Managerial Versus Professional Control: The Case of Performance Appraisal in UK Universities

Willy McCourt and Josie Moores

Abstract

We offer a case study of the relative efficacy of managerial and professional modes of control over professional behaviour.  It focuses on performance appraisal in UK higher education, particularly one ‘new’ university.  Despite the government’s intention that appraisal would be used for managerial purposes, in operation appraisal had a development or mixed orientation, and even then was only partly effective.  We argue that appraisal failed because it cut across professional values in an area of professional autonomy, and that it can be rescued, if at all, only by aligning it with those values.  While management remains necessary for allocating resources, professional mechanisms have a neglected value for improving work performance in ‘clinical’ areas where professionals necessarily retain autonomy.

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