06.06.14

The Elusive Effectiveness of Performance Measurement in Science: Insights from a German University

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Biester, C; Flink T. (2014): The Elusive Effectiveness of Performance Measurement in Science: Insights from a German University

Abstract
Over the last decades, procedures of compiling, measuring and evaluating academic performance have made incursions into the realm of universities. The result is an effect on employment negotiations, increased competitive performance measurement in funding allocation and, in the context of salary distribution, impact on how individual and collective achievements of academic staff are compared among each other or  between different research institutions. Despite the pervasiveness of this type of systematic performance measurement impinging upon nearly all university activities, we still know little about whether these systems matter for researchers under evaluation. Based on empirical insights from an evaluation at a large German university, we discuss  perceptions of professors exposed to one university performance measurement system. That exposure seems to trigger, in particular, worrisome attitudes of ambivalence towards the university and the academic value system.