validation of the model of cultural competencies of Iranian higher education managers

Subject Areas : Education

vahidreza ghamari ¹ , narges saeidian khorasghani ² , ali rashidpoor ³

1 - PhD student in educational management, Isfahan Islamic Azad University (Khorasgan), Isfahan, Iran
2 - Academic staff member of the Department of Educational Management, Isfahan Islamic Azad University (Khorasgan), Isfahan, Iran, (corresponding author)
3 - Member of the academic staff of the Department of Management and Planning of Cultural Affairs, Isfahan Islamic Azad University (Khorasgan), Isfahan, Iran

Received: 2023-01-06 Accepted : 2023-02-12 Published : 2024-08-22

Keywords: higher education, managers, cultural competences,

Abstract :

Introduction and purpose: By creating a model to identify, promote and measure the cultural competence of managers in the country's universities, it is possible to achieve solutions to strengthen these competences and ultimately improve the performance of higher education centers and institutions in Iran. The purpose of this research was to validate the model of cultural competencies of managers of higher education in Iran.

Research methodology: The research method was of mixed type. In the qualitative section, an exploratory approach was used with Atride-Sterling theme analysis strategy. The scope of the research in the qualitative section was 24 books and 120 articles (32 foreign articles and 88 domestic articles). The data were analyzed in the qualitative section through three stages of qualitative coding (basic, organizing and comprehensive). A survey research method was used using a researcher-made questionnaire based on qualitative findings. The content validity of the questionnaire was done by subject experts and face validity. The statistical population includes the directors of higher education in the country, whose number was 6769 at the time of the research, and 369 of them were As the members of the statistical sample, they were selected by random sampling. Descriptive and inferential statistics and confirmatory factor analysis (using SPSS21 and Amos version 26 software) were used to analyze quantitative data.

The findings of the research led to the identification and confirmation of the extracted themes of the cultural competence of the managers of 182 basic themes, with comprehensive themes in the five domains of cultural skills (with 3 organizing themes and 57 basic themes), cultural knowledge (with 3 organizing themes and 33 basic themes) ), cultural awareness (with 3 organizing themes and 31 basic themes), cultural interactions (with 2 organizing themes and 36 basic themes) and cultural tendencies (with 4 organizing themes and 25 basic themes) were identified. The results showed that the extracted model has high internal validity. It is necessary to provide a suitable practical model in the selection and appointment of higher education administrators in order to achieve the cultural competence of Iran's higher education administrators by knowing the effective factors.