In 2016, the Austrian Federal Ministry of Science, Research and Economy celebrated ten years of the ‘Wissensbilanz’/Knowledge Balance Sheet (KBS). From the Ministry’s perspective, the KBS presents a ‘panoramic view’... [ view full abstract ]
In 2016, the Austrian Federal Ministry of Science, Research and Economy celebrated ten years of the ‘Wissensbilanz’/Knowledge Balance Sheet (KBS). From the Ministry’s perspective, the KBS presents a ‘panoramic view’ on scientific and societal progress, and it supports the agreement between government and public universities on relevant indicators to represent the development and competitiveness of the Austrian Higher Education Institution (HEI)-sector. When the KBS was defined as mandatory by the Austrian University Act in 2002 the context of governing HEI in general had faced radical changes since the mid-1980s. The implementation of a new public management (NPM) rationale confronted public universities (not only) in Austria with a cultural shift and new management tools. A culture of ‘the collegium’ deciding main issues transformed into a culture of more managerial decision-making and a kind of corporatization. The underlying idea of governance was to combine autonomy with accountability and legitimation towards the public, and with the implementation of internal managerial control procedures.
Public universities are in times of increasing engagement for ‘third mission’ per se organizations that have to navigate multi-stakeholder eco-systems when being active in technology transfer, innovation, continuing education and social engagement. Congruently, the Ministry in Austria understands the mandatory KBS as an adequate tool to present a ‘panoramic view’. On reverse, being mandatory does not guarantee internal or external relevance. Within this setting of public university characteristics, expectations regarding the KBS and empirical evidence of KBS in praxis, we discuss functional and dysfunctional effects of the Austrian mandatory KBS. Our main research questions are: (1) what to learn from the implementation of a mandatory KBS-framework concerning the hybridization of university governance and management control? And, within a context of hybrid activities, (2) what to learn about the ambiguity of performance measurement and management interventions as well as intended/unintended impact? Furthermore, we challenge the methodological limits of measuring the merits and the impact of universities (see e.g. Kelly/McNicoll, 2011).
Because of our longitudinal approach, interviews with (as far as possible) the same persons in 2011/12 and 2016/17 allowed for a personal retrospective on expectations and emerging practices as well as for a prospective look. The interviews were recorded, transcribed, and matched with internal and external documents for contextual information, fostering a data triangulation process.
Our empirical findings and results will be presented out of the stakeholders’ perspective, according to the following structure: (1) The implementation of the KBS and its change over time. (2) A judgement on cost-benefit-ratio by main stakeholders. (3) The hybridity of internal managerial control procedures and governing autonomous entities of the Austrian HEI-sector by the Ministry responsible towards the public. (4) An outlook on what (could) happen(s) with the KBS by having a closer look at improvements of performance measures proposed to guide performance management in favor of impact on goal achievement. Or, in more general terms, where does “governing hybridity” (Johanson & Vakkuri, 2017) take the Austrian Public University system?
