How the corporate model is changing higher education

The corporate model has spread through higher education. Universities now talk about performance, targets, branding, and measurable outcomes. Senior administrators are expected to think like executives. Consultants advise on restructuring and efficiency. But does this borrowing make sense or does it change what a university is for? Professional administration is not the problem. Universities are large organisations that need financial discipline and sound planning. The real question is why should the logic of a corporation become the model for an institution whose purpose is the creation and questioning of knowledge?

A corporation and a university are built around different goals. A corporation exists to create economic value, usually measured in revenue, growth, or market position. A university, on the other hand, teaches, conducts research, preserves knowledge, and prepares people for society. Many of its outcomes cannot be identified when the work is done. Can you measure the value of a question before anyone has answered it?

Take research, for instance. A company wants research that produces a useful product. A university must also permit research whose value is not yet visible. A historical question or a theoretical argument may take decades to create impact, if it ever does. How can an institution know in advance which questions will turn out to be important? Corporate decisions usually follow short cycles of performance. A university has to think in decades. A scholar may need years to build real expertise. A research project may take 10 years to mature. A teacher’s influence on a student may not show itself until long after graduation. A system built around immediate, measurable returns will struggle to recognise such work.

Room for failure

Now, look at how failure is treated in these spaces. A corporation tries to avoid unsuccessful investments because resources must generate returns. A university cannot work the same way. Intellectual work carries uncertainty by design. A hypothesis can be wrong. A student can make an argument that fails and still learn something from it. A scholar can challenge an accepted position and be mistaken. If every activity must show a predictable outcome, what happens to the willingness to take an intellectual risk?

There is also a huge difference in how these two relate to authority. A corporation needs people who work towards shared goals. A university needs people who can question those goals and the assumptions behind them. Academic freedom exists for this reason: knowledge cannot be produced through agreement alone. Naturally, therefore, “efficiency” becomes a complicated word inside a university. It is useful when it clears away unnecessary bureaucracy. But can it really serve as the organising principle of academic life? A seminar with six students looks less efficient than a lecture to 200. A researcher may spend months on a question that produces no immediate publication. A department may keep a course with low enrolment because it teaches something unavailable elsewhere. Efficiency alone cannot judge any of this.

The problem accentuates when students are viewed as customers. A customer buys a service and expects satisfaction. A student is supposed to be challenged. Good education does not always give a student what they initially want. It may require difficult reading, unfamiliar ideas, and sustained effort. Should a university’s responsibility really be limited to customer satisfaction?

The biggest problem with the corporate model is that it pushes universities to turn complex purposes into indicators: rankings, publications, citations, and enrolment numbers. These can be informative but, once they become goals in themselves, they start to decide what the university values. What can be counted assumes greater importance than what is hard to count. This is especially damaging for fields such as Philosophy, Literature, and History, whose value does not show up as an immediate commercial return. Their contribution lies in helping people interpret society and examine their own assumptions. If the same managerial lens judges every discipline, some of the university’s own purposes will always come out looking unimportant.

Of course, this does not mean rejecting Management altogether. Universities need competent administrators, transparent systems, and responsible use of resources. They can learn from business practices that genuinely help. But borrowing administrative tools is not the same as adopting a business philosophy. One can strengthen a university. The other can change what the university believes it exists to do. In today’s market-driven world, it is worth remembering that a university does not become more modern simply by adopting the language of business. Its central question should remain distinct: not only how efficiently it runs, but also what kind of knowledge it should create, what kind of education it should offer, and what kind of society it should help people build.

The writer is former professor and dean, Christ University, Bengaluru.