Australian research productivity and top level research performance has risen, despite many universities sliding in last week’s Times Higher Education World University Rankings.
One of the world’s leading experts on research performance measurement, Curtin University Professor Cameron Neylon, said that the Leiden Open University rankings, also released to far less fanfare last week, demonstrated a more accurate picture of research performance.
“If improvements in the Times Higher Education rankings are part of your KPI’s, then it’s time to change your job,” Professor Neylon said.
“I mean it, seriously. If increasing your rank in the Times Higher is one of your KPIs, it should be taken out, because it’s not a useful KPI for university leadership in this country at this time.
“All I am seeing looking through these rankings is a bunch of small changes; none of which are statistically significant. They are lagging indicators, several years out of date.
“I am not saying ignore it, because (the THE ranking) does have a material effect on the way the university is perceived, but if the number (of the THE rank) is your KPI then A. You are playing a game your are bound to lose and B. You are also not guiding the university in the right strategic direction.”
Professor Neylon said there was clearly far more investment in university research in other countries, than in Australia, so our research performance would continue to decline relative to other nations, but that did not mean our research was going backwards. The Leiden ranking indicated that there had been a strong increase in research performance particularly among the ATN universities and positive improvements in research performance on average across the country – just at a lower rate of growth than in other countries with higher research investment.
In the absence of any Federal Government program to replace ERA to measure research performance, it appeared some people were latching onto the rankings as proof that Australian universities were in decline, but the sector was being presented with an opportunity to tell its own story in the vacuum that had been left behind.
While many DVC R’s around the country were thinking about ways to better measure and manage research performance, the issue appeared not to have risen on to the radar of Councils or the wider public, Professor Neylon said.
“In the absence of Government inaction to replace ERA, there are big opportunities for the sector to choose how to tell its own story about research performance, what should be measured and what matters.”
