Exploring employer branding to enhance distinctiveness in higher education

ISSN: 1857-7431 (Online)The purpose of this paper is to offer a methodological contribution to empirical studies on employer branding in higher education, exploring a framework to measure organizational attractiveness of higher education institutions and identifying particular features of employment experience that are most manifested, valued by and significant to their employees. Specifically, this paper reports the results of research undertaken in 19 Lithuanian higher education institutions (N = 1105) applying an 11 dimensional 67-item Organizational Attractiveness Extraction Scale (OAES). The findings indicate that work in academia is predominantly driven by interesting, intellectually challenging work, attentive supervision and good relationships. This study corroborates the findings of previous research that higher education institutions face lowering salaries, increasing work load and occupational stress, and deepening culture of mistrust. The paper also aims at operationalizing labor market identities of higher education institutions as a meaningful strategy for establishing distinctiveness and developing employer branding strategies. To that end, cluster analysis based on employee perceptions of employment experience in higher education institutions has been carried out and produced four attitudinal segments, and, consequently, derived four groups of organizational identities. The study also demonstrates that data does significantly differentiate between types of higher education institutions, i.e. surveyed universities and colleges. Implications and recommendations for the employer brand development in higher education are presentedMatematikos ir statistikos katedraVadybos ir ekonomikos universitetas, ISMVadybos katedraVytauto Didžiojo universiteta

Ryšys tarp naujojo vadovo charakteristikų ir organizacijos veiklos rezultatų

Whereas the turnover of managers causes changes in an organisation and influences its operational results, this phenomenon stays a relevant object of academic discussions. The article aims to identify characteristics of a new manager and analyse the relation of changes of managers with operational results of an organisation. The authors of the article have produced a theoretical model defining the relation between characteristics of a new manager and operational results of an organisation. The skills and characteristics of the new manager presented in the model reflect the results of the analysis of scientific literature. The results of the operational activities are presented in three groups: financial results of the organisation, turnover of employees and changes in the organisation introduced by the new manager. In order to identify the relation between characteristics of the new leader and operational results of the organisation, a quantitative research in rapidly growing and most profitable Lithuanian companies, where managers have been replaced during the last three years, has been performed. The results of the research have showed that, when analysing the candidates, priority was given to employees already employed in the company rather than to external candidates. Based on the results of the research, operational results of the majority of the analysed companies improved under a new manager. The analysis of the research data has demonstrated that there is no link between characteristics of a new manager and financial results of an organisation. The skills of a newly appointed manager to establish mutual relations were best evaluated, and the relation between the above ability of the manager and changes in the organisation was established

Lyginamoji Danijos ir Lietuvos viešbučių darbuotojų įgalinimo studija

The paper looks into employee empowerment from a comparative HRM perspective. A survey of customer-contact employees at upscale hotels in Denmark and Lithuania was conducted to compare and contrast the implementation of organisational empowerment in the two samples and to study the impact of organisational empowerment on work related attitudes (psychological empowerment, job satisfaction, and affective commitment). As hypothesised, significant differences between the Danish and Lithuanian samples were found in the levels of organisational empowerment and job satisfaction. The levels of organisational empowerment and job satisfaction were higher in Denmark, a country with lower power distance and uncertainty avoidance. No significant differences were found in the levels of psychological empowerment and affective commitment between the samples. Research findings showed a statistically significant positive relationship between organisational empowerment and all three measured altitudes in both samples. Besides psychological empowerment was found lo have a positive impact on job satisfaction, while the latter had impact on affective commitmen