivity. Excellence in teaching or clinical practice does not equate to readiness for academic leadership.

Faculty workforce data indicate growing reluctance among mid-career educators to pursue leadership roles due to perceived unpreparedness, workload concerns, and lack of institutional support (Fang & Kesten, 2017). Leadership is frequently framed as an endpoint or service obligation rather than as a developmental pathway embedded within faculty role progression.

This paper argues that academic nursing is perpetuating a known failure: expecting individuals to perform complex professional roles without structured preparation, supported transition, or demonstrated competence.