A study of the distribution of decision-making authority within selected colleges of business as perceived by management and marketing faculty
Abstract
The problem which was investigated through this study was a determination of the opinions of selected management and marketing faculty concerning participation in organization decision making. Thirteen colleges and universities from Louisiana were selected based on the criteria of the granting of the Master of Business Administration Degree as the sample source.
Permission was obtained from Rensis Likert Associates, Inc. to modify and use the Profile of a College or University, Form 6--Faculty as the research questionnaire with which to elicit opinions. Two-hundred fifty-two questionnaires were distributed and 163 were returned and included in the study.
Twenty-four hypotheses were developed and grouped into eight sets of three hypotheses each based upon the comparison of different means. The first three sets of hypotheses related to the comparison of grand means. Testing of these hypotheses revealed no difference in the grand means between the respondents with less than three years at their current institution and those with more than three years, tenured respondents and non-tenured respondents and female and male respondents of the questions relating to the deans, department heads, or the faculty.
The remaining five sets involved a comparison of the means of individual questions for similar respondent groups. Testing of these five sets of hypotheses revealed strong differences of opinion relating to the current level and the desired level of involvement in the making of decisions relating to general college or university matters by deans, department heads and the faculty.