This phenomenological study examined the lived experiences of Lutheran college presidents leaving the presidency. The purpose of this research was to gain a deeper understanding of the experiences of former college presidents who were associated with the ELCA colleges. Ten former college presidents were interviewed. They shared personal stories, thoughts, feelings, and reflections related to exiting the presidency. I conducted a thematic analysis of the transcribed interviews to discover commonalities among participants' experiences. A long list of preliminary themes emerged from the texts. I emailed the list to the participants and followed up with a telephone interview to confirm the findings. The list of themes was shortened to reflect their comments.

After analyzing the data, four main stages, 13 themes, and 16 sub-themes emerged. The four main stages included: pre-exit stage, exit stage, post-exit stage, and lessons learned. The themes and sub-themes were all found in the literature, but for two: not as effective and losing the edge in the pre-exit stage, and period of isolation in the post-exit stage. The lessons learned section provided meaningful insights.

The knowledge gained in this study may help current presidents considering exiting, future presidents who aspire to the role, or board members whose job it is to hire, manage the performance of, fire, and retire college presidents. This study might also help Human Resource Development (HRD) professionals who work with college presidents or institutions.