Some things just don't fit into job descriptions.

UW-Madison Chancellor John Wiley, who will step down in September, talks about some of his adventures while holding the university's top office.

Unexpected calls for help

Several years ago, the chancellor's office got a phone call from a Wisconsin company concerned that they'd have to shut down or lay off workers because they were having trouble getting the necessary parts from their supplier in Shanghai.

"They asked did we know anyone in Shanghai who might be able to help intervene," Wiley said. "We contacted a Chinese lawyer who'd come here for a short course that we offer on U.S. law for international lawyers. He intervened and got things going the next day.

"Things like that happen a fair bit. That's why governors always take along university representatives on their trade missions because we have so many alumni everywhere."

Mr. Wiley goes to Washington

"If you ever see me at the airport, you can make money betting I'm going to Washington," Wiley said. "That's my most frequent trip. Probably once a month at least, sometimes more.

"I visit with every single elected official from Wisconsin just to make sure they understand our legislative agenda and other things we're concerned about, things we'd like to see happen."

It's lonely at the top

Wiley had served as provost at UW-Madison for about six years before becoming chancellor, so he thought he had a pretty good idea of what he was in for.

"The biggest surprise was the stature or reverence people have for the title, for the position of chancellor," Wiley said. "People I've known my whole life who'd call me John if they were trying to be polite or almost anything else if they weren't, started referring to me as Chancellor Wiley, which I found unnerving and irritating."

The real challenge, he said, is not to get isolated from what's happening around you.

"You find out quickly that people don't like to say no to you and that they tell you what they think you want to hear instead of what you really need to know," Wiley said. "That's very dangerous. It's hard to get good, accurate information."

Auld lang syne with alumni

There are about 120 UW-Madison alumni clubs around the world and Wiley tries to attend Founder's Day events of at least three or four groups each year.

"Their first choice is always a coach, the football or basketball coach or the athletic director these days. But they'll settle for a chancellor," Wiley said.

He's been to alumni gatherings as far away as Singapore, where more than 150 of the 210 alums living there showed up on one occasion. For a European alumni get-together held in Norway several years ago, Wiley took along four student musicians.

"The featured event was a cruise through the fjords with the string quartet playing on deck," Wiley said. "The alums loved that."

On the won't-be-missed list

It's no secret that UW-Madison's dealings with several not-to-be-named-here elected officials were sometimes prickly in recent years.

"Their attitude, their mantra is 'perception is reality,'" Wiley said. "If you're in the business, as some of them are, of first creating the perception and then declaring it to be reality and then making decisions as if it were reality — talk about heading in the wrong direction. It just frustrates the daylight out of me.

"I think like a physicist or engineer. To me, reality is pretty sacred. I'm very quantitative and fact-oriented, probably too much so. "

— Heather LaRoi