National imperatives, local realities: the complexities of university change processes. A cultural perspective Kay Jaffer Education Students’ Regional Research Conference University of the Western Cape 27 – 28 October 2006

Introduction To really understand university change processes, one needs to develop a deep understanding of the values, attitudes and practices of the people working in them – a cultural perspective is proposed.

HE Change imperatives Great expectations: HE policy framework, transformation, equity and development Globalised conditions: marketisation, massification of HE; competition; Mechanisms of regulation Changed labour relations: LRA; BCEA; EEA

Change at organisational level: Implementation gap – slow to change lack of institutional capacity, skilled and experienced managers. Solution – management training and/or appointments Institutions – attempted change strategies not really useful: planning, changed governance, restructuring

Different approach to organisational change Need approaches that focus on the cultural contexts in which change processes unfold Take into account role and power of people in change processes, esp ito of their values, attitudes and practices

Current cultural perspectives on change IN HE: HE Literature: Burton Clark 1986, McNay 1995, Masland 1992, Tierney, Kezar and others SA HE lit: Jansen, Cloete and Kulati, Webster and Mosoetsa, Johnson. In SA policy documents: In SA institutions

My perspective Draws on work of Alvesson (1992, 1996, 1997, 2002) and Trowler (1998, 2000, 2002) Alvesson: argues for more reflective, nuanced concept of organisational culture Describes ‘fallacies’ of current approaches: reifies, essentialises, unifies, idealises, consensualises. Cultures in organisations loosely-coupled, complex, situated, contextually-contingent, involving relations of power.

Alvesson continued Proposes multiple cultural configuration perspective Notion of cultural traffic – cultural patterns that change with the flow of meanings and values, which are ever shifting and overlapping.

Trowler Links MCC to change processes and responses to change Mainstream views of organisational culture not adequate to explain what happens in universities Social practice theory - cultures not merely enacted, partly constructed on an ongoing basis through interaction People act as ‘filters’ of change: they receive, experience and implement change in different ways – implementation staircase.

Implementation staircase * institutional leaders interpret policies acc to local circumstances and pressures * departments receive, read an interpret acc to cultural, historical contexts * those at the ‘coal face’ receive and enact policy

You need to expect therefore: Different outcomes at different locales Resistance and re-construction, or simply avoidance and ignorance Meanings are developed as change processes unfold Signs and events are read in different ways by different groups.

Trowler Popular view - university members passive ‘victims’ of encroaching managerialist cultures develops categories of different types of response, some creative and engaging: Sinking - Swimming - Coping - Reconstructing and reinterpreting

Conclusion Pre-existing values and attitudes of staff need to be understood and addressed – deeply-rooted in socialisation, history and traditions and reinforced by daily recurrent behaviours. But they do not simply enact cultural norms and values; they are involved in their construction on day to day basis meanings) codes of signification (QAA) discursive repertoires recurrent practices ( communication) identities in interaction (factions, positions) power relations (agenda setting, what happens) tacit assumptions (about assessment) rules of appropriateness (in the classroom) implicit theories (about learning, universities, scholarship)