Michele Girotto | Universitat Politecnica de Catalunya (original) (raw)

Papers by Michele Girotto

Definitely, the success of the 22@ Barcelona throughout its ten first years can not be explained ... more Definitely, the success of the 22@ Barcelona throughout its ten first years can not be explained only by looking at the management, promotion and facilitation of placement of certain types of businesses to the district. The conversational capital theory, an evolution of social capital, allows us to provide a different explanation, while complementary, to understand the differential factor that this initiative has meant to the Poblenou district. The productive conversation that has been generated among the stakeholders of the district, especially between businesses, city administration and institutions has helped to generate emotions and attitudes of trust and reciprocity, which have promoted a higher level of partnerships and collective projects. All this have resulted both in the enhacement of individual competitiveness, expectations of change in the citizens and attraction of more businesses to the district.
The learning process that generates the 22@ seen from this perspective, suggests that the systematic investment in this conversational capital can be a key issue in order to address a major challenge: the metropolitan economic conversation, still unsettled but crucial. More so when the new challenge that the local administration raises for the next 10 years, inspired by the 22@, concentrates on the economic domain and expects to “Arrobitzar” all the productive areas of the metropolis. The creation of the metropolitan government this year is the opportunity to generate conversation where there has long not been, despite being more than relevant for the future of the country.
In terms of economic and employment results, this new metropolitan conversation will depend largely on the cultural paradigm that will frame it. That's why, having on board the results and the general opinion relate to this “conversational” paradigm, 22@ Barcelona may constitute a framework that could optimally anchor this major national challenge. Nothing but this Barcelona, who knows “how to chat”, could be the natural leader that gentle integrates with the rest of the metropolitan municipalities and creates conversation in an added value framework with Catalonia. This new conversation which is just beginning includes a change of scope regarding economic promotion. As such, it will be a cultural change and this 22@ conversational perspective could be the most appropriate approach in order to support it.

Higher education systems within several OECD countries have experienced relevant changes which ha... more Higher education systems within several OECD countries have experienced relevant changes which have redirected them towards greater market orientation. This trend, desirable or not, is
unquestionable, and far from disappearing, it is undergoing an important expansion as a consequence of the higher education globalization. This new reality has not avoided controversy and has a direct influence on issues such as academic identity, the manager-academic link to the knowledge marketization, competition between institutions and the quality of educational services and its outcomes; as well it has a direct impact on the development and implementation of strategy in higher education
institutions. The ideas and impact of managerialism have been widely studied in the Anglo-Saxon area and in some European countries, although in the Spanish context, scanty studies can be found which analyze the influences of these trends upon the strategic practices of the universities. In this context, at
one hand, this article introduces a theoretical reflection about the concept of managerialism, as respect to issues involved in the strategizing in universities and about the strategy as practice perspective. At other hand, the articles uses a case study in a Spanish university in order to reflect on existing practices in
developing strategy and what factors may influence within the process. . Finally, the article introduces the limitations of the analysis and draws on reflections regarding the relationship between strategizing at university with the concept of managerialism, introducing a basis for broader and comparative studies in the context of the Spanish higher education system.

The environment of the university and the society in general is suffering in recent years signifi... more The environment of the university and the society in general is suffering in recent years significant changes in demographic, economic, social, technological, as well national and international competitiveness. Obviously, these changes also affect the organizing and management of the higher education institutions. Faced with these challenges, institutions have begun to adapt and use strategic management tools, in order to facilitate continuous adjustment to these new situations. Consequently, the number of universities which have initiated the application of some kind of tool to support their strategic management has increased significantly. However, this growth has occurred in a scattered way, both in terms of content and processes, which has not been accompanied by specific studies. Within this context, the paper aims to analyse the current situation of the university strategic management system, introducing a debate about the relationship between the strategic management and the managerial tools efficacy in the specific case of the Spanish universities. This main objective is embodied within the three parts of the paper: first, the description of the current context of the university strategic management and the strategic planning usage, placing it within the Spanish case, secondly, through a survey and a qualitative study, a review of the various experiences carried out by Spanish institutions is presented, and finally, the results are used to draw reflections upon the future challenges of the university strategic management and its decision-making system, with the effective use of the managerial tools for the quality of the university services in the current context of changes in which higher education institutions are subjected.

Talks by Michele Girotto

This paper explores the study results conducted in the framework of a LLP-European project on the... more This paper explores the study results conducted in the framework of a LLP-European project on the field of university modernization that carried out a survey amongst leading European universities in Science and Technology. The focus of the study was to better understand how strategy is developed within these universities, which tools are mostly used and how the strategic management processes are organized and implemented. The paper is framed to analyze the fundamental questions being examined: how is the strategy definition process in these universities like; what tools and models of strategy development and monitoring are used; how they assure that strategies are implemented and aligned; what supporting instruments are at place and how do universities establish the feedback mechanisms of the strategy development and ensure organizational learning from this process. The paper explores these central questions and sets forth a comprehensive discussion on the main practices trends and perspectives.

This study focus on strategizing in practice from the viewpoint of academic manager’s experiences... more This study focus on strategizing in practice from the viewpoint of academic manager’s experiences and practices in strategy implementation. The strategy process of an organization creates and implements strategy. Although this process influences the activities of many members of the organization, strategy research has only recently started to become interested in the activities of practitioners and practices in strategizing. Therefore, studying strategizing entails giving more room to explore how different organizational actors engage in institutional strategy process. Specifically in the context of professional organizations such as universities, studying strategizing can result event more complex given the popular concepts like resistance to change, staff understanding and subunits goals or control structures and practices. This study analyzes the strategy implementation in three types of universities and explores variations of implementation practices and its outcomes within and across cases, as well as patterns of behaviours in the use of strategic planning by different academic managers.

The purpose of the paper is to explore university strategizing by means of examining academic man... more The purpose of the paper is to explore university strategizing by means of examining academic managers narratives relate to institutional strategy. This main objective is explored in two parts: theoretically it draws on connections of concepts such as managerialism, governance and market orientation with the way institutional strategies are formulated and implemented in higher education institutions. Empirically, the approach taken is narrative and discursive analysis, based on a case study in a Spanish public university. This analytical scheme is based on a systematic exploration of the main factors considered to be responsible for enabling or constraining strategy implementation.

This paper aims to explore the role of strategy text as an intermediate point of connection betwe... more This paper aims to explore the role of strategy text as an intermediate point of connection between the institutional discourses and the organizational members’ practices. There are a variety of seminal works on the linguistic turn in management studies, especially on the subject of organization research on strategy. For instance, Jarzabkowski and Fenton (2006) argue that research needs to shift from the current dominant perspectives on strategy and organization as largely coherent and reified state to embrace more socially dynamic and pluralistic views on the organization and its activities.

This article draws on university management experiences in different ibero-american countries. As... more This article draws on university management experiences in different ibero-american countries. As we look at these countries, we ask: to what extent the universities that make up the Ibero-american context are able to compete in the framework of the
"World-Class Universities”? Which models of governance and management should be put in place to effectively support the changes needed? What is the overall vision and what are the specific objectives that the Universities are trying to accomplish? How might strategic planning assist in achieving these goals? What does experience in these nations suggest? What are the results to date? For this we have applied a survey to university top managers. We next provide a discussion of the involvement in strategic making across each analyzed country, fostering the bountiful challenges and changes drivers that are bringing many transitions and challenges within the governance and management of the higher education.

This paper explores, through a case study in a Spanish higher education institution, how strategy... more This paper explores, through a case study in a Spanish higher education institution, how strategy text has been reproduced and what implications it has entailed upon the collective engagement or disengagement in the continuity of new texts. The analytical scheme is drawn on strategizing as social practice and it
takes a discourse perspective of strategy as text. As follows, the discussions presented in the paper suggest that the strategy texts were seeing as isolated parts, which may have not provided affiliation among the university collective action. This leads to observe that the use of the texts was characterized as being an instrument of control, rather than a guide to provide a future direction. The mismatch between the texts and the talks from the university practitioners, may suggest continuity with no consecutiveness within the strategy text reproduction, where the local practices were seem to run independently from the
engagement in the text production and reproduction.

This study explores the production and reproduction of strategy texts in a university context. Th... more This study explores the production and reproduction of strategy texts in a university context. The focus of analysis is at the level of unfolding and interaction between the strategy text, the actors and the practices mediated by it. The discussion is based on two important aspects of strategizing: how the actors constitute themselves as producers of the strategy text and how practices are constituted or modified among the text production and implementation. It suggests that the mediating role played by the “text” is nested around its use as a political instrument controlling, embedded in the follow through of the taken for granted institutionalised practices.

The article sets out to address a critical perspective on strategic planning development in the h... more The article sets out to address a critical perspective on strategic planning development in the higher education sector, both from theoretical and methodological points of view. The objective is to examine and understand the role of language and micro-practices in realizing strategy, as a possible factor to be considered in terms of the efficiency of the accomplished strategy. Theoretically, the article withdraws a criticism concerning previous empirical studies being limited to financial measures of performance and engages within the need to go inside the process itself to better understand the kind of work that is actually being done. Methodologically, the articles suggests strategic alignment as key determinant on unveiling the level of strategy accomplishments and its overall performance, setting up a discursive approach to strategy in order to provide more accurate insights on the correlation between the degree of strategic alignments or misalignments with micro-practices deployment. To support these views, the article reports on part findings from the application of case studies within two Spanish universities, and it is characterized as being part of longitudinal cases which is in process within European higher education institutions. The paper then explores the implication of the part findings, addressing the main issues for the ongoing research project.

Although strategic planning has been touted in numerous studies, the effectiveness of how it has ... more Although strategic planning has been touted in numerous studies, the effectiveness of how it has been written and read is not that obvious, the clarity around what truly defines its performance effectiveness remains unattainable as there is no unifying theory that has emerged to date that can provide the framework for further researches. In response to the need for renewed attention on strategic planning, the “practice perspective turn” could provide a new methodological approach to better address questions such as of performance implications. This paper provides a brief review of the theoretical background associated with strategic planning development within the higher education context, sets forth a research agenda focused on the analysis of the micro-practices deployed in the planning process and its
interrelationships with strategic language and alignment as collaborative endeavour in enhancing its performance, and presents preliminary findings to date.