"UT Southwestern Chair, Department of Neuroscience"

Job Details

The University of Texas Southwestern (UTSW) Medical Center announces a search for a chairperson of our Department of Neuroscience. UTSW Medical Center is a rapidly expanding comprehensive health center located in Dallas, Texas, one of the most rapidly growing, prosperous, and technologically advanced regions of the country.

The UTSW Department of Neuroscience represents the core of basic science in the O’Donnell Brain Institute (OBI), a $1 billion investment dedicated to making UTSW the nation’s leading center of brain science advancement. The Institute’s programs span the entire spectrum from world-leading neuroscience research to the most advanced diagnostic and therapeutic technologies. The Department of Neuroscience occupies approximately 50,000 square feet of modern laboratory and teaching space in the heart of our scientific campus. The department currently houses 22 faculty members. Its current Chair, internationally renowned neuroscientist and geneticist Joseph Takahashi, announced his retirement after 16 years of leadership.

Scientists in the Department of Neuroscience benefit from access to more than 40 campus-wide core facilities covering all modern technologies ranging from cryo-electron microscopy to gene manipulation in mice, to chemical library screening. The new chairperson will join a university faculty that is well known for its collegiality and collaboration. This mutual support helps to account for the University’s unprecedented pace of scientific advancement and recognition over the past 50 years. During this period, six of our faculty have earned Nobel Prizes for work performed on our campus, three have received Breakthrough Prizes, and five have earned Lasker Awards. Our faculty include 24 members of the US National Academy of Sciences, 25 members of the National Academcy of Medicine, and one member of the National Academy of Engineering. Thirteen of our faculty are Howard Hughes investigators, one of the largest numbers for any institution in the country.

UTSW has a highly successful graduate student program that currently enrolls approximately 100 new students each year. Graduate students enter the program undifferentiated with respect to scientific fields. With generous support from the Perot Family Foundation, our M.D./Ph.D. program enrolls an average of 10 outstanding scholars each year. Our faculty currently supervises 650 postdoctoral fellows who come to us from the leading scientific institutions throughout the world.

Beyond a highly competitive recruitment package, the Department of Neuroscience expects to receive substantial financial support from the State, whose voters recently approved the Dementia Prevention Institute of Texas (DPRIT). With a budget of $3 billion to be spent over 10 years, DPRIT will support neuroscience research and commercial development at Texas institutions.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE CHAIR

The next Chair will assume a leadership position driving the success of the Department of Neuroscience’s mission and making significant contributions to UT Southwestern, the campus, the surrounding community, and beyond. This leader will exemplify the qualities of leadership, collaboration, communication, and fairness. In addition, the leader will:

• Provide visionary and innovative leadership to guide the department into the next phase of growth and development. The Role of the Chair of Neuroscience UT Southwestern Medical Center
• Promote the highest standards of rigor and impact in mechanistic neuroscience research, advancing fundamental understanding of brain function and disease.
• Ensure strong partnership and efficient collaboration with other Departments and partnering organizations.
• Develop and mentor the academic careers of current faculty/fellows and skillfully recruit and retain outstanding new research scientists to build a high-performing, cohesive team and cultivate a pipeline of next-generation leaders within the department.
• Support and advance graduate education within the department. Continue to foster positive learning environments.
• Support and advance the department’s culture of collaboration, innovation, and excellence.

DESIRED OUTCOMES

• A growing department of faculty and staff united by scientific rigor, intellectual ambition, and a shared commitment to excellence.
• A deep and durable leadership bench, with faculty prepared and supported to lead major scientific, educational, and institutional initiatives.
• Sustained high morale driven by transparent governance, meaningful engagement, and investment across all career stages.
• Research and educational programs that are cohesive, well-supported, and positioned for long-term impact.
• A strong, intentional culture that reinforces collaboration, rigor, and mutual respect within an already vibrant neuroscience community.

The Chair will bring many of the following qualifications, professional experiences, and personal attributes:

• An outstanding record of research and scholarly achievements that merit appointment to the rank of full professor in the department;
• Distinguished researcher with a world-class scientific reputation;
• Good judgment in hiring and an eye for scientific excellence; a track record of supporting faculty and staff;
• An altruistic leader with a proven commitment to mentoring, motivating, and promoting faculty;
• An inclusive and receptive leadership style that values open dialogue and constructive engagement across differing viewpoints;
• Experience running a laboratory and managing administrative staff to support grant applications and accounting;
• Experience navigating and advocating for a department within a complex university, research, or medical center environment;
• An understanding of budgets and a record of fiscal responsibility;
• Visionary and principled leadership; a results-oriented approach, the highest level of integrity, and timely decision-making;
• Personal qualities that foster collaboration and resilience, such as humility, persistence, patience, good humor, and flexibility;
• A history of progressively responsible and successful academic leadership in a complex university, research organization, or medical center; demonstrated track record of academic excellence and success in leading and advancing research and academic programs;
• An appreciation of the importance of collaboration among different basic biomedical research fields, and between basic science and clinical disciplines.

CRITICAL LEADERSHIP CAPABILITIES

Strategic and Intentional Leadership

• Understands and explains how changes in neuroscience and relevant fields affect the department and its collaborators.
• Develops strategies to build sustainable research programs and scholarly activity within the department.
• Translates the strategies of UT Southwestern and the department into clear, specific objectives and plans for individuals. Qualifications and Characteristics UT Southwestern Medical Center
• Creates a strong and impassioned vision for building excellence across all aspects of the academic mission.

Collaborating and Influencing

• Engages all relevant partners with a genuine give-and-take approach, seeking win-win outcomes with broad consensus.
• Cultivates relationships with all stakeholders and frames the department as an ally committed to the success of individuals, other units, and the institution as a whole.
• Is a consensus-oriented leader who displays “respectful courage” and is highly influential in their ability to encourage people forward.
• Possesses insight and conviction in setting a transformative plan, flexibility in achieving broad buy-in, and humility to share credit and empower others.

Leading People

• Adapts leadership style to each individual team member to get the best outcome.
• Regularly meets with individuals to discuss projects, career goals, research funding avenues, and offer any support they may need.
• Recognizes individual and team successes and supports ongoing development of faculty and graduate students.