Introduction
This essay examines the process of strategic management in the development of a plan to implement a university-wide peer review scheme at the
Commencing with an overview of the specific contextual setting for strategic management to be employed within universities as a means of maintaining and enhancing their academic position, particular emphasis is given to examining how strategic management should enable universities to respond to an increasingly competitive HE environment without resorting to management as a control mechanism.
The second section then briefly introduces the mutually reinforcing roles of quality improvement and strategic management in universities, with quality of the educational provision seen as a core strategic objective. The process of strategic management as it can be interpreted to the university environment is then explored, setting the theoretical grounds for a critical analysis of the plan in question.
The final part presents a case study of planning the introduction of peer review at the
Issues of dominance and control arising from the analysis help to site the failure to implement a coherent university-wide operational strategy for peer review and ultimately to implement the original proposal, within insurmountable problems presented by a domineering formal management model, which finds absolute incongruence with the collegial basis of peer review.
Strategic Management in the Higher Education sector
While the European Commission has emphasised that the development of a knowledge society should bring political and social as well as economic benefits (Yorke & Knight, 2006), the university as it functions within the contemporary UK Higher Education sector is increasingly paralleled to an enterprise system (Cartwright, 2005; Bauer & Henkel, 1999; Henkel, 2000) concerned primarily with the transformation of inputs into profitable knowledge products (Johnes & Taylor, 1990).
Recognition of the increased competitiveness of the sector has led to the uptake of strategic management as an integrating mechanism within universities, with proponents citing close parallels to the private sector (Shattock, 2003).
This is notwithstanding doubts over whether competition is an appropriate means of securing efficiency gains and protecting the quality of education (Brown, 2004). Indeed, while an uptake of strategic management appears to align with the private sector values instilled via the emergence of an audit mentality within HE (Shore & Wright, 1999; Brown, 2004) it in reality raises significant challenges for universities required to demonstrate accountability to external governmental agencies while simultaneously pursuing entrepreneurial goals in seeking out means of differentiating their ‘products’ and competing with other HEIs.
Strategically speaking, universities could, in this sense be argued to be at risk of becoming ‘stuck in the middle’ Porter (1985) and consequently failing to achieve sustainable competitive advantage through inconsistent strategies. This is particularly pertinent given criticisms of such approaches to strategic management for which “the destruction of social welfare is not just a coincidental by‑product of strategy; it is the fundamental objective of profit-seeking firms and therefore, of their managers” (Ghoshal et al, 2003, p305), raising important questions about how and what strategic management theory and practice should be encouraged within universities.
As Shattock points out (2003), the way an institution is managed has a direct effect on the progress of departments and disciplines, student experiences and opportunities and the careers of academics and other staff. In light of this, HEIs need to adopt a more sustainable and relevant argument for the use of strategic management than competitive short-term advantage; that is, they should seek to achieve the non-deterministic yet responsive and sustainable integrating of policies and processes towards achieving and maintaining the best institutional outcomes (ibid).
In doing so, it is necessary to first recognise the factors influencing the uptake of strategic management in universities and how, in an era when changes in economy drive developments in education (Morrison, 1998) universities are forced to manage the impact of outside forces in triggering change in Higher Education (Keller, 1983).
A cocktail of more diverse sources of income (e.g. student fees, residences, research), a broader financial base and more intense competition, thus bring universities closer to private sector organisational objectives but with the important proviso that;
“entrepreneurial universities… are not universities which have sacrificed excellence for a new commercialisation but universities which have become entrepreneurial in order to generate funds to enable them to maintain and enhance their academic position” (Shattock, 2003, p.28, emphasis added)
As
How the risks and opportunities involved in pursuing a particular strategy are managed, however, depends on a much wider institutional culture than that of the top executive, with decision-making in successful universities being dispersed rather than centralised (Jarzabowski, 2003) such that strategies happen in environments open to new ideas (Birnbaum, 2000) wherein;
“the role of the central steering core is to sustain that [academic] vitality, support their ambitions within a framework of strategic objectives and manage the processes that bring their ambition to fruition” (Shattock, 2003, p.41).
This implies embracing strategic management as an integrating rather than control mechanism, uniting goals, policies and actions in a cohesive whole (ibid).
As in the private sector, Strategic Management brings value to universities as a means of identifying opportunities for improvement rather than accepting the ad hoc determinism of traditional public sector administration. However, the extent to which a particular strategy can be achieved and ultimately be of benefit to the educational organisation and its core educational values and academic position, depends on its congruence with the needs of the organisation and its prevailing culture (ibid). A sensibility towards the prevailing leadership culture and management styles as well as the micro/macro context of the organisation, represents an essential underpinning for developing and managing strategy as coherent and integrated within the long-term strategic aims of the university. At the core of such aims remains the educational provision wherein the “criterion of acceptability to stakeholders in strategic choice” (Johnson & Scholes, 1997, p.32) takes precedence.
Quality improvement as a core strategy
One of the central issues for universities in achieving aims and steering towards opportunities to better the educational provision, concerns the monitoring and improvement of quality. Strategies towards quality improvement are seen in concomitance to wider organisational aims (Ashworth & Harvey, 1994). Within constraints of preset mandates and agendas and externally imposed policy, managers are responsible for planning quality improvement in universities (Hodson & Thomas, 2003; Gosling & D’Andrea, 2001) based on well-defined notions of institutional inputs, processes and outcomes, commonly nowadays in accordance with a rational-technicist approach to decision‑making (Levačić et al, 1999).
In terms of monitoring quality of the educational provision, universities are more accountable than ever to agencies like the QAA via processes of audit and inspection, which assess value-for-money and fitness-for-purpose of the educational provision (Biggs, 2001; Cartwright, 2005; Hodgkinson & Brown, 2003; Lomas, 2002), the latter providing some conceptual momentum for planning improvement. However, such standardised external frameworks are comparatively restrictive and can serve to inhibit incremental or opportunistic change and innovation. They further give no consideration to local realities and aims of different universities operating in diverse economic contexts. It is further important not to underestimate the accountability also prevalent within a market economy of HE. Universities and particularly the individuals who work in them, are still made to conform and demonstrate their value to market consumers within performance indicators (Morley, 2004) and prevailing notions of education as a service industry.
In this light, strategic management presents a favourable option to universities to bring them into more direct contact with regional realities and to face local challenges.
In response, beyond organisational accountability, quality and specifically the pursuance of Prospective QA oriented to improvement (Biggs, 2001) becomes a central concern of university strategy. Too often, mission statements functioning more like marketing tools than statements of strategic purpose (Shattock 2003) set the tone for quality improvement as a continuous unattainable abstract aspiration forcing a sense of permanent struggle (Morley, 2004) and ambiguity as to who precisely will benefit from such improvement (Lemaitre, 2002).
While there is clearly no straightforward formula for improving quality in HE, the need for it to focus on teaching and learning is rarely contested (Preedy et al, 1997). In the process of determining a strategic direction however, the contesting conceptions of quality which may be held by the various stakeholders to an institution, can create a complex context from which to initiate a plan of improvement and continuing quality assurance, in which mediation between various quality agendas (both within and external to the organisation) becomes necessary for external accountability as well as institutional development (Preedy et al, 1997, p.6).
Accordingly, in the long and medium term plan of the organisation, with a view to subsequent implementations and improvements in areas such as reputation, league table performance, staff and student retention and demonstrable quality of learning, the effective tackling of quality issues at strategic level is vital.
The operationalisation of abstract mission statements into long-term strategic plans and shorter-term operational plans, becomes the means by which strategic management processes function to integrate generic aims into more focused strategic objectives and operational plans. All changes oriented to quality enhancement are in this way inseparable from the wider strategic aims of the university in connecting relevant achievements to targets at both operational and tactical level.
The process of strategic management in universities
Historically, strategic planning in universities has been a quantitative exercise involving the rational distribution of resources, leaving the legacy of “a strongly bureaucratic approach to management issues with a Weberian attachment to regulation and hierarchy” (Shattock, 2003, p.25). However, strategic planning has been shown to work poorly when confined to analytic decision-making (
The reality, however, is that many universities have adopted top-down management structures characterised by an anti-collegial, non-participative, non-empowering style whereby, those “at the top” are nonetheless primarily viewed “as a conduit pipe for resource allocation decisions taken elsewhere” (Shattock, 2003, p.27). In such a setting, vital day‑to-day management decisions inevitably contribute to the construction of a strategic plan in continual emergence (Birnbaum, 2000; Mintzberg, 1994).
HEFCE guidelines on strategic management in higher education (HEFCE, 2000) emphasise a deceptively formal (Bush, 2003) process, broadly consisting of three phases including planning; documentation of planning; and implementation and monitoring. This view generally coincides with the assertion that there needs to be a flexible long‑term plan backed up by regular strategic review, which takes an holistic perspective of the university with the aim of organising and harmonising the pluralistic activities of the academy (Shattock, 2003).
However, the approach is also deterministic in emphasising the unpredictability of markets and stakeholders; a feature otherwise found in the strategic management literature of the 1980s/90s (e.g. Peters, 1989). Elsewhere the purposive nature of strategy is identified as it’s unique contribution to management (Mintzberg in Pearson, 1999), invoking consideration of the role leadership plays in strategic management. In keeping with a widespread emphasis on the responsibilities of senior managers for the overall success of a company (Houlden, 1990) the HEFCE guidelines make extensive reference to the key decision‑making roles of Vice-Chancellor and Boards of Governors. Leadership in strategic management is described as envisioning, consulting, challenging and communicating, with involvement of other staff reduced to providing feedback and ideas to senior managers who retain the power of decision-making. However, serious problems exist with this approach in the context of HE; not least in light of the top-down system of accountability which remains, meaning that the impact of poor management decisions is often felt most forcefully and damagingly through policy implementation within the lower echelons of the organisation.
Starting from steps such as environmental ‘scanning’, ‘analysing’ the organisation and its resources and ‘generating ideas’ for future directions (HEFCE, 2000), reinforces a top‑down, highly rational and analytical approach to strategy. Analysing the environment means viewing it from without in a detached way and such collegial contributions, which can threaten power structures and lines of authority, will never find realisation within university operational plans if the overarching strategic plan and its management are not characterised by flexibility as a main purpose in the management of strategy (Pearson, 1999).
Any ideas which do emerge from the initial planning phase must then undergo a rigorous process of assessment of available resources and changes in the business environment, as well as analysis of the existing provision. As in the private sector then, (Houlden, 1990) university strategic planning commences at least in part with a form of internal audit. However, in contrast to private sector companies which may seek cost differentiation as a competitive strategy (Porter, 1985), it is assumed unacceptable for HEIs to accept low quality in return for high levels of recruitment or profitability (HEFCE, 2000).
In commencing from such a basis, managers play out roles as auditors imposing the political technology of audit (Shore & Wright, 1999) over employees through a coercive and punitive process.
Whether or not such problems are overcome, from the initial stages of the planning process, opportunities are generally identified to underpin idea generation towards new activities, improvements or discontinuation of specific activities. In this sense, potential growth is understood to require awareness of both opportunities and needs created by populations, incomes and technologies (
According to HEFCE (2000), the planning process must then be effectively documented, hence the systematic output of mission statements (
The final stage of implementation and monitoring (ibid), is when clear responsibilities and objectives are assigned. In determining the success or failure of a plan from this point, the nature of the objectives set, as open (and therefore intangible and immeasurable) or closed (measurable and achievable) is clearly relevant (Johnson & Scholes, 1997). Within universities, the attainment of ‘open’ objectives such as ‘high quality educational provision’ can create significant challenges for managers and others, as the following case study illustrates. More quantifiable targets (e.g. increasing undergraduate student retention by 30% by 2010) must be understood in light, not only of direct benefits such as commensurate increases in funding and rising up the league tables, but in terms also of the interaction with more subjective inter-related educational aims, such as student satisfaction, personal achievement and quality learning.
Case study: Planning migration to Peer Review
Background
In line with HEFCE guidelines, the
In 2003, CeLT presented a proposal to the Academic Board (CeLT, 2003) for an institution-wide move to adopt peer review as a quality assurance and improvement methodology, in place of the existing peer observation scheme, which was essentially a legacy of the QAA inspection regime.
The process
The proposal to manage a transition from peer observation to peer review was developed through a phase of research into the pedagogical issues emerging from a comparison of the two methodologies. The benefits of peer review and problems with observation have been widely acknowledged. In particular, emphasis is given to the value of the former as a means of evaluating teaching quality through a collegial model based on improvement, as opposed to the formal inspection framework supported by observation (Cockburn, 2005; Douglas & Douglas, 2006; Lomas & Nicholls, 2005; Milton, 2002). Strong criticisms have further been levelled against peer observation for its association with management processes (Gosling & D’Andrea, 2001).
Figure 1 summarises the initial stages of the planning process as conducted within the University.
CeLT requested (by Executive) to conduct review of peer observation schemes currently in operation across the University. CeLT identify peer review as proposed strategic objective for 2003/4. CeLT make general recommendations for implementation and initial pilot implementations in academic schools to Academic Board at meeting in June 2003. Recommendations accepted but no decisive action plan developed. CeLT initiates pilot implementations for small groups within academic schools. 2006 Learning and Teaching Strategy and 2006-2010 Strategic Plan make no mention of peer review. Schools left to implement at own discretion and cost. CeLT conduct informal analysis of methodologies of peer observation currently being used. CeLT research literature and approaches adopted by other universities that offer potential “to support enhancement of student learning experiences and feed directly into staff development”. Figure 1: Initial stages of the planning process as conducted within the University.
Indeed, the proposal lacks evidence of an attempt to assess acceptability or feasibility of peer review or whether it can be made to work and fits the culture of the organisation (Johnson & Scholes, 1997). Reference is made to the need for specialised training, recruitment of personnel and project management but this is not developed into a comprehensive analysis or linked to any sort of audit of costs or resources.
The early analysis stages conducted by CeLT present none of the necessary strategic foundations which might identify the plan with potential differentiation of the university in terms of presenting either unique characteristics to the market, leading in quality or cost or performing superlatively (Pearson, 1999).
If investigated effectively, potential savings in staff time would likely have been identified in abolishing one-to-one observations, together with a better return on investment for the anticipated improvements to teaching quality, while still satisfying internal and external QA requirements. A simple analysis, perhaps using performance indicators to assess comparative value for money of the existing and proposed systems (Johnes & Taylor, 1990; Cave et al, 1999) as a starting point, would have helped fill at least part of the information void facing the Academic Board as decision makers.
Certainly the clear pedagogical advantages underpinning the plan would be expected to merit further support from executives given the university strategic focus towards quality learning.
The fact that this did not take place and that the subsequently formed University Strategic Plan sets as targets the increased or continued alignment with “national developments in audit and inspection”, the target being “good outcomes from every QAA review” implies a regression from the recommendations of the CeLT report and previous agreed strategic objectives that is not solely based in resource issues.
Crucially, the present strategy masks the benefits to be supported through adopting QA processes aimed at improving rather than assessing teaching, in enabling the identification of methods which support higher order learning skills (Yorke & Knight, 2006). Such benefits are clearly linked with almost all the wider strategic aims of the university, most notably those related to employability, representing a core inconsistency of strategic aims. Given the importance of consistency to effective strategic management (Pearson, 1999) this merits further examination; examination which reveals a fundamental barrier within the management style adopted within the university.
Emerging themes of control and collegiality
It is without doubt that control is directed towards neither improvement nor learning (Hoecht, 2006).
The failure to implement the university-wide transition to peer review demonstrates more than an adherence to a prevalent paradigm (Seymour, 1993; Kuhn, 1996) or strategic momentum.
Peer observation required a much more fundamental shift of management style towards a collegial model of improvement that empowers lecturers and requires a basic culture of criticism (Douglas & Douglas, 2006).
The prevailing observation scheme reinforces the formal model of management (Bush, 2003) adopted within the university and legitimises naked power over moral authority (Brennan & Shah, 2000). Retaining use of observation as a form of political technology in reinforcing notions of performativity and control, keeps in place the existing rationality of governance ad its coercive and punitive implications (Shore & Wright, 1999).
This is further reinforced in the apparent devolution to deans that has subsequently taken place, of power and financial management in exercising discretion over whether or not to adopt the new scheme. As Shattock (2003) explains, though, when Deans are empowered to pursue departmental interests detached from a unified strategy of the university, this may prove destructive and reduce consideration of university issues to negotiation between the institution’s constituent parts. Deans who are, as in this case, delegated authority rather than being part of the central decision process, are likely to be unable to act effectively as an interface between employees and central management, instead responding to incentives directed towards them personally, over and above their faculty (ibid). Their role is moreover inseparable from the financial and bureaucratic pressures of the central organisational management, to the point that apparent devolution of responsibility is likely to encourage a rigid form of machine bureaucracy in such hierarchical organisations (Pearson, 1999).
An interview with the CeLT representative responsible for the project and further informal dialogues with members of staff in the School of Computing and IT (Appendix 1) where peer observation has been retained as a formal process linked to individual staff appraisal, have revealed some of the underlying failings of the management culture.
In particular, it emerged that very little involvement with staff or even consultation had taken place and that suggestions must anyway be filtered through the School Learning and Teaching Coordinator. CeLT had sought to justify the impetus for change from external sources and research with little regard for staff ideas. Having failed to investigate constraints relating to leadership and management culture, their priority was solely to justify and facilitate what they saw as a pedagogically sound development. In taking recommendations to the Academic Board, they sought formal validity and the authority to impose the new scheme, but did not question if the underlying organisational culture would support its implementation.
This approach represents a rational and abstracted empiricism aimed at breaking down academics and learning into more manageable parts to create an idea of a stable organisation in which structures and practices can be engineered, sustained and reproduced (Morley, 2003).
CeLT, in seeking out only enough information to support their intentions before the Academic Board, denigrated academic employees to manageable resources. A collegial framework (Bush, 2003), as is required for peer observation to function effectively, was not in place, making the proposed collegial scheme of peer review unrealistic without a shift in the model of management adopted across the institution. While the collegial model of management is often seen as an idealistic model (ibid), such incongruence between culture and practice provided very shaky ground on which to base such a plan.
Conclusions
In the case examined, there is evidence of a lack of understanding of strategic priorities and management at operational and tactical level from those in CeLT handed the responsibility for planning the implementation, as well as a failure, crucially, to understand the fit of the proposal with the organisational culture.
Like many post-’92 institutions,
The prevailing style of management has acted as a barrier to the integration of core educational elements of the institution with other market-driven objectives such as that to associate the university with employability and enterprise.
Harmonious integration is furthermore unlikely to be achieved until the educational improvement issues which underpin strategic developments can be addressed with equal strategic priority as more immediately profitable enterprises. Good examples include the employability mission and investment in facilities; both of which respectively demand that the university have in place means to understand and develop the quality of teaching and learning and evaluate the enhancement brought by investments in properties and technologies to learning and teaching.
Further, the devolution of responsibility to individual schools for quality improvement implementations including peer review, without providing suitable tools, training or incentives, has left open the possibility for exploitation of lines of power with the result of an inequitable and confusing system.
The lack of any unifying strategic direction on quality improvement is indicative of an unwillingness to adopt a scheme which essentially empowers lecturers and undermines existing domineering power structures founded on coercion and control. In this light, the failure to achieve implementation of peer review university-wide is more accurately understood in terms of the anti-collegial organisational culture, whereby strategic management is used crudely as a political technology to reinforce existing control mechanisms.
References
Ashworth, A. & Harvey, R. (1994) Assessing Quality in Further and Higher Education.
Bauer, M. & Henkel, M. (1999) Academic Responses to Quality Reforms in Higher Education:
Biggs, J. (2001) The reflective institution: Assuring and enhancing the quality of teaching and learning. Higher Education, Vol. 41; pp. 221-238.
Birnbaum, R. (2000) Management Fads in Higher Education.
Brennan, J. & Shah, T. (2000) Managing Quality in Higher Education.
Brown, R. (2004) Quality Assurance in Higher Education: The
Bush, T. (2003) Theories of Educational Leadership and Management (3rd Edition).
Cartwright, M.J. (2005) Some Observations on the Factors that Influence Strategies for Educational Improvement in Post-1992 Universities. Research in Post-Compulsory Education, Vol. 10:3; pp. 337-349.
Cave, M., Hanney, S., Henkel, M. & Kogan, M. (1997) The Use of Performance Indicators in Higher Education (3rd Ed.).
CeLT (2003) From Peer Observation to Peer Review.
CeLT (2006)
Clark, B. (1998) Creating Entrepreneurial Universities.
Cockburn, J, (2005) Perspectives and Politics of Classroom Observation. Research in Post-Compulsory Education. Vol. 10(3). Pp. 373-388.
Cox, P. (1994) Strategic Quality Improvement at De Montfort University. In Parsons, C. (Ed.) Quality Improvement in Education: Case Studies in Schools, Colleges and Universities.
Ghoshal, S.,
Ghoshal, S. & Bartlett, C. (1993) The Individual Corporation.
Gosling, D. & D’Andrea, V-M. (2001) Quality development: a new concept for higher education. Quality in Higher Education. Vol. 7(1); pp. 7-17.
HEFCE (2000) Strategic Planning in Higher Education: A guide for heads of institutions, senior managers and members of governing bodies.
Henkel, M. (2000) Academic Identities and Policy Change in Higher Education.
Hodgkinson, M. & Brown, G. (2003) Enhancing the Quality of Education: A Case Study and Some Emerging Principles. Higher Education. Vol. 45; pp. 337-352.
Hodson, P. & Thomas, H. (2003) Quality assurance in Higher Education: Fit for the new millennium or simply year 2000 compliant? Higher Education. Vol. 45; pp. 375-387.
Hoecht, A. (2006) Quality assurance in
Houlden, B. (1990) Understanding Company Strategy: An Introduction to Thinking and Acting Strategically.
Jarzabowski, P. (2003) Contradiction and coherence: managerial contributions to strategic activity.
Johnes, J. & Taylor, J. (1990) Performance Indicators in Higher Education.
Johnson, G. & Scholes, K. (1997) Exploring Corporate Strategy (4th Edition).
Keller, G. (1983) Academic Strategy: The Managerial Revolution in American Higher Education.
Kuhn, T. S. (1996) The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (3rd Edition).
Lemaitre, M. J. (2002) Quality as Politics. Quality in Higher Education. Vol. 8(1), pp. 29-37.
Levačić, R., Glover, D., Bennett, N. & Crawford, M. (1999) Modern headship for the rationally managed school: combining cerebral and insightful approaches. In Bush, T & Bell, L. (Eds.) The Principles and Practice of Educational Management.
Lomas, L. (2002) Does the Development of Mass Education Necessarily Mean the End of Quality? Quality in Higher Education. Vol. 18(1); pp. 71-79
Lomas, L. & Nicholls, G. (2005) Enhancing Teaching Quality Through Peer Review of Teaching. Quality n Higher Education. Vol. 11(2), pp. 137-149.
Milton, P. (2002) The QAA Subject Review Experience. LTSM Generic Centre Conference, May 2002.
Mintzberg, H. (1994) The Rise and Fall of Strategic Planning: Reconceiving Roles for Planning, Plans, Planners.
Morley, L. (2003) Quality and Power in Higher Education.
Morley, L. (2004) Theorising Quality in Higher Education.
Morrison, K. (1998) Management Theories for Educational Change.
Pearson, G. (1999) Strategy in Action: Strategic thinking, understanding and practice.
Peters, T. (1989) Thriving on Chaos: Handbook for a Management Revolution.
Preedy, M., Glatter, R. & Levačić, R. (1997) Introduction: managing quality, resources and strategy. In Preedy, Glatter, & Levačić (eds.) Educational Management: Strategy, quality and resources.
Porter, M. E. (1985) Competitive Advantage.
Seymour, D. (1993) On Q: Causing Quality in Higher Education.
Shattock, M. (2003) Managing Successful Universities.
Shore, C. & Wright, S. (1999) Audit Culture and Anthropology: Neo-Liberalism in British Higher Education. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, Vol. 5:4; pp. 557-575.
Yorke, M. & Knight, P. (2006) Curricula for Economic and Social Gain. Higher Education, Vol. 51; pp. 565-588.
Personal reflections on peer review including summary of informal interviews with CeLT and academics in the
In Spring, 2006, out of a personal initiative, I conducted a series of informal interviews with members of staff in the
My personal reflections on the value of peer observation had begun prior to this when I witnessed a mentor conduct an observation of teaching and construct two very diverse reports from the same event. One was a severely critical report for staff development purposes. The other report, whilst constructed upon virtually the same criteria, but this time for submission to the Dean for QA purposes, instead presented a more favourable view of the session. This event caused me to reflect on the value of the observation process and its potential to encourage a punitive and confrontational culture. It was an opportunity to understand how the records of observations submitted to managers in the
As a member of the School Learning and Teaching Committee, I never witnessed or participated in any discussion about the scheme. In December 2005, emails were circulated by Associate Dean and Line Managers with orders to commence peer observation for the year. No mention was made of any alternative process and members of staff were not invited to submit comments.
My subsequent efforts to converse with staff about this were a result of a simple desire to engage colleagues in discussion about peer review. The interviews were not sanctioned by any formal planning or other procedures.
When approached in 2006, colleagues were happy to talk and share ideas about their own experiences of peer observation and the prospect of a replacement peer review scheme. Most accepted the prevailing observation system as a pointless yet obligatory tick-box process. They could not articulate easily any connection with teaching or strategic aims such as improving student retention and questioned what managers ultimately did with the data passed to them. However, most were also surprised by my questions and appeared to have reflected little on the process of peer observation previously; accepting it as a requirement of their job. When probed, interesting ideas emerged on the preferred direction of the scheme with an emphasis on shared experiences, a non‑judgmental approach and greater opportunity for discussion rather than reporting.
Nearly all staff made some form of reference to terms like ‘confidentiality’, ‘protection’, ‘funding’ and ‘judgmental’ in relation to observations, suggesting uncomfortable punitive implications and a trustless feeling of being controlled and monitored. However, indicative of the prevailing culture, staff saw the decision and authority to rest with the Dean and senior management.
The Dean of the School declined to speak on the subject outside of formal procedures.
It emerged during this series of conversations that CeLT had not approached academic staff in general in the School for consultation on the peer review proposal. Most knew nothing about the proposed scheme, although some were aware of peer review and spoke enthusiastically about its potential benefits. There was a distinct feeling, when informed of the proposal of 2003 (3 years prior) of a process being imposed from the top with reinforcement of the authority of School managers rather than academics in matters relating to teaching quality improvement.
I also interviewed the author of the peer review proposal from CeLT.
She was keen to warn me that my efforts to engage in conversations with my colleagues could undermine the role of the School Learning and Teaching Coordinator and seemed nervous about my desire to talk with colleagues on the topic of peer review. It was suggested that any such initiatives should be channelled through the Coordinator. This was a definite indicator of the rejection of collegiality and hierarchical system of control underpinning the proposal.
The remainder of our conversation centred largely on the Academic Board meeting of 2003. In her own terms, as the only female member of staff present at the meeting, she had felt intimidated by the lack of receptiveness to the proposal. Criticisms were brought at the time to a lack of clear identification of how to manage the resource requirements created by the scheme.
We also talked about the process of research and analysis behind the proposal. It was clear that the idea of peer review had emerged from awareness of its pedagogical merits. Instead of talking to members of staff to understand their feelings, gather opinions or respond to questions, however, external research had formed the foundations for the proposal with little regard for organisational characteristics.
There was some confusion over what had occurred after the proposal. However, poor communication and coordination towards a university-wide implementation had led ultimately to the scheme being abandoned. Academic schools could now choose whether to adopt the scheme based on the pedagogical arguments from CeLT and school-specific priorities.
In the School of Computing and IT, in keeping with a hierarchical, punitive and formal management culture, the scheme of peer observation linked directly to staff appraisal prevails. This significant time investment causes stress and contribtes very little to the improvement of learning and teaching for staff obliged to be involved in it.