Organizational Differences among Universities in Three Socioeconomic Contexts: Finland, Spain and Ecuador. Relational Coordination Approach

Education Sciences

Antón García¹  Carmen De-Pablos-Heredero²  Sajid Haider³  Angela Lorena Carreño⁴  Cristina Checa-Morales⁵ 

[1] Animal Science Department, University of Cordoba, Rabanales University Campus, 14071 Cordoba, Spain;Department of Business Economics (Administration, Management and Organization), Applied Economics II and Fundamentals of Economic Analysis, Rey Juan Carlos University, 28032 Madrid, Spain;Department of Management Sciences, COMSATS University Islamabad, Vehari Campus, Vehari 61100, Pakistan;Faculty of Administrative and Economic Sciences, Technical University of Manabí, Portoviejo 130105, Ecuador;International Doctoral School (EID), Rey Juan Carlos University, 28008 Madrid, Spain;

关键词: relational coordination;    student satisfaction;    higher education;    communication;    discriminant analysis;   

DOI  :  10.3390/educsci11080445

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

The knowledge of local culture is essential to establish competitive strategies in higher education. The objective of this research was to identify the organizational differences among three universities with different international contexts and satisfaction level. An approach was made regarding Relational Coordination (RC) attributes: accurate, frequent and problem-solving communication, shared knowledge, mutual respect and shared goals, by discriminant analysis method. A random sample of 300 students, 100 belonging to each university, was surveyed on the 23 RC variables in 2017–2018. First, the RC variables were evaluated by general linear model (GLM). The three universities—Arcada University of Applied Science (ARCADA) in Finland, University of Cordoba (UCO) in Spain and Agricultural Polytechnic of Manabi “MFL” (ESPAM) in Ecuador—and the two levels of student satisfaction—Low and High—were used as fixed factors. Second, a discriminant model was built with RC variables. A higher level of RC practices concerning to accurate, frequent and problem-solving communication achieved higher levels of satisfaction, regardless of the universities’ socioeconomic context. RC differentiation among three universities showed that shared goals with lecturers and administrative officers and problem-solving communication among classmates were the variables with the highest discriminant power. Two clusters were obtained, where UCO was the most differentiated university. In conclusion, organizational practices made a difference among the three universities. Discriminant analysis can be adapted and extended to different universities to improve quality.

【 授权许可】

Unknown