AbstractThe author reviews models of staff development in higher education. Micro models of staff development practice are distinguished and evaluated. He categorises models into product‐orientation, prescription‐orientation, process‐orientation, problem‐orientation and eclecticism and commends the latter model. He identifies three macro models of staff development responsibility: ‘management’, ‘shopfloor’ and ‘partnership’, and a variation of the latter, ‘decentralisation’. Of the various micro‐macro combinations which are possible, eclectic decentralisation is commended to higher education institutions for the