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My work seeks to address the contribution of SD to enhancement of quality in HE. I have sought to explore a cluster of research questions in this area, the focus varying slightly over time as my roles have changed and developed, opening and closing opportunities for investigative work. The primary research questions have been: how may SD contribute to enhancing HE and what are the implications of those contributions for HE staff, HEIs, and the SD community itself? How are HE organisations and management changing and how may staff and SD professionals engage with and influence such changes? At the next level down, I have developed associated, more particular questions, for specific projects. Examples include: What are the prospects for successful re-alignment of enhancement bodies, including the main one for SD? What strategies have been developed to enhance the contribution of PTT? Are they well founded and influential? How far do they meet the needs of stakeholders, including PTT themselves?

In recent years modernisation practices introduced by successive governments and university funding bodies have converged to bring about a much larger and more academically diverse student body, alongside an increase in bureaucracy, marketization and government accountability. Middle managers in schools of healthcare have confronted these changes in tandem with obligations to the on-going pressures of integration with higher education and collaborative relationships with major stakeholders. Previous research into the role of the middle manager suggests that recruitment to the role is haphazard, that post-holders have little training, and that they struggle to manage aspects of their role. However, there has been little published research specific to the role of the middle manager in schools of healthcare. This study explores the professional identities of 14 middle managers in a single case study school of healthcare in a selected chartered (pre- 1992) UK university. The study adopts an interpretive approach, in line with social constructivism, exploring their beliefs, feelings and perceptions with regard to their career background, identities and role. The findings show that leaders in healthcare education claim legitimacy for their role from their credentials as clinical practitioners, managers and academics. This group of middle managers shared an early appreciation of the competitive nature of their field, and the importance of symbolic and academic capital. They were inclined to attribute their career success less to situated than core or dispositional aspects of their identity, and spoke of high levels of job satisfaction. It is recommended that new understandings of this role be incorporated into more specific job descriptions, shaped by the strategic vision of the university. Middle managers are identified as pivotal agents of change, and mediators who encourage staff to work with strategic, cultural, political and economic realities Senior leaders of higher education institutions might wish to consider employing individuals who are at a point of professional mastery, managerial expertise and academic acumen to equip them to juggle the multiple identities within this post.

The Higher Education sector as a whole has come under increasing levels of public scrutiny over recent years, often critiqued in relation to sustainable funding strategies and levels of public funding. One response from Governments and HEIs is to consider institutional merger as a means of reducing the number of providers, whilst maintaining levels of access to and quality of higher education. This thesis seeks to review a merger case study – University of the West of Scotland (UWS) - created in 2007 following a merger of the ‘University of Paisley’ and ‘Bell College of Higher Education’ creating Scotland’s largest modern (post-1992) university with over 20,000 students and around 2,500 staff. Whilst many organisational mergers are referenced as failures (eg, Epstein 2005) or presented as cases whereby success cannot be reliably measured for around 10 years post-merger (eg, Mao et al 2009), in 2010 the UWS merger was lauded a success by the Scottish Government and Scottish Funding Council. This study seeks to ascertain what were the key factors in the merger process that resulted in this successful outcome. A literature review is provided, followed by a research methodology that includes document analysis, in-depth focussed interviews and focus groups. Document analysis is considered fundamental to gaining a thorough understanding of the vision, intended outcome of the merger and the strategic approach the institution took to deliver a successful merger. In-depth focussed interviews with senior staff of the University explore key themes identified from the literature review and resultant conceptual framework, this will be supplemented by focus groups with a number of academic and support staff to ensure representation of staff views cutting across the layers of the organisation. The qualitative data extracted via these methods inform the findings and conclusions of the study. This study is expected to be of particular interest to scholars, practitioners and policy makers in the higher education arena.

The role of universities has evolved over the centuries. The most recent manifestation is the 'Entrepreneurial University' which engages with industry through various knowledge transfer practices and seeks to commercialise its research. First adopted by US universities this model has been replicated by universities in Europe, Australia and Asia. One of the consequences of this rise in the 'entrepreneurial university' has been a sharp increase in patenting by universities. However, both the number and proportion of exploited patents is small. Given the costs of patenting this represents a significant waste of resources. The primary aim of this thesis is to explain why some patents are exploited while others are not. This, in turn, involves exploring the actors who are involved in the decision to patent a scientific discovery and take it forward to exploitation. By identifying the factors that promote and hinder patent exploitation this will assist Technology Transfer Offices in deciding which inventions to patent. The study uses qualitative methods incorporating a case study approach. The patent portfolio from the University of Strathclyde is used as the case study. Interviews with six directors of technology transfer offices in universities in Scotland and England were undertaken to understand the general process of commercialisation. Two samples of patents from the University of Strathclyde's patent portfolio, one comprising patents that were commercially exploited, and the other comprising unexploited patents, were examined in order to understand the different outcomes. Exploited patents included both those that were licensed to established and those that were used to start new spin-off companies. The study finds that whether a patent is commercially exploited, and way in which it is exploited is influenced by three factors: (i) the entrepreneurs and the inventors, their characteristics and motivations. (ii) the characteristics and nature of the technologies (scope, stage) (iii) the TTOs' lack of resources and a due diligence system. The study concludes with proposals for how TTOs can enhance their decision-making process regarding which discoveries to patent in order to improve the overall effectiveness of the commercialisation process in universities.

When a small, specialist higher education institution merged with a large university, both parties declared an interest in protecting the identity of the smaller institution. This thesis is concerned with the discursive (re)construction of the post-merger identity of that institution. It is informed by an appraisal of the policy context and a critical review of the literatures of mergers and acquisitions; organisational culture; organisational identity; and organisational discourse and stories. There is a tendency within mergers and acquisitions literature to concentrate on acquiring companies; to adopt a managerialist perspective; and to measure success in financial terms, This research focused instead on the acquired institution. Eschewing a managerialist perspective, stories were elicited from all those most closely affected by the merger, including staff, students, senior managers and governors. This thesis seeks to offer insights into human experiences of merger; to identify grounded criteria for evaluating success; and to locate the merger within wider socio-economic and political contexts. Findings from the analysis of twenty-nine semi-structured-interviews are presented as scripts for documentaries. Anonymised quotations from participants are interwoven with commentary from the researcher, to form new, plurivocal narratives. The audience anticipated is one familiar with the context and ready to engage with a scholarly approach. Conclusions are presented in an open letter to the Minister for Education and Skills in the Welsh Govemment. Discourses identified within the interviews are mapped on to a model which presents types of organisational culture found in universities (McNay, 1995). This opens up the possibility of accounting for the production and reproduction of the cultures, with their associated subject positions and forms of organisational identity. Lessons to be learned from analysis of the merger are elucidated, with a view to enriching the quality of debate about the future of higher education in Wales and beyond.

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The expansion and specialisation of 'non-academic' higher education roles, in response to increased regulation, monitoring and measurement of the sector, can be attributed to a rise in neoliberal manageralism and globalisation. Such changes have challenged the professional status of the academy, potentially 'de-professionalising' academic staff. This thesis explores the extent to which a concurrent professionalisation of administrative and managerial staff has occurred, and examines the case for higher education administration as a profession. Building on a conceptual framework linking the literatures of 'professionalism' and 'identity' with personal reflections and an examination of the role of the Association of University Administrators (AUA) as a representative body for university administrators, a qualitative analysis was undertaken with six UK higher education institutions, comprising in-depth interviews with 23 administrative/managerial staff. These were augmented by further indepth interviews: two with staff at the AUA; and three with internationally based administrative/managerial staff (two from Canada; one from Holland). The produced data, together with the conceptual framework, facilitated construction of a thematic, analytical model which enabled exploration of nomenclature, behaviours, perception, qualification, status, and structure(s), as elements of constructed professional identity. The findings reveal that higher education administrators/managers possess the necessary tools to construct an identity as a professional, but that they lack the collective selfconfidence to claim university administration as a profession. The study recommends that through the facilitated acquisition of 'academic empathy', increased sectoral and societal visibility, promotion of higher education administration as a career path, and the development of a strong and consistent public voice, it is possible to instil the collective selfconfidence necessary to proudly assert that university administration is a profession.

This research is at the intersection of strategic management, international business and internationalisation of higher education institutions (HEIs). It focuses on the managerial aspects of higher education institutions with offshore branch campuses. In the past couple of decades the number of offshore branch campuses established by HEIs - mainly universities - has increased dramatically, but most research carried out to date in this field has been anecdotal and the number of theoretical studies in this area is very limited. Thus, the aim of this research is to breach this gap by developing a theoretical framework that is capable of explaining the managerial aspects of foreign branch campus operations. The key research question in this study is how transnational higher education institutions (TNHEIs) strategically manage their offshore branch campuses. In order to address this question, the literature on TNHEIs with regard to managerial complexities is reviewed. By assimilating and reconceptualising this literature, a multidimensional framework is constructed, which encapsulates the most pertinent ramifications of managing an offshore branch campus. The framework has been constructed by drawing on a widely used paradigm in the international business discipline, known as the dichotomy of global integration versus local responsiveness (I-R dichotomy). It helps to portray the TNHEIs’ strategic positions and positional change strategies on three dimensions of curriculum, research activities and staffing.