Research production or productive research?:strategic management and performance measurement in University of Oulu

This thesis explores the strategy and its management at the University of Oulu in relation to the political and legal guidance. Conflicting interests inside the organization are also examined. In order to combine both internal and external pressure mechanisms on strategic management and performance measurement, the institutional perspective is needed. Neoinstitutional theory with mechanisms of institutional isomorphism provide framework for understanding what pressure mechanisms affect the most on universities as an organization. In strategic management, attention is also paid to how the strategy is implemented and how the strategic performance is monitored in case university. Thesis is executed as qualitative case study which aims to describe how the external pressure mechanisms for institutional isomorphism a) materialize in the strategic management and b) reflect on the performance measurement criteria of University of Oulu. The analysis was primarily based on three managerial documents. Complementing information was acquired through interviewing the person responsible for these managerial documents, university intranet and official publications. The analysis was carried out as theory-grounded content analysis. The data was coded in theory-based categories: coercive / regulative, mimetic / cultural-cognitive and normative. As a result of analysis it can be stated that institutional isomorphism is materialized in the case of University of Oulu through all three aforementioned mechanisms. The coercive features are based on University law, MCE funding criteria, MCE performance agreement and other laws or regulations. The mimetic features are related to organization structure, management frameworks, monitoring systems and other things, for example profiling. The normative features are rooted in academic profession, social obligations, recruiting and accreditation. The most visible finding regarding the performance measurement were a) strong influence of coercive mechanism through MCE funding criteria, which shows as almost complete copying of funding criteria to be used as performance measurement indicators in strategic management b) the need to further develop the PM system. The findings of this study are from many parts in accordance with previous studies utilizing the same framework in university context and are considered reliable. However further conclusions about how the institutional isomorphism influences other universities’ strategic management and performance measurement cannot be drawn based on this case study. Thus more research is needed on how the universities form, implement and monitor their strategies under the effect of different external and internal pressures