As Provost, you have many departments that report to you.  These departments house different academic disciplines.  Given this situation,  you will be faced with some new and unfamiliar experiences.  Before you became Provst you most likely have spent a significant part of  your career working in departments that have a defined specialty.  It is important that you take the time to learn about and understand each of the departments that report to you.  I found a very effective method is to meet with the department chair and or dean and ask them to educate you about their discipline with particular reference to the challenges they face in educating their students.  You should ask questions and make notes so that it will be clear that you really want to understand what each department does and what challenges they face doing it.  It is a good idea for you to ask each of the chairs or deans to tell you about the people that report to them.   You will want to learn who are the most contributing members of the schools, as well as faculty and/or administrators who might present issues for the chair or dean.  Listen carefully, ask questions, and don’t be judgmental or critical.  You might offer some advice but keep that to a minimum.  You will want to make it clear that you want to hear and understand what the chair or dean is telling you.  If you take this approach, you will begin to create a relationship with the chair or dean in which she or he sees you as a person who values what she or he has to say and is willing to learn something that will help you in doing your job.  It is a good idea to have conversations with the faculty members or chairs from time to time.  In those conversations, you should ask them about their teaching and research.  It is likely that any issues they have will come up in the meeting.  It is important that you present yourself as an impartial listener.  You can always follow up with a meeting with the department chair or dean if you believe that an issue the faculty member has raised needs to follow up.  Make no decisions and take no action until you get the complete picture of the issue.  Remember, people present their own perspective of an issue.  Their perspective is not likely to be unbiased and complete. Acting on incomplete and biased information will create a major problem for you.  It damages your relationship with the department chair or dean and ultimately it will result in you being perceived as a biased and impulsive leader.  That is not an image you want to project. 

  I recommend that you recommend that department chairs use the same procedure outlined above with each of their faculty members.   You can point out that, even though they are in the same discipline, it is not likely they are familiar with all the areas of the discipline, and they can learn a lot by talking to faculty whose specialty is different from yours. 

As Provost, you have a number of departments and schools representing different disciplines that are different from the one you came from.  It is essential for you to learn as much about those disciplines, the chair, dean, and faculty members so you will know how to be most effective in your support and help to those departments.