Management change discourse

I analysed the management change during 1998-2014 within four management discourses; bureaucracy, professionalism, democracy and managerialism. Critical discourse analysis (Fairclough 1992) is used as a theoretical-methodological framework in this research. It is obvious, on the basis of this study that the uni-versity management changed from a bureaucracy and a collegial decision making process towards managerialism with a management emphasis reflecting a busi-ness orientation. The tentative management change from bureaucracy towards managerialism in the transforming university organisation creates the need for novel management knowledge. The trust management that I introduce in this research contributes to the contemporary university organisation, as well as to knowledge-intensive organisations in general, in order for success in organisa-tional renewal and to gain competitiveness.

The emergence of the managerialism discourse can be seen as the rector dis-cusses the business concept ‘strategy’ and the appropriateness of a strategy in the university organisation in detail in his speech in 2004. While ten years later in 2014 the re-contextualisation of the managerialism discourse can be identified when the same actor who is now the rector of the ‘new’ university organisation discusses the ‘brand identity’ and ‘visual image’ of the new organisation without hesitation. The ‘external’ discourse from business context is internalised within the transforming university organisation context.

The competitiveness theme in the managerialism discourse unfolds in a simi-lar way. There was a critical tone in the rector’s discourse towards using the rank-ings of universities to measure the competitiveness of the university organisation.

There was a fear that universities would be tempted to develop ‘Mickey Mouse’

programmes because of the strong presence of marketization driven by the rank-ings. The value of the information gathered from ranking-lists was compared to the Eurovision Song Contests in the rector’s discourse in 2005. A few years later

in 2008, as the merger of two university organisations was at hand, the discourse on rankings was taken for granted as a measure of the effectiveness of the ‘new’

organisation. The ‘new’ organisation aims at a certain position in the ranking list as a part of the strategy.

The nature of professionalism in the university brings its own special aspect to university management. The university organisation is a typical professional bureaucracy, which relies on the skills and knowledge of its operating profes-sionals to function. The university profesprofes-sionals have autonomy in their work.

The management emphasis in the university disturbs the autonomy of the pro-fessionals. The emphasis on management in the university brings elements such as superior-subordinate relationships into play instead of viewing the university professionals as ‘constituents’ (Birnbaum 1989) in the university organisation.

The operationalisation of managerialism occurred when the new pay scheme was applied to universities on 1.1.2006 and all the employees in the university were identified by their supervisors.

Management was further emphasised in the university reform in Finland in 2010. Managerialism brings benefits to professionals at the university, allowing them to concentrate on their main missions of teaching and research. The admin-istrative duties are allocated to a few full-time managers. The collegial decision making and bureaucracy of old is shifting towards managerialism.

Students remain at the core of the university community. However, globalisa-tion transforms the nature of student recruitment. There are now universities all over the world available to applicants. Modern information technology ensures the availability of universities abroad. The contemporary generation is interna-tionally mobile. The idea of selective student recruitment is changing towards the idea of how to attract good new students to the university and the area.

The university management is based on democracy. After the university re-form, the students are still regarded as full members of the university commu-nity. Students are automatically members of the Students’ Union. Students are also represented on the governing bodies of the university. University education is still free of charge in Finland after the university reform. The ideology of the freeness of the university education is sacred in Finnish debate, especially among the students. The rector implies power and enlarges the ideology of freeness dis-cursively. He asks whether it is efficient to accomplish several university degrees for free or to study oversized degrees without limits set on the amount of credits accomplished.

The themes concerning regional policy in a university context are not men-tioned since 2006 in the rector’s discourse. The discourse reflected the transi-tion (Kekäle 2001) of the ideal of social and regional equity as the core of higher education in Finland. The development of society was viewed as unpredictable, turbulent and difficult to control. The university is positioned discursively to become and active player in the local area. The university is articulated by the rector to behave more as a partner with local stakeholders, businesses and start-up entrepreneurs.

The discourse about the increasing importance of the stakeholders gains more dominance towards the end of this research period and in the 2010s. Cooperation between the university and the local region is needed. The success of the ‘new’

organisation, the University of Eastern Finland, is a ‘fateful’ (speech 2008) in east-ern Finland and indicates that the university is developing in line with the rest of the country. The benefits gained by the cooperation between the university and stakeholders are reciprocal. The university students and professionals provide significant input to local business and cultural life, and the environment in gen-eral, through internships, projects and research, and as customers.

Managerialism and the management emphasis in the contemporary universi-ty means that there are common goals and integrated patterns of decision making common to the entire university organisation. Traditionally, there were personal goals or strategies for each professional in the university. This is the point where the different logics of management in the transforming university organisation clash. The logic of professionalism meets the logic of managerialism. The tension between professionalism and managerialism needs to be solved in order to ac-complish the competitiveness of the new university organisation.

The discourse of multidisciplinarity as a strategic choice is interpreted as a he-gemonic discourse in this study. Even though everything is changing in the case organisation in the context of the merger ultimately nothing changes concerning the strategy. The strategy of multidisciplinarity is applied to the new organisation after the merger. Hegemony assists in maintaining the status quo (Eriksson &

Kovalainen 2008) in the transforming organisation. The multidisciplinary strat-egy discourse contains themes of crossing disciplinary boundaries, like in the former organisation, but a novel theme in this discourse contains the additional feature of crossing the new geographical campus boundaries in the new organi-sation: “As we all know, up until now the regional boundaries in eastern Finland have not been the easiest ones to cross.” (Speech 2012)

The dynamic forces of external change create an unstable environment where bureaucracies are not the best operators. Strictly distinguished disci-plines and educational programmes lead to pigeonholing, where novel research and innovations are not likely to emerge. Cooperation between peers and ‘inter-disciplinary efforts’ (Minzberg 1983) are needed in the transforming university organisation.

Trust as a managerial element has a big role to enable a multidisciplinary strategy. Trust management (Savolainen 2011, 6) refers to the leader’s ability, in-tellectual resources and skills to enable interaction, co-operation and productiv-ity. Trust enhances cooperation and enables the creation of social and cultural capital. As discussed earlier in chapter 5.2, the special feature of the university organisation is that the university community has ownership in the university institute. Social and cultural capital accumulates in the course of time in the uni-versity organisation. Therefore, the management in uniuni-versity cannot be solved in a straightforward manner by applying public sector management methods or business management.

Trust management means (Savolainen 2011, 121-122) interaction and enabling.

The manager creates possibilities for interaction and enables common ways of doing things and achieving results. As the transforming university organisation desires to be an international research university, the multicultural aspects have to be taken into consideration in the management. Parochialism is discussed by the rector in 2014.

The rector refers to the editorial column of Times Higher Education –magazine by John Gill, who wrote about the success of the Finnish education system. There is a possibility for every young person in Finland, on the basis of their own abil-ity, to gain an education, regardless of their financial background. The question John Gill posed was “Why is this not concerning those who are not defined as ‘us’, those who come from outside our country”. The speech in 2014 ends by stressing the international aspects of the transforming university organisation.

“Our goal is to significantly improve the international and national reputation and attrac-tiveness of the University of Eastern Finland. This means, among other things, increasing engagement in international education and research collaboration with our strategic part-ners in Finland and worldwide. Furthermore, we should not only be increasingly active in recruiting international students and faculty members, but also put more emphasis on integrating them into the university community.” (Speech 2014)