‘Inspired and assisted’, or ‘berated and destroyed’? Research leadership, management and performativity in troubled times

Research leadership in Australian universities takes place against a backdrop of policy reforms concerned with measurement and comparison of institutional research performance. In particular, the Excellence in Research in Australian initiative undertaken by the Australian Research Council sets out to evaluate research quality in Australian universities, using a combination of expert review process, and assessment of performance against &lsquo;quality indicators&rsquo;. Benchmarking exercises of this sort continue to shape institutional policy and practice, with inevitable effects on the ways in which research leadership, mentoring and practice are played out within university faculties and departments. In an exploratory study that interviewed 32 Australian academics in universities in four Australian states, we asked participants, occupying formal or informal research leadership roles, to comment on their perceptions of research leadership as envisioned and enacted in their particular workplaces. We found a pervasive concern amongst participants that coalesced around binaries characterized in metaphoric terms of &lsquo;carrots and whips&rsquo;. Research leadership was seen by many as managerial in nature, and as such, largely tethered to instrumentalist notions of productivity and performativity, while research cultures were seen as languishing under the demoralizing weight of reward and punishment systems. Here, we consider what is at stake for the future of the academic workforce under such conditions, arguing that new models of visionary research leadership are urgently needed in the &lsquo;troubled times&rsquo; of techno-bureaucratic university reforms.<br /

Organisational patterns in new product development: contrasting The Netherlands, Finland and Portugal

Companies pursuing competitive advantage through continuous innovation are confronted with the tension between today's work and tomorrow's innovation. This paper reports on the search for so-called patterns in NPD. In order to investigate whether different types of consistent NPD configurations might be identified through a quantitative research design, a quick scan using a structured questionnaire was carried out in Dutch, Portuguese and Finnish firms (n = 82). The results highlight some practices in NPD configurations that could be related to key success factors identified in best practice studies, such as a dedicated project organisation, an organisational culture fostering personal engagement and encouraging individuality and creativity, and a strategic NPD programme with a long-term thrust. The results also indicate a pattern of variety among the different countries and a first indication of possible relationships between NPD strategy, structure and culture based on a bivariate correlation analysis

Leadership in academia: Individual and collective approaches to the quest for creativity and innovation

This chapter summarizes the specific challenges for leadership in academia with a focus on universities, and discusses recent approaches to facilitate the development of leadership abilities in this context. Individuals and groups in academia essentially strive for creativity and innovation through knowledge creation and transfer. Their performance is measured relative to specified targets (e.g., quality and quantity of publications, third-party funding, teaching and student supervision). We argue that in academia constant tensions between creativity and innovation on the one hand, and structures, procedures, and (legal) regulations on the other hand persist. This poses significant challenges to leadership. The chapter starts with a short characterization of the most pressing challenges and their implications for leadership. We then distinguish between leadership of universities (i.e., administrative leadership) and leadership in universities (i.e., research leadership). Next, we depict approaches that highlight leadership as a property of individuals and as a collective phenomenon in academia. Finally, we draw lessons for leaders and organizations who seek to create enabling conditions for sustained successes in the quest for creativity and innovation

Patterns in NPD: searching for consistent configurations : a pilot of Dutch, Finnish and Portuguese cases

Companies pursuing sustained competitive advantage through continuous innovation are confronted with the tension between today’s work and tomorrow’s innovation. Based on the assumption that a holistic understanding of the relationships between strategy, processes, structure, and culture of New Product Development (NPD) imbedded in their overall context will contribute to the identification of consistent NPD configurations with sustained innovation performance, this paper reports on the search for so-called ‘Patterns in NPD’. In order to investigate whether different types of consistent NPD configurations might be identified through a quantitative research design, a so-called quick scan using a structured questionnaire was carried out in Dutch, Portuguese and Finnish firms (n=82).\ud The results of this quick scan, which was seen as a pilot study for larger scale data collection, did highlight some practices in NPD configurations that can be related to Key Success Factors identified in best practice studies, such as: a dedicated project organization, an organisational culture fostering personal engagement and encouraging individuality and creativity, and a strategic NPD programme with a long-term thrust. Results also indicated possible pattern variety among the different countries (esp. Portugal vs Finland and the Netherlands) and a first indication of possible relationships between NPD strategy, structure and culture based on a bi-variate correlation analysis

Theory development and application in higher education research:tribes and territories

This paper examines the idea of tribes and territories, as an example of a theory developed and applied within higher education research of relevance to higher education policy. It traces the origins and meaning of the term, reviews its application by higher education researchers and discusses the issues it raises and the critiques it has attracted. It is concluded that while, like all theoretical frameworks, tribes and territories has strengths and weaknesses, it remains of use for thinking about academics, disciplines, their relations and associated policy areas