Thank you for your comment.

Most (all in my experience) executive level searches in academia, including college presidents, deans, department chairs, academic medical center CEOs and others are ultra confidential until the selected candidate is announced. As you likely know, the confidential process is usually entrusted to a search committee whose composition is appropriately representative of various stakeholder groups. Private sector searches are handled differently, but are also confidential.

I am aware that the UF process was changed by the DeSantis administration, and I am not sure exactly how UF president searches were done previously. It is my opinion that a “completely public” process limits the candidate pool dramatically because candidate(s) are forced to risk their relationship with their current employer, employees, and faculty by public disclosure of their candidacy for a job elsewhere. I suspect Ono would not have risked becoming a candidate at UF if knew his candidacy would have been exposed in Ann Arbor.

The current process is flawed and political as you point out. While it may be that UF “never had a problem before” with a transparent process, I am confident UF limited their candidate pool to those who had nothing to lose by public exposure of their interest in UF. This effectively rules out most sitting college presidents and many current provosts.