Does excellence have a gender?. A national research study on recruitment and selection procedures for professorial appointments in The Netherlands
| Date | 01 November 2006 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/01425450610704470 |
| Published date | 01 November 2006 |
| Pages | 523-539 |
| Author | Marieke van den Brink,Margo Brouns,Sietske Waslander |
| Subject Matter | HR & organizational behaviour |
Does excellence have a gender?
A national research study on recruitment and
selection procedures for professorial
appointments in The Netherlands
Marieke van den Brink, Margo Brouns and Sietske Waslander
University of Groningen, Faculty of Behavioural and Social Sciences,
Groningen, The Netherlands
Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this research is to show that upward mobility of female academics in
regular selection procedures is evolving extremely slowly, especially in The Netherlands. This paper
aims at a more profound understanding of professorial recruitment and selection procedures in
relation to gender differences at Dutch universities.
Design/methodology/approach – This paper explores the recruitment of university professors as
a gendered process and is mainly based on the analysis of selection committee reports between
1999-2003 from six large Dutch universities (n¼682).
Findings – The research findings give a clear indication of gender differences in selection and
recruitment procedures. Although not in all disciplines, the paper observes a disparity in the
percentages of male and female applicants who were successful in the selection procedure. There is no
confirmation of the predicted relationship with the nature of the procedure (open/closed), but there is a
correlation with the number of women on the committee.
Research limitations/implications – As it was not possible to make any pronouncements about
the quality of the applicants, a strict measurement of gender bias is not possible.
Practical implications – The results show that academic disciplines are gendered in a different
way, requiring different measures at the institutional and individual levels.
Originality/value – This is the first paper on recruitment and selection procedures that takes into
account disciplinary differences and factors such as the number of applicants for each professorship
and the recruitment potential by gender.
Keywords Universities,Recruitment, Selection, Gender,Discipline, Academic staff, TheNetherlands
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
In recent years the measurement of academic excellence and the use of particular
performance indicators have been subjects of heated debate in the international
academic community (Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW,
2005)). Academic excellence is fundamentally difficult to define. There is a general
consensus that excellence is not a “universal fact” or “natural given” and that it would
be misleading to treat it as a simple, easily measurable attribute, such as height or
speed (Brouns and Addis, 2004). As a result, it is susceptible to many kinds of bias.
Different aspects of the measurement of academic excellence have been criticized by
many scholars – for example, the criteria (Rees, 2004), the peer review system
(Horrobin, 1990; Jefferson, 2002; Lawrence, 2003; Wennera
˚s and Wold, 1997) and
recruitment and selection procedures (Benschop and Brouns, 2003; Cole et al., 2004;
Husu, 2000).
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/0142-5455.htm
Does excellence
have a gender?
523
Employee Relations
Vol. 28 No. 6, 2006
pp. 523-539
qEmerald Group Publishing Limited
0142-5455
DOI 10.1108/01425450610704470
In this paper we examine the academic recruitment and selection practices for full
professors, the most influential people in academia. The way in which new professors
are recruited has far-reaching consequences in terms of the research carried out, what
is valued, what paid little attention, and what is left to the “maverick”. There are
indications that academic recruitment and selection processes are gendered, from the
drafting of the profile (often with a male candidate in mind) and the assessment of
(gendered) academic qualifications of applicants, to the interviewing of applicants by
selection committees usually made up of male peers with co-optation rights, with sex
stereotypes and similar-to-me effects implicitly governing conversations (Benschop
and Brouns, 2003; Fogelberg et al., 1999).
This paper explores the recruitment of university professors as a gendered process
and is based on an analysis of committee reports at six large Dutch universities
(n¼936). In its reportto the dean, the selection committee in mostcases provides details
of the procedure followed and the reasons for its recommendations. The research took
place between November 2004 and June 2005, and our aim was to look at differences in
successful applications by male and female candidates for professorial positions. Our
principal question was: Is there a difference between successful applicationsby male and
female candidates for professorial appointments at a general and/or disciplinary level?
On the basis of literature research, we have formulated two premises to explain gender
differences in the number of recently appointed full professors (see below for an
extensive description). Firstly, the nature of the procedures might influence women’s
chances in appointment procedures. We expect women to be more successful in open
competitions forprofessorships than in more closed and restricted procedures. Secondly,
the composition of the selection committee might influence women’s chances in
appointment procedures. However, we do not know in what way it influences women’s
chances; the existing literature is not univocal about the advantage for women.
The paper opens with a description of the current state of affairs; we will see that no
extensive literature is available on recruitment practices in academia. In the second
section, we expand our premises and in the third we discuss the research methodology.
We continue by presenting the results of our empirical analyses, revealing the success
rates of male and female applicants and testing our hypotheses. We discuss our
findings in the final section.
Recruitment and evaluation in academia
Recruitment has been analysed as a key process for understanding the reproduction of
gender segregation and discrimination in the labour market and within organizations
(e.g. Curran, 1988; Collinson et al., 1990; Harris, 2002; Reskin and Roos, 1990; Teigen,
2002). Recruitment and evaluation procedures for academic positions and grants have
also been the object of study (Steinpreis et. al., 1999; Wennera
˚s and Wold, 1997;
Lindberg et al., 2003). However, few have focused on the actual process of recruiting
new staff in order to understand the reproduction of the gender order in academia.
Well-known studies, such as that by Wennera
˚s and Wold (1997), have emphasized the
outcome of the peer review process, not the process itself. While there have bee n some
studies on selection procedures in academia in The Netherlands, they have focused
primarily on the selection interview (Van Vianen, 1987).
Wenneras and Wold’s renowned investigation of gender bias in the selection of
research proposals and applicants was a starting point for many other studies on
ER
28,6
524
To continue reading
Request your trial