Quality and competitiveness in Higher Education

There is a growing pressure on HE regarding accountability, declining resources, changing of the law environment, broadening of expectations, tighter connections with the labour market from the requirements of the knowledge economy which forces institutions to be

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entrepreneurial and future oriented. Cost-effectiveness and return on investment are becoming more and more important. To better understand the context we must consider HE as service (Neubauer 2014). This approach emphasis a marketing oriented view, which must be considered from a strategic point of view (Michael 1990). Higher education marketing, which became a separate field, could be defined as translated from Piskóti (2011:42): ‘the market and image oriented, planned, strategic and tactical activities of the institutions, in which they are using their resources and competences to sell their knowledge-intensive products and services in a way that they constantly satisfy their customers, so the activities can support the long and short term economical and societal goals of the institution.’

It is a strategic question how can the quality of the service can be improved? There is an increasing demand for the quality assurance of HE, because the massification of HE could lead to a decline in quality of teaching and learning. Both the increasing expectations of the labour market and budget restraints supports that process (Tan - Kek 2004; Polónyi 2006b). In identifying quality in HE, the satisfaction of students becomes an important factor, but we must consider it besides the strategic needs of the institutions. The SERVQUAL model is usually applied to assess the quality of services and in this context, to assess the quality of HE. Parasuraman, Zeithaml and Berry (1988) considered quality as perceived quality minus expected quality. In their research, they developed the SERVQUAL model, which can interpret quality in the previously discussed way. In this research, HE specific version of the gap-model of service quality (based on the SERVQUAL approach) will be used. This model is the framework for the research, focusing on the first and fifth gap. The first gap is the discrepancy between management perceptions of customers’ expectations and actual customer expectations, while the fifth gapassess the discrepancy between customers perceived and expected quality.

Analysing the quality of services is important with regard to the question of competitiveness. Several European Union document emphases the need for HEIs to be competitive in the knowledge economy, in order to contribute to Europe’s competitiveness (European Commission 2006a; European Commission 2006b).

After Barakonyi (2009) competitiveness in HE means that the institution - is able to compete in the international knowledge market,

- is able to gain position and stand its ground on the long run, which means that - it is successful in the competition for students,

- it is able to sustain and sustainably grow its market share and profitability, - it is able to sustain and strengthen its position in international research and

innovation and

- it is an attractive choice for international research and cooperation.

127 2. Methods

This research applies a deductive approach; its purpose is to explore the service quality of HE regarding student expectations and satisfaction from the students and from the management’s point of view. Using a quantitative paradigm, after the examination of the literature, two online surveys were constructed. It is helpful that the constructs that are in focus are relatively stable in time (Polónyi 2006a). The problem is interpreted from a service marketing and higher education management approach. The questions that stems from the literature review are the following:

- Considering HE as a service what can be the outcome of the operation, who are the main customer and how does the institution characterizes the students?

- What are the main expectations of students regarding the quality of HE?

- What are the main differences between the perception of the management about student expectations and the actual expectations of students regarding the quality of HE?

Answering these questions leads to the following hypotheses, which will give the main structure of the discussion of results:

- The management perception on Higher Education

- The management of HEIs considers the graduated student as the output of HE. (H1)

- The management of HEIs considers the employers and the state as main customers. (H2)

- The management of HEIs considers the students alongside the

‘commodity’ metaphor. (H3) - Student expectations

- Among the expectations of fee-paying students the quality of teaching and learning are dominant in contrast with state-funded students. (H4) - Students consider themselves alongside the ‘consumer’ metaphor. (H5) - Fee-paying students less likely to feel that they have a high return on

investment regarding their studies in comparison with state-funded students. (H6)

- Consumer and provider gaps

- Based on the gap-model of service quality the first and the fifth gap could be considered significant. (H7)

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To test the hypotheses exploratory and multivariate (Principal Component Analysis) statistical analysis were used with SPSS.

Two separate but connected surveys were created. The first one was for students of HE and the other one was for the management of HEIs (rectors, rectors, deans, vice-deans, heads of institutes and departments). The students were reached via social media platform using the snowball method and an access-based sampling, while the management was reached via personal e-mails.

Both surveys began with a general data which will be used to describe the sample. The common elements of the surveys were the item list of expectations based on literature review (Davies 2002; Kandiko - Mawer 2013; Tan - Kek 2004; Eagle - Brennan 2007;

Pereira - da Silva 2003; Rajasekhar - Muninarayanappa - Reddy 2009). The students assessed each item on a 1 to 6 scale whether or not these items are important for them (expected service) and after that they assessed each item again on a 1 to 6 scale how these expectations are met (perceived service). The management assessed each item on a 1 to 6 scale what they thought that these items are important factors for students. The next common element was the metaphors regarding student roles. Students and the management rated 3-3 statements, one for each 3 metaphor whether or not they agree with the content of the sentences (Nordensvärd 2011).

3. Results