This article provides a detailed description and analysis of how one Canadian institution used groups of department heads as change agents to address their most acute department head role tensions. It is demonstrated that this institution's change initiative aligned very closely to the recommendations proposed, in both the literature pertaining to…

Much research has been undertaken to investigate the cultural, structural and, to some extent, the economic effects of mergers in higher education. However, surprisingly little research has been done on why higher education institutions decide to merge. This article identifies and discusses a number of structural factors that may play a role when…

Despite considerable international literature acknowledging issues associated with the effectiveness of university academic boards (also known as academic senates or faculty senates), there is little current empirical research exploring why difficulties might exist and what (if anything) might be done about them. This article reports the findings…

Recent changes in European higher education have accompanied a strong desire and need by national ministries to have comparable data across institutions and a growing recognition from campus leaders that effective planning and decision-making requires reliable institutional data and analyses. This has induced changes and restructuring of duties…

Middle-level academic managers play a central role in university management; however, their roles are not always clear and straightforward. Although this research subject has been comprehensively investigated in the last 40 years, most studies are western-biased. This study examines the roles of Heads of Department in a newly established…

The study discussed here was based on a collective case approach involving a specialist UK higher education institution. Six individual interviews were carried out with a cross-sectional sample of the institution's staff members. Additional information was gained through observations and examination of relevant documents. These data were…

This paper investigates the state and structure of professional norms in the context of undergraduate teaching in a university in Kazakhstan. The purpose is to understand the belief system held by academics with regards to their professional duties in the context of teaching. Evidence of such normative structure would suggest that the Kazakhstani…

As austerity measures become a reoccurring theme, higher education institutions (HEIs) worldwide are examining diverse sources of funding, such as philanthropy, as an alternative to State support. This paper argues that building lifelong relationships with alumni offers an HEI with a strategy to yield other residual benefits for the institution,…

This paper reports and analyses findings from a qualitative study that explored the impact of organizational policy, cultures and support structures on the research pathways of early career researchers within one Australian university. The author captured the perspectives and experiences of six early and six senior researchers and examined the…

Transparency and comparability of higher education institutions especially in terms of their academic programmes and research activities are important issues for today's working environment. This paper is an overview of a recently completed PhD thesis which outlines examples of selected Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development…

This paper addresses the question of what potential success factors are relevant when developing and managing higher education-business partnerships. To shed light on this question, the paper presents a review of research literature on the possible success factors in university-industry relations. To shed further light on the factors identified in…

This article aims at analysing and discussing student participation in Portuguese higher education institutions and, specifically, in university governance. In a first moment, it describes this participation under both the previous (1988-2007) and the new legal frameworks (since 2007). A discussion of the changes introduced by this last framework…

In the context of new public management reforms, many business management concepts were transferred to universities. Most studies on the transfer of business management concepts to universities show that transfers were not as successful as expected. These studies also provide nuances as to why it is such a delicate matter. However, a basic…

This article explores how budget cuts affected faculty in two departments--a physical sciences department and a humanities department--at one research university in the USA. Using theories of academic capitalism as a guide, the author focuses in particular on changes in governance structures and increasing competition between disciplines for…

This paper focuses on assessing possible levers in the hands of a university's top management team for inducing or managing change when faced with environmental drives. The topic is discussed after analysing change in a university over a 20-year period. The case study underlines the opportunities and difficulties of linking external environmental…