Complexities, challenges and implications of collaborative work within a regime of performance measurement: the case of management and organisation studies
By Emma Jeanes, Bernadette Loacker & Martyna Śliwa
https://doi.org/10.1080/03075079.2018.1453793
ABSTRACT
The current demands on higher education institutions (HEIs) to become more efficient and effective have led to increasing performance pressures on researchers, and consequently on the practices and outcomes of researcher collaborations. In this paper, based on a qualitative study of collaborative experiences of management and organisation studies scholars, we explore the complexities and challenges of researcher collaborations under the current regime of academic performance measurement. Our study suggests that researcher collaborations are underpinned by four main rationalities: traditional-hierarchical, strategic-instrumental, scholarly-professional and relationship-orientated. We find that strategic-instrumental rationalities are the most prevalent and typically infuse other rationalities. Our research demonstrates that there are potential adverse consequences for the quality and purpose of outputs, the effects on collegial relationships and risks of exploitation and reinvoked hierarchies in collaborative relationships. The study reveals some of the problematic implications for academics and HEIs that emerge as a consequence of research productivity measurement.
KEYWORDS
Academic hierarchy; business schools; New Public Management; researcher collaboration; research performance measurement
Critics of academic performance management, and especially research productivity measurement, have highlighted that it gives rise to individualistic behaviours and practices, reinforcing competitive- ness and potentially undermining collegiality (Ball 2012). Lynch (2015, 199) warns that those who have internalised the productivity imperative are likely to develop an ‘actuarian and calculative mindset’, and to adopt a way of relating to the university organisation and to other academics, including collaborators, in purely transactional, career-oriented terms.
This incentivises collaborative publications since both quality and quantity of output matter for assessing research productivity and can even impact global rankings.However, questions have been raised about the quality of outputs produced under the regime of ‘excellence’. For example, it has been argued that as a result of these measurements, academics might be more concerned with producing publications that conform to external quality evaluation criteria rather than striving to produce what they consider their ‘best work’
The increasing predominance of journal lists and rankings as performance measurement tools tends to exert a ‘homogenizing impact’, stifling scholarly diversity and innovation. A specific study of management scholars has further shown a tendency to approach writing for academic publication as a ‘game’ rather than a process of critical inquiry
Collaboration is commonly considered a vehicle for building professional networks, sharing knowledge, ideas, skills, experiences, workload, resources and risks associated with the research process, and for improving future employment prospects as well as attracting research funding for the collaborating parties
A variety of rationalities inform prevalent practices of researcher collaboration. Below we critically discuss these rationalities, which we term as:
(a) traditional-hierarchical
(b) strategic-instrumental
(c) scholarly-professional
(d) relationship-oriented.
Interpersonal Problems:
Even though his name (senior collaborator) is last in the alphabet, he puts his name first … I’ve tried to address it but there’s been no response. So you kind of feel like the hierarchy has been slipping in … I didn’t really know how to handle that.
These ‘less mutually collaborative research teams that come together more because of employ- ment and institutional relationships’ (Louis-MCR-BC) were widely evident. Such tolerance for inequality results in systematic burdens and challenges placed on those lacking an established institutional position, who are compelled to collaborate.
Where seniority-based collaborations have been experienced as problematic, some researchers have developed a ‘calculative mindset’ towards collaborations.
Rather than collaborations achieving greater creativity and pluralism, under the current regime of academic performance measurement, it is likely that collaborative practices foster a scholarly ‘monoculture’ and thus lead to narrow, incremental, often self-referential and superficial projects being embarked upon – i.e. ones that are seen to hold the promise of bringing highly evaluated, quantifiable and thus ‘excellent’ outputs, and contributing to researchers’ career progression.
This output-orientation in relation to the main objectives of collaborations reflects a broader observation stemming from our study in that strategic-instrumental rationalities underpinning col- laborations were the most widespread in our sample of participants. This demonstrates that, in a ‘partnership or perish climate’ (Berman 2008, 167), strategic-instrumental considerations tend to sup- press other collaborative rationalities such as those focusing on scholarly activities, projects and relationships. Even where academics claim a relationship- and friendship-based ‘ethics of care’ and ‘gift giving’ to be core to collaborations, they simultaneously express an instrumental approach to collaboration and, specifically, an underlying need for the creation of ‘added value’ (Macfarlane 2017) through publications.
Problematic collaborative practices and relations are, however, not limited to ‘vertical’ collaborations.
Strong performance cultures in HEIs tend to encourage academic malpractices, delineated by a lack of contributions, reliability, mutual responsiveness, trust and, thus, a lack of collegiality and engagement within collaborations.
Scholarly responsibility appears to be replaced by a sense of institutional accountability, mainly defined by meeting performance targets and metrics.
Our study demonstrates that current performance and research productivity pressures in HEIs ‘crowd out’ some important academic values and ideals, such as the pursuit of research out of scholarly curiosity and an aspiration for critical inquiry, and the cultivation of diverse and mutually supportive collegial relationships – in support of an unquestioning acceptability of demands for strategic, output-oriented and career objectives-driven academic practices.
We see the ascent of the opportunistic, career-driven scholar who cultivates strategic, low-risk high-output collaborations, which may foreclose more interesting, inventive and valuable forms of research and jeopardize collegial relationships informed by critical reflexivity, equality and mutual trust.
While we do not argue against the aspiration to produce high-quality research, our study of researcher collaborations among MOS academics underlines that the (un)intended con- sequences of the prevailing performance management regime and its emphasis on efficiency, excellence, relevance and accountability are far-reaching, for academics and for HEIs.
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