Effectiveness in an institution of higher education: A multi-dimensional model and its empirical examination

Abstract

Lewin and Minton (1986) observe t ha t the i s sue of Organiza t iona l Effect iveness served as a unifying theme for over a c en tu ry of research . . .ye t the empirical r e sea rch has not cont r ibuted to the development of a universal theory of organizat ional (p.514). We propose tha t one of the main causes for this s ta te of affairs is the lack of an agreed upon, comprehens ive , mul t id imens iona l definit ion of the of organizat ional effectiveness and its var ious components . Gu t tman (1977) sugges ts t ha t in o rder to arrive at useful defini t ions it is be t te r to think in t e rms of the observat ions on the concept (p. 336), t hus defining it t h rough address ing the problem of wha t the variables to be s tudied are. As a tool for cons t ruc t ing the con ten t un iverse of all observa t ions re levant to a m u l t i d i m e n s i o n a l concep t , G u t t m a n deve loped the m a p p i n g s e n t e n c e (1957) . The p u r p o s e of this p a p e r is to develop s u c h a mu l t i d imens iona l de f in i t i on for the c o n t e n t u n i v e r s e of the c o n c e p t Organ i za t i ona l Effectiveness by us ing a mapping sentence, and to examine its applicability to the s t udy of effectiveness in one ins t i tu t ion of higher educa t ion in Israel.