A RELATIVE-VALUE - BASED SYSTEM FOR CALCULATING FACULTY PRODUCTIVITY IN TEACHING, RESEARCH, ADMINISTRATION, AND PATIENT-CARE

Purpose. To design and test a simple, easily modifiable system for cal culating faculty productivity in teaching, research, administration, a nd patient care in which all areas of endeavor would be recognized and high productivity in one area would produce results similar to high p roductivity in another at the Louisiana State University School of Med icine in New Orleans. Method. A relative-value and time-based system w as designed in 1996 so that similar efforts in the four areas would pr oduce similar scores, and a profile reflecting the authors' estimates of high productivity (''super faculty'') was developed for each area. The activity profiles of 17 faculty members were used to test the syst em. Results. ''Super-faculty'' scores in all areas were similar. The f aculty members' mean scores were higher for teaching and research than for administration and patient care, and all four mean scores were su bstantially lower than the respective totals for the ''super faculty.' ' In each category the scores of those faculty members who scored abov e the mean in that category were used to calculate new mean scores. Th e mean scores for these faculty members were similar to those for the ''super faculty'' in teaching and research but were substantially lowe r for administration and patient care. When the mean total score of th e eight faculty members predicted to have total scores below the group mean was compared with the mean total score of the nine faculty membe rs predicted to have total scores above the group mean, the difference was significant (p < .0001). For the former, every score in each cate gory was below the mean, with the exception of one faculty member's sc ore in one category. Of the latter, eight had higher scores in teachin g and four had higher scores in teaching and research combined. Conclu sion. This system provides a quantitative method for the equal recogni tion of faculty productivity in a number of areas, and it may be usefu l as a starting point for other academic units exploring similar issue s.