The Impact of Higher Education Performance Evaluation Frameworks on University Decision Making: a Systems Thinking Approach

The last 25 years have been very unsettling for higher education providers with a changing student profile, accompanied by an increase in external performance measurement in the form of a series of surveys, frameworks and league tables. In this pressured environment, to ensure that the decisions that are being made are efficient and effective, some form of performance measurement was required. The adoption of a performance measurement system has enabled the higher education provider to track and monitor their performance and has also provided information to support and enhance their decision-making. This performance measurement system has been developed using the balanced scorecard approach for the framework. The decision-making and performance measurement activities that are undertaken are not straightforward because the higher education provider is a dynamically complex system. This dynamic complexity is caused by the presence of interconnected components, time delays, feedback and non-linear relationships and leads to policy resistance and decisions that lead to unintended consequences. This research recommended the adoption of a systems thinking approach to help overcome the complexity that is present in the system. This research thus integrated the balanced scorecard approach with the system dynamics methodology to create a performance measurement system. The research took the format of a case study of a higher education provider based in England where students pay to study. The research process adopted included interviews and group workshops to elicit tacit knowledge, and the data gathered was analysed using an approach informed by grounded theory. The performance measurement system included a causality map that evidenced the complexity that exists within the higher education provider and explained how this impacted the decision-making that is undertaken. The causality map informed the production of a strategy map that linked the higher education provider’s strategy to the operational level decision-making undertaken. This causality map demonstrated the concurrent decision-making that needed to occur to ensure success and informed the production of the strategy map which incorporated the appropriate KPIs. The process of engaging stakeholders in the elicitation of tacit knowledge provided the decision makers with an opportunity to reflect on their mental models which has the potential to lead to mental model enhancement as well as sustained individual knowledge and enhancing organisational learning. The contributions to theory are the extensions and challenges to the three theoretical underpinning theories in this research namely: the adoption of the BSC as the framework for the PMS; the acceptance of the concept of bounded rationality; and the applications of the systems thinking perspective. The contributions to practice are the creation of an environment that facilitates individual and organisational learning, the adoption of the outputs to support continuing professional development of current and future leaders, and the identification of the key areas that drive success.