Institutional context, collaboration, human resource development infrastructure and performance of Universities in Kenya

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine the influence of the institutional contexts of universities and the phenomenon of University-Industry Collaboration on the relationship between the Human Resource Development Infrastructure and performance of universities in Kenya. The study was guided by five objectives, namely to determine: the relationship among the various components that constitute the HRD Infrastructure for universities in Kenya; the relationship between the HRD Infrastructure and University-Industry Collaboration; the influence of the University-Industry Collaboration on the strength of the relationship between the HRD Infrastructure and University Performance; the influence of the Universities' responsiveness to institutional contexts on the strength of the relationship between University HRD Infrastructure and University Industry Collaboration and the influence of the Universities' responsiveness to institutional contexts on the strength of the relationship between University Industry Collaboration and University Performance. The design of the study was guided by the positivism epistemological orientation and used a descriptive survey design that targeted 180 respondents from 19 Universities. 130 of them responded from 16 universities. The research found that the degree of responsiveness to the national culture is just slightly above the level of indifference, moderate for the institutional context and high for human capital development needs and the HRD value base. The study reports low scores on responsiveness to the tolerance to mistakes, an aspect that was considered to reflect in the design of the HRD Infrastructure with low scores on building the ability to solve problems and encouragement of managers to take risks. The reported mean scores show that the universities have a clear picture of the set of OD Needs which reflects in the components of the HRD Infrastructure. However, they rate lowly on areas that are critical to building learning systems. The reported score on the motivation to pursue collaboration is slightly above the 50-50 chance while the level of collaboration is relatively moderate with high variation in responses. The types of collaboration programs were found to be slightly high for all the items except in technology licensing, research parks and technology transfer where low scores and wide variation among the universities were reported. The readiness for change performance registered a higher mean score than that of bottom line performance. Hypothesis one was partially supported, hypotheses 2, 3 and 4 fully supported while hypothesis 5 was not supported. The study found that: there is a significant correlation

between the University HRD Infrastructure and University Industry Collaboration; U-I-C partially mediates the relationship between HRD Infrastructure and University Performance; responsiveness to the institutional context moderates the relationship between the HRD Infrastructure and U-I-C and not the relationship between U-I-C and University performance. The findings of the study provide an insight into the situational positioning of HRD in universities in Kenya whereby it is reported that HRM is yet to become strategic. The findings offer some practical and epistemological lessons to managers in this sector and scholars in management respectively. The findings provide empirical evidence that strengthens the calls for U-I collaboration and those for the integration of the resource based view and the institutional theory in research. The findings also confirm the empirical and theoretical underpinnings drawn from the multidisciplinary set of theories and provide an epistemological support for research in HRD based on a positivist perspective. The study recommended that universities adopt programs that will strengthen their learning capability and alignment of the learning cultures with their set of HRD Practices. The study called on future research efforts to replicate the current study from the industry side using objective indicators of the variables used and integrate the organization theory imperatives of size and strategy.