Teaching innovation management in Poland: An exploratory study of perception and power in institutional task failure.

摘要

This exploratory qualitative single-site study used Robert Merton's adaptive typologies (1938) as a tool for structuring interviews with faculty members to acquire data about perceptions of task goals and means in the context of both failed and successful post-diploma programs in a public institution of higher education in Poland that specializes in economics and business education.;A department of innovation management in Poland was chosen because one of the post-diploma programs in the area of innovation management had failed to launch. It was believed that a number of broader issues related to perception and power may have played a role in that program's failure.;Data from the interviews were analyzed using Anthony Giddens (1984) construct of power—with the intention of exploring the forms of power expressed by the various structural properties in which the faculty member are situated and the ways in which those forms influence perceptions. These structural properties were analyzed at three levels: institutional, national and international.;All of the faculty members in the department (except one) participated in the study. In addition to the interviews, demographic data and data about faculty member publications was gathered. Data about the social structures in which faculty members are situated were also gathered from several sources: a general survey of structural limitations to the post-diploma program landscape, interviews with experts in other institutions and interviews with experts in Poland that study Polish academics, cultural capital in Poland and internal dynamics related to business education.;Data suggested that perceptions were influenced by a number of distinct factors: a national structure of power and control that appears to tolerate failure of post-diploma programs, a lack of alignment programs and the departmental area and a complex market of funding sources.;This exploratory study concluded that there are a number of social structures within and external to Poland that are influencing the perception of goals and means of faculty members in the creation and development of post-diploma programs in the specific field of innovation management.