The Relationship Between Academic Activities and Organizational Behavior at Universities in Turkey

Year 2006, Volume: 46 Issue: 46, 175 - 198, 01.07.2006

Doç. Dr. Ahmet Aypay

Abstract

This study surveys universities regarding systematic theories in organizational behavior and faculty activities. The study reports the results of the relationship between faculty activities and models of organizational behavior at universities in Turkey. The data collected various departments of the Facttlies of Arts and Sciences and Faculties of Economics and Administrative Sciences at Universities in Turkey. The universities in the samole is ramdomly selected. The study demonstrates how the observation of different types of dominant organizational behavior in various types of higher education organizations might be related to different faculty activities. The study found a partial relationship between five models of organizational behavior and faculty activities based on the four domains of scholarship. In addition, the study found a strong relationship among the models of organizational behavior. Summary This study surveys universities regarding systematic theories in organizational behavior and faculty activities in Turkey. The study reports the results of the application of models of organization to colleges and universities. The data collected various departments of the Facutlies of Arts and Sciences and Faculties of Economics and Administrative Sciences at Universities in Turkey. The study ramdomly selected universities. The study demonstrates how the observation of different types of dominant behavior in various types of higher education organizations might be related to different faculty activities. The study found a partial relationship between five models of organizational behavior and faculty activities on the four domains of scholarship. The study found a strong relationship among the models of organizational behavior. The purpose of the study is to investigate whether there is relationship between models of organizational behavior and models of organizational functioning, namely, bureaucratic, collegial, political, symbolic and systemic models at selected universities in Turkey. Faculty members in Turkey were required by law of 2547 for teaching, research and publlications as well as service to society. It may seem that these responsibilities may conflict with one another. It is essentially correct that if one teaches too many courses, then his/her research will suffer. The same principle may apply to service to society. However, the findings in the literature does not support this claim. On the other hand, if one carries out extensive research, it is obvious that ones teaching will be better off since one can easily transfer the findings of results into his/her teaching. All faculty members in Turkey are required to teach 10 hours of coursework in a week in order to receive their salary. Additional teaching is subject to additional income. The research activity is very essential for junior level faculty at universities around the world since their future in academia depends heavily on their research. A new role emerged for faculty members recently. Although faculty members are not strangers to this new role, it is called as “service to academia.” This new role includes activities such as advising students, being members of committees such as curriculum, parking, physical facilities planning, peer-reviews, directing theses both at college and university levels. Braxton and Bayer's (1986) review of literature on academic activities of faculty members resulted in that a multi-dimensional performance evaluation approach is necessary. In order to do that, first the concepts such as research, publication, and scholarship should be defined. These authors claim that being a faculty member may be considered both as a process and a product. The reason behind this claim is that Professional knowledge and skills are in the center of scholarly activity. The evaluation of faculty scholarship is essentially a subjective process. Thus, Braxton and Bayer (1986) argued that in order to make his process more objective, there should be some quantitative measures such as boks, chapters, journal articlecs, etc. Citation indexes may also be used to evaluate faculty activity. Findings of studies in the literature indicate that there is a complex organizational structure at colleges and universities (Beger, 1997; Bergquist, 1992; Birnbaum, 1988). There may be different roles of colleges and universities. Sometimes they seem to be conflicting just as in the discussions of the nature of scholarly work. This study uses the models of organizaitonal functioning in the literature such as bureaucratic model, collegial model, political model, symbolic model, and systemic model. Method The study randomly selected 500 faculty member who work at universities in Turkey. The department included in the study are: Biology, chemistry, mathematics, history, science, physics, sociology, and economics. An instrument developed by Braxton and colleagues for faculty activity and a second instrument developed by Berger (1996) were used in the study. The reliability and validity of the instruments were satifsfactory. Two e-mail vawes of reminders have been sent to faculty members. However, one-third of the questionnaire was returned. Findings The studs did not find any gender differences between male and female faculty members regarding academic activities and perception of organizational structure. No significant differences was found regarding the perception of organizational structures based on the interests of the type of academic activity. There is a difference among faculty members regarding their interest of research, teaching, and application. When the correlations among the academic activities is considered, high positive correlations have been found. There is also high correlations between organizational models such as symbolic and collegial models. However, it is interesting that faculty members did not perceive models of organizational functioning were not correlated highly with one another. There have been a small positive correlations have been found. These correlations between research activity and bureaucratic, symbolic, systemic, policical, and systemic models. There is a low level of correlation between bureaucratic model and teaching. There is a low positive relationship between political model and research activity shows the competition for resources among faculty members.

Keywords

academic activities , organizational behavior

Üniversitelerde Akademik Etkinlik ve Örgütsel Davranış Arasındaki İlişki

Abstract

Bu çalışma Türkiye'deki üniversitelerin belirli bölümlerinde öğretim üyelerinin akademik etkinlikleri ile örgütsel davranış arasındaki ilişkiyi araştırmaktadır. Öncelikle örgütsel davranış alanındaki kuramların bulgularının sistematik bir biçimde sunulması sonucu gözlenen modellerin Türkiye'de üniversitelerde ne düzeyde gözlenebileceği ve bu modellerin üniversite öğretim üyelerinin akademik etkinlikleriyle ne düzeyde ilişkili olduğu belirlenmeye çalışılmıştır. Alanyazındaki örgütsel davranış modellerinin üniversitelerde uygulanması sonucu gözlenen farklı örgütsel davranış biçimlerin, ve bunların hangi tür yüksek öğretim kurumlarında daha baskın bir biçimde gözlenebildiğini ortaya koymaktadır. Araştırma üniversitelerde algılanan örgütsel modeller ile öğretim üyelerinin akademik etkinlikleri arasında kısmen, örgütsel modellerin kendi aralarında ise yüksek düzeyde olumlu bir ilişki olduğunu ortaya koymaktadır.

Keywords

üniversitelerde akademik etkinlikler , örgütsel davranış

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