A risk culture maturity framework for the South African public higher education sector

Abstract

Timely, perhaps, this study is completed as the country inches closer to the threshold of marking 30 years of democracy. Expectedly, whilst celebrating the milestones achieved over the last three decades, South Africans’ reflections will also focus on challenges engulfing the higher education sector. Specific, amongst those challenges, is how to elevate this critical sector, which serves as a reservoir of innovative thinking and undeterrable explorative co-solution-seeking, onto a more competitive plane. Hence, the theory of transitions served as a point of departure for this research study. The purpose of this study was to contribute towards deepening risk culture within public HEIs, and doing so through developing a risk culture maturity framework that incorporates key phases of a typical higher education institution value chain. Broader than enterprise risk management, the framework incorporates strategic management, institutional culture, external environmental scanning, and touches on both management and oversight structures. Significant about the study is the fact that it recognises the crucial role played by HEIs in relation to the socioeconomic transformation of societies that such HEIs serve. Necessarily, enhanced organisational agility, in the midst of a highly competitive landscape, enables these HEIs have to strengthen their sense of relevance to the market. Tapping on a mixed-research methodology, both a quantitative content analysis and in-depth interviews were conducted on six case studies. Thus, serving as a basis for the research results, and leading to the development of the risk culture maturity framework. In terms of main findings emanating from the study, it’s a paradox. Despite higher education institutions being centres of learning, hosting experts in the fields of enterprise risk management and organisational strategy, including institutional culture, leadership dynamics, and organisational agility, charity does not begin at home. Despite public HEIs’ keen interest in initiatives such as international university rankings, collaborations at both local and global platforms, their learning organisation posture seems inadequate. Despite priding themselves of expert analysts and/or the finest researchers who are amid their staff complement, public higher education institutions remain largely oblivious to some of the key emerging trends shaping the competitive external environment. Finally, informed by the literature review and reflective perspectives of research participants, the last chapter touches on some of the contributions the study brings, viz. to the body of knowledge, to practice, and to the transitions theory which is the lens through which the study was conducted. The study then points to 4 areas of future research, viz. the possibility of private HEIs turning out to be Black Elephants, in terms of risk; the feasibility of Councils elevating their bar; the influence of HEIs on the ERM landscape; and how the notion of continuous improvement plays itself out.