How to be more collegial

If, as Richard Sennett argues in The Corrosion of Character, contemporary work cultures erode long-term commitment and shared moral frameworks, then choosing collegiality is a quiet form of resistance. In academia, where competition, evaluation, and scarcity shape daily life, collegiality does not emerge automatically. It has to be practised, and for me, relationships and compassion are on my list of core values and guiding principles (stuck to my computer monitor, to remind me frequently of what truly matters in my career). The good news is that being more collegial does not require heroic gestures or structural power. It is built through small, repeated actions that re-centre trust, care, and mutual recognition in our everyday work.

Here are a few practical ways to cultivate collegiality in academic settings:

• Take time to spend with others: Collegiality starts with presence. Informal conversations over coffee, checking in after meetings, or simply asking how someone is doing create relational space that metrics cannot capture. Time spent together is not unproductive; it is the groundwork of collaboration and community.
• Share your teaching materials, especially with new faculty: Syllabi, slides, assignments, and rubrics represent hours of invisible labor. Sharing them generously helps newcomers settle in and signals that teaching is a collective endeavor, not a competitive one. I’m always surprised by universities where it is culture to hog your teaching materials; where I studied, we all shared all teaching materials so we can rotate easily and can build on the experience of others.
• Build collaborations based on trust, not transactionality: Ask yourself whether a collaboration is grounded in mutual curiosity and respect, or merely strategic exchange. Trust-based collaborations are more sustainable and far more satisfying in the long run.
• Open doors for others: Recommend colleagues for talks, committees, grants, or networks, especially younger colleagues who are navigating the system. Opening doors is one of the most tangible ways to redistribute opportunity in uneven systems.
• Listen to the career needs of others: Not everyone wants the same things from academia. Some prioritize stability, others flexibility, others still impact beyond the university. Collegiality involves listening without projecting your own ambitions onto someone else’s path, and collaborate in a way that is aligned with your and your collaborators’ career needs.
• Mentor: Mentoring does not require senior titles. Sharing experience, naming unwritten rules, or normalizing uncertainty can make a profound difference, particularly for PhD candidates and early career researchers.
• Pay it forward: Many of us are where we are because someone once took a risk on us. Collegiality means remembering that debt and repaying it not downward, but forward, often to people we may never directly benefit from, and without any expectation to be “paid back”.

None of these practices will dismantle neoliberal academia on their own. But together, they create pockets of resistance where collective academic values can survive. Collegiality is not about being endlessly nice or ignoring structural inequalities. It is about refusing to let competition fully define how we relate to one another. In a system that corrodes character through speed, scarcity, and surveillance, practicing collegiality is a way of reclaiming agency. It reminds us that academia is not only a site of evaluation, but also a shared intellectual and human project, and where a culture of care and mutuality can form the basis of how we work.

How do you support your colleagues?