Abstract
Management by values (MBV) is a new form of management that creates a collective spirit and provides value-oriented work by combining people in an organization on common grounds. Even though existing research recognizes the importance of MBV in companies, less is known regarding MBV in educational organizations. This study provides an implementation of MBV at Istanbul Technical University (ITU) with an aim to increase the sense of belonging, create common organizational culture, reach targets, and perform higher so that the current engineering education provided is improved. The current situation of management at ITU was analyzed and an application method was developed, which was later implemented at Faculty of Management at ITU. Primary data used were collected from students, academicians, and managers of ITU via online surveys and face-to-face interviews. The results indicate that MBV, which has various benefits, should be used in educational organizations to build a more qualified educational environment, to raise more qualified students, and to have more satisfied members.
TopIntroduction
Educational organizations are the institutions that form the foundations of an individual, provide connections between individuals, broaden the horizons of people, educate and develop the society, provide to gain perspective, and shape the foundations of thought. Rapid change and uncertainty all over the world with the development of digitalization affected educational institutions, which have critical importance. Education systems changed from document-based management to virtual learning environments (VLEs), which creates the need for interactions, cooperation, and common value systems (Schuster, 2017). This is invaluable to find ways to keep up with these conditions and to benefit from these developments to train engineers in the best way who are an important part of society and technology. In engineering education, it has become a necessity to use new management approaches in education to provide quality and contemporary education process that allows students and academicians to take the initiative considering that the people studying engineering are very fast-changing, rapidly developing, and productive minds. It is necessary to ensure that students and academicians are well understood, that their desires are taken into consideration by managers and that they play an active role in the management processes in order to understand the developments and tools that are emerging with digitalization, to keep up with the requirements of the changing world, and to implement them quickly and effectively. A difference can be made in engineering education by collecting students, academicians, and management in the common values to get the highest performance and yield. At this point, Management By Values (MBV) emerges and meets the requirements of current conditions.
MBV is a new form of management that creates a collective spirit and provides value-oriented work by combining people in common denominators in the organizations (Dolan and Richley, 2006; Akdemir, 2007). In organizations that are using MBV, they have an average of 5 to 7 specific values that unique for the organization, which are selected with respect to the values of every member in the organization. These values show what is important for the organization, guide them in all processes and decisions, and reflect the organization and its members. In this way, the opinions of every member are taken into consideration and management becomes a common process in which everyone participates instead of coming under the values of single persons. MBV is a new strategic leadership instrument that is a different way of sensing, processing, and applying information concerning behavioral sciences. MBV provides a strong structure to redesign the prevailing culture of organizations by shared values. The main objectives of MBV are simplifying, guiding, and securing commitment. Simplifying provides dealing with the complexity of organizations by harmonizing the changes in all standards. Guiding offers strategic management to be able to reach future targets of organizations. Securing commitment provides improvement of members’ loyalty in daily works (Dolan and Garcia, 1999). Even all of the organizations have some level of values, MBV gives top priority to values in management and decision-making processes.
Value is the abstract measure to determine the significance of something and the response that something worth, based on the Turkish Language Society. Values are a set of principles that shape and control peoples’ behaviors. Values affect peoples’ decisions and beliefs about various actions. Therefore, values generate personal integrities and identities of people. These guide people to decide how important, useful, or accurate something is. Values have critical importance on the formation of individuals, organizations, and societies. These construct judgment of peoples. Values are general concepts that reflect the opinions, emotions, priorities, and objectives of the majority to ensure the continuity of the organizations. These are the basic standards that determine desirable or not-desirable, favorable or not-favorable, right or not-right of individuals, organizations, and societies. (Töremen and Akdemir, 2007).
Key Terms in this Chapter
Human resource management: Strategic approach aiming to bring out the highest potential of individuals and organizations by enabling people to work efficiently by guiding people in an organization more effectively.
Educational Organizations: Institutions that form the foundations of the individual, provide connections between individuals, broaden the horizons of people, educate and develop the society, provide to gain perspective, and shape the foundations of thought.
Values-Based Management: A new strategic leadership instrument that is a different way of sensing, processing, and applying information concerning behavioral sciences.
Commitment: Separating your time and interest by taking responsibility for your wishes and beliefs for the person, organization, or work you are affiliated with.
Organizational Culture: Refers to common values, beliefs, experiences, and actions which represent the organization uniquely.
Values: A set of principles that shape and control the behaviors of people. These are general concepts that reflect the opinions, emotions, priorities, and objectives of the majority to ensure the continuity of the organizations.
Behavioral Sciences: A branch of science that examines and generalizes human behavior/action in different perspectives such as psychology, sociology, law, or management.