cher 2016 kallenberg

Navigating through the ‘patchwork’ university The critical position of the third space professional

Paper Presentation CHER 2016 Annual conference The University as a Critical Institution?

Queens’College, University of Cambridge, UK, 5-7 september 2016.

Ton Kallenberg

Advance organizer

I was interested into three questions: • Is there still talk of the existence of

the interacting spheres? • do “third space professionals”

differ from Academics and

Administrators regarding their perceived influence on different processes within the universities?

• how does third space professionals navigate throughout the university?

• Universities as hybrid organizations • The Interacting Spheres Model • The emergence of the Third Space

Professionals (TSP) • Results of international survey • Conclusions of survey • Position and activities of TSP • Micro-cultures • A casus • Conclusions for further research

Queens’ College, Cambridge, UK, 2016, September 5-7

Universities as hybrid organizations

Universities are seen as hybrid organizations wherein various subsystems operate independently to each other.

They were divided in two groups of officials:

• academics - engaged with primary tasks: education and research

• administrators (overhead) - management and support of the primary tasks

• pure overhead: human resources, finance control, facility management etc.

• specific educational and research support

relationship between academics and administrators: conflictual, competitive, negative (i.e. Birnbaum, 1988; Conway, 1998).

Hanson (1979): interacting spheres model



The Interacting Spheres Model (origin: Hanson, 1979)

Developments in higher education

During the last decades a lot of developments, such as:

• substantial drive towards greater accountability, performance, quality

inspection, target setting (and so on) (Deem & Brehony, 2005; Anderson, 2008;

Kolsaker, 2008; Meek et al, 2010, Hyde et al, 2013)

• trend towards managerialism (Smeenk et al, 2009)

• universities have become more bureaucratic organizations (“There is an

irresistible rise of academic bureaucracy, and where does it stops?”) (Conway,

2012)

emergence of third space professionals / new professionals / blended

professionals (Whitchurch, 2006; Klumpp & Teichler, 2008; Schneijderberg &

Mercator, 2013) Queens’ College, Cambridge, UK, 2016, September 5-7

Third Space zone


The emergence of the Third Space Zone

Third space professionals

they:

• work at the interface between administration, academics and university leadership

(Whitchurch, 2006, 2008, 2013; Mcfarlane, 2011)

• have essential sector-specific expertise (Klücken et al, 2013)

• monitor, regulate and manage the educational processes (Deem & Brehony, 2005)

• work “under the radar”, invisible workforce (Rhoades, 2010)

• can neither been seen as part of the administrators nor do they belong to the

academic staff (Klumpp & Teichler, 2008; Schneijderberg & Merkator, 2012)

• work with both the academic and administrative rhythms, timescales and staff, and

work between the organizational structure of checks and balances (Kallenberg,

2016b)

• by being aware of their binding function, they can use their (tacit) knowledge to

interpret and synthesize this knowledge within the organization (prism-effect)

(Kallenberg, 2013)Queens’ College, Cambridge, UK, 2016, September 5-7

Academic middle manager (Hellawell & Hancock, 2001; Kallenberg,

2005; 2013) umbrella term for the middle manager from the academic staff who: ...is integrally responsible for program curricula, from strategy through to educational management

academic manager (Mercer, 2009) mid-level academic manager (Inman, 2007; Whitchurch, 2008; Larsen et al, 2009) manager academics (Deem & Brehony, 2005) middle leaders (Branson, Franken & Penney, 2016) academic middle leaders (Preston & Floyd, 2016) academic dean (Wolverton et al, 2001; Vieira da Motta & Bolan, 2008) vice-dean; head of study; program director; educational director

Educational Administrator (Kallenberg, 2015)

umbrella term for the middle manager from the administrative staff who: …play their role in developing, supporting, and advising on educational activities. … show scientific aspirations

director educational affairs head quality control educational advisor program coordinator


Third space professionals can be distinguished into:

My questions

I was interested into three questions: • Is there still talk of the existence of the interacting spheres? • do “third space professionals” differ from Academics and Administrators

regarding their perceived influence on different processes within the

universities? • how does third space professionals navigate throughout the university?


The research

1. online survey (SurveyMonkey)

• addresses (adapted from websites) of employees of faculties.

• in questionnaire - three levels: (1) curriculum processes, (2) education

support processes, (3) education conditional processes

2. interviews and observations (Actor Network Theory)

when where addresses respondents dataset

Netherlands spring 2015 6 univ 1.632 548 (31,6%) 490

Belgium spring 2016 5 univ 2.521 768 (30,4%) 611

Denmark spring 2016 4 univ 1.580 453 (28,7%) 309

total 15 univ 5.733 1.769 1.410


Academics


Model of Educational processes. The inner circle shows the educational process (curriculum), the central circle shows the education support processes and the outermost circle shows the education conditional

processes (Kallenberg, 2016b)

Academics

The Netherlands Belgium Denmark Total

Male / Female 52,0% / 48,0% 42,5% / 57,5% 48,7 % / 51,3% 47,2 % / 52,8 %

Age (median in) 46-50 year 36-40 year 41-45 year

Degree (Ba/Ma/PhD) in % Other degree

10,7 / 23,9 / 58,7 5,9%

15,7 / 37,1 / 31,8 15,3%

10,3 / 33,3 / 52,3 3,9%

13,1 / 32,6 / 45,6 8,6%

Academic 245 51,1%

290 47,6%

160 51,8%

695 49,7%

Administrator 161 33,6%

246 40,4%

84 27,2%

491 35,1%

Academic Middle Manager

54 11,3%

43 7,1%

46 14,9%

143 10,2%

Educational Administrator

19 4,0%

30 4,9%

19 6,1%

68 4,9%

Results


Professor 4,06 4,25 3,82 4,01 2,51 1,79 1,91 2,33 2,34 2,25 2,66 2,93 3,03 2,90

Assistant/Associate Professor

3,80 4,18 3,68 3,81 2,34 1,60 1,64 1,98 2,02 1,39 1,61 2,12 1,83 1,68

Research Assistant/Researcher in Training/Researcher

2,42 3,28 2,43 2,80 1,72 1,36 1,38 1,62 1,53 1,16 1,18 1,57 1,29 1,34

Scaffolding 1,63 2,04 1,82 1,46 2,04 1,51 2,23 2,35 4,00 1,25 1,28 2,04 1,63 1,73

Monitoring 1,59 1,59 1,83 1,80 3,67 1,96 2,69 2,41 2,56 1,46 1,43 2,02 1,78 1,55

Administrating 1,18 1,38 1,24 1,31 1,69 1,35 2,73 1,96 1,61 1,59 1,55 1,48 1,49 1,43

Faci l i tat ing 1,13 1,36 1,29 1,21 1,29 3,23 1,25 1,42 1,23 1,68 1,48 1,57 1,51 1,42

Communication 1,12 1,10 1,20 1,10 1,12 1,20 1,24 3,75 1,41 1,37 1,29 1,35 1,73 1,90

Finance 1,07 1,14 1,09 1,16 1,20 1,30 1,22 1,36 1,09 3,78 1,87 1,57 1,71 1,56

Human Resources 1,02 1,02 1,02 1,00 1,07 1,26 1,10 1,12 1,05 1,49 3,70 1,33 1,60 1,42

Governance / Quality Assurance

2,07 2,37 2,61 2,38 2,46 1,89 2,53 2,36 2,53 1,94 2,00 3,57 2,82 3,00

content

provision

development

testinglogisti

cs

technique

administration

communication

st & st

guidance

financeHRM

qualitygovernance

strategy


Academicsacademics

academic middle managers

educational administrators

administrators

0

1,25

2,5

3,75

5

educational process

educational support process

educational conditional

process

content

provision

development

testinglogisti

cs

technique

administration

communication

st & st

guidance

financeHRM

qualitygovernance

strategy


Conclusions

The first two questions can be answered affirmative 1. The Interacting Spheres Model:

• academics don’t experience influence on administrative processes • administrators don’t experience influence on educational processes • Loosely Coupled System is still there!

(esp. Administrators seems to be an archipelago or a Patchwork) 2. Third Space Professionals:

• Yes! TSP’s differ from Academics and Administrators regarding their perceived influence on different processes within the universities.

• Third Space Professionals are a new specialized buffer zone between academics and administrators

• Will there be a ‘fourth power’ (educational administrators)? (or: when will

there be a stop on the rise of the bureaucracy?)


The university as a patchwork

Why a patchwork? • there’s no communality -> there is a wide variety of habits, customs, rules

and specialties • there are different interests all over the university • lack of collaboration • all kind of decisions are made in addition to and independently of each

other • all kind of initiatives are being taken

(e.g. my university during last year 187 on educational innovations) • there are a lot of micro cultures

So [third question]: How does third space professionals navigate throughout the ‘patchwork’

university?


Third Space Professionals has ‘to deal with’: HEI’s as large institutions with many clashes of interest

• tension of functions: administrators (managerial efficiency) versus professionals (content quality)

• tension of focus: centralization versus decentralization (central staff vs faculties)

• tension of initiative: top-down versus bottom-up (and vice-versa)

• tension of interest: education versus research

• tension of control: hierarchy versus collegiality

“organized chaos” (Cohen & March, 1974)

“garbage can model” (March & Olsen, 1976)

“loosely coupled systems” (Weick, 1976)


Prisma van de verandering?

Prism

a van d

e verand

ering?

De rollen van academische middenmanagers

bij strategische innovaties in het hoger onderwijs

Ton Kallenberg

Ton

Kallenb

erg

Prisma van de verandering?

Hoger onderwijsinstellingen moeten innoveren.

Instellingen die niet of onvoldoende innoveren

verliezen de aansluiting met een continue ver-

anderende markt en verliezen hun bestaansrecht.

Het doorvoeren van strategische innovaties

verloopt echter moeizaam en leidt niet altijd tot het

gewenste resultaat. Bij het doorvoeren van deze

strategische innovaties in de organisatie speelt de

academische middenmanager een belangrijke rol.

Onderzocht wordt welke rollen de academische

middenmanager bij strategische innovaties in het

hoger onderwijs vervullen en ook wordt onderzocht

waardoor deze vervulling wordt beïnvloedt. Hierbij

worden organisatorische, functiegerelateerde en

persoonlijke variabelen onderscheiden.

The third space professional holds an paradoxical in-between position

possibilities: • unique ‘(tacit) knowledge’ basis (he knows what’s

happening in the organization) • integrates strategic information with operational

information (and vice versa) • is in position to speak and negotiate with stakeholders

in the organization on strategic, organizational and operational level.

in short: the prism effect of the academic middle manager is that he select, interprets and synthesizes information and uses this information in a custom way elsewhere in the organization.

constraints: • encapsulated in processes • imbalance in role expectations and freedom of action • accountable, but that’s not (always) accomplished with

the same amount of authorization • leadership is expected, but account with reference to

managerial targets, etc.


4 types of activities (in which third space professionals are involved)

how often do you fulfill the following activities? 1 = almost never /…/ 5 = daily

Academic middle

managersEducational

Administrators

administrative activities managing work of teams or colleagues; planning, administrating, monitoring and controlling structures and processes; etc. (Tucker, 1992; Bennett & Figuli, 1990; Gold, 1998; Gunter & Rutherford, 2000; Boyko & Jones, 2010);

2,45 3,37

relational activities based on substantive discourse of meetings and building trust among colleagues (Meek et al, 2010; Boyko & Jones, 2010);

3,84 3,42

intervening activities diplomacy between and within (central) management and academic values; negotiating (Meek et al., 2010; Boyko & Jones, 2010);

4,11 3,79

result oriented activities attending to student performance, efficiency and effectiveness (Clegg & McAuley, 2005; Wolverton, Ackerman & Holt, 2005; Verhoeven, 2007).

3,58 4,09

N = 143 N = 68


Department Department

resistent to policy

neutral to policy

supportive to policy

Diplomats / Hubs• micro-cultures affect processes • the more departments are involved: the more difficult • role of TSP: create people and policy alignment • TSP has to create networks of ‘hubs’ • TSP must have attention to the power of the process


micro-cultures and interaction between them

Actor Network Theory

• ANT methodology - from late 70s - further developed by Latour (1999, 2005) in sociology; Law (1992, 1999) in organizational sociology; and Mol in health and policy. More recently: Fox (2005), Fenwick & Edwards (2011) and Viczko (2015) pointed out the relevance of the Actor Network Theory for education related research

• focuses on relationships and connections that develop between social and material phenomena

• ANT looks at everyday 'things' (objects, memories, intentions, technologies, texts) that are able to exert force on each other. They can convince each other, force, seduce, resist and change. ANT is aimed at understanding 'how' these things ('actants') develop together into networks that can act. These networks (in ANT-language called 'assemblies') produce forces and other effects such as: knowledge, identities, routines, behaviors, policies, curricula, innovations, repressions, reforms, diseases, and so on

• The formed networks can continue to expand over wide areas, long distances or time periods. Of course, networks can also shrink, dissolve, or be abandoned. Thus, a network is dynamic with changing dimensions and connections and should not be seen as a technical network (such as a train or subway system or a 3G/4G network)



The Schoolyard or playgroundIt is a melting pot, in which there is continuous cooperation between balls, bikes, swings, lawns, games, children (and their capabilities), supervisors, safety rules, and so on. The playground is a composition or a 'network' of things that are composed in a particular way

Casus faculty

academic middle manager: >> he pulled away the focus from people by taking into account objects as sources of equivalent force>> and made a balanced consideration of people and processes

results: jointly examine issues; more aware of each other’s expertise and problems; more acceptance of the power of a certain process or ‘thing’

AdministratorsAcademics

Actants

academics: “the administrative mafia”, “the bureaucracy is endless”, “my time is much too costly to have to deal with scheduling and timetables”

administrators: “we never question their expertise in their discipline, but they question ours”, “I expected cooperation, but I got resistance”, “I never meet them during my working hours”

AdministratorsAcademics

Actants


Conclusions

• There is still talk of the Interacting Spheres Model, indeed: The university is a ‘patchwork’

• Third Space Professionals are a new specialized buffer zone between academics and administrators

• Third Space Professional has to do a balancing act between and within the spheres [and the actants!]

• It’s a critical position: “You’re damned if you don’t, and you’re damned if you do”

• the core of their activities are: intervening and relational (AMMs), and result oriented activities (EAs) • at least three competing expectations inherent in the TSP’s role towards

people: collegiality, professionality and authority; • and three competing competences inherent in his role towards the actants:

‘tacit-knowledge’, content-knowledge, educational-management knowledge


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The paper will be available on: https://leidenuniv.academia.edu/TonKallenberg

Ton Kallenberg [email protected]

Leiden University - The Netherlands

@tonkallenberg


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