Abstract
Higher education is experiencing profound instability as institutions confront financial pressures, political scrutiny, and the accelerating demographic cliff. Admission leaders stand at the intersection of these challenges, carrying significant emotional demands as they recruit students, support staff, and uphold institutional expectations during sustained uncertainty. Although emotional labor has been examined in service and frontline roles, far less attention has been given to how higher education leaders experience and make sense of this work during periods of disruption. For this qualitative narrative inquiry, I invited seven admission leaders to participate in two in-depth narrative interviews, seeking to understand how they described and enacted emotional labor during the demographic cliff and how they cultivated emotional endurance through authenticity, integrity, and optimism. I analyzed the transcripts using open, in vivo, emotion, value, and emotional labor coding to identify cross narrative patterns.
The results indicate that emotional labor for these leaders involved more than composure or emotional control. They described emotional labor as a reflective and relational process through which they aligned outward expressions with ethical commitments and a sense of purpose. Emotional endurance emerged as the central pattern across the narratives, representing the ongoing effort to sustain integrity, express authenticity, and practice disciplined optimism while navigating institutional strain. Leaders described how emotional endurance grounded their presence, preserved mission alignment, and supported care for others, while also revealing limits when institutional expectations conflicted with personal values.
My interpretation of emotional labor in higher education is a reflective and relational practice through which leaders work to align their outward expression with their ethical commitments and sense of purpose. Admission leaders described emotional endurance as the ongoing effort to sustain integrity, express authenticity, and practice disciplined optimism while navigating institutional strain. Their narratives underscore the importance of organizational cultures that support and make space for emotional authenticity, reflective practice, and manageable workload expectations. Areas for future inquiry, particularly related to emotional endurance and the long-term well-being of leaders who carry significant emotional demands during periods of instability, are addressed.