Getting "There": Understanding How Innovation and Entrepreneurship Become Part of Engineering Education

The investments made to change engineering education in the US are immense, as anyone who has perused NSF’s annual reports quickly realizes. As Giersch notes (2014), significant change requires attention to at least two dimensions: equipping individual faculty with effective tools and approaches, and working on an institutional level to scale and sustain improvement. How to operationalize this conceptual understanding is still elusive, however – both individuals and organizations tend to resist change, and the prospect of doing both simultaneously is daunting. This paper presents the results of new research on a national network of universities engaged in an effort to embed innovation and entrepreneurship in undergraduate engineering education, in an attempt to “look under the hood” at the process of change. While innovation and entrepreneurship serves as the primary lens for this research, the lessons learned may be of value to engineering education transformation more generally, and perhaps also to transformation in other disciplines. Previous articles examining the work of this network have summarized the types of activities that have been initiated at the institutions; this paper will update that information and move beyond to examine the work of change itself, with particular focus on these dimensions: • Change as a team effort: How do team size and composition impact the effectiveness of transformation initiatives? How can teams organize their work to maximize their chances of success? • Leading change: How do leaders of teams working in these initiatives approach their work? Are there particular leadership attributes or attitudes that can accelerate change? • The context of change: What impact do institutional context factors, such as college or university leadership transitions, have on engineering education transformation efforts? In addition to presenting the results of research currently underway, the paper will suggest areas in which additional research is needed. The research presented here is not focused on the ways in which innovation or entrepreneurship are or should be taught – only with the question of how I&E offerings become embedded in the engineering education experience. Introduction As the Greek philosopher Heraclitus proclaimed, “change is the only constant.” In an increasingly complex global market, organizations are driven to change for survival and success (Isaksen & Lauer, 2002). Higher education institutions experience the same pressures to continually evolve in response to internal and external demands. The number of enrollments in higher education is on the rise, and students and faculty are travelling further in search of new experiences and opportunities for impact (Ashwin, 2015). A recent report also shows that students themselves are changing: The “non-traditional” student (e.g., working full-time, delayed entry to college, financially independent) is now the majority category of student enrolled in a university (American Council on Education, 2015). Yet another important factor is that the growing number of universities and the impact that technology has had on the way education is constructed and delivered, has made for a competitive environment in higher education (Staley & Trinkle, 2011). Given all this, universities must look towards innovations that will enable their own survival and success while meeting the needs of students and faculty. These innovations may be at a grand scale, such as instituting a new strategic mission, or they may be smaller initiatives, such as cultivating a new culture within a department. One such development is the proliferation of offerings in innovation & entrepreneurship (I&E) in schools of engineering as well as universitywide. These range from single workshops or courses to extensive degree programs and start-up incubators. While the growth trend is clear (the growth of the engineering entrepreneurship division of ASEE itself is one indicator), not yet understood are the factors that enable or hinder successful efforts – in I&E, and even more generally in higher education. Existing research In examining efforts at universities seeking to embed I&E in their programming, we explore three critical considerations for the management of change in the university setting. First, we consider change as a team effort. As the primary vehicle through which organizations accomplish most of their goals, universities also look towards teams to generate innovative ideas that promote growth and change for the university. One basic consideration in the context of teams is how the composition of the team impacts the management of change. Second, we consider the leadership of change. Team members rely on their leaders for influence, guidance, and support (Amabile, Schatzel, Moneta, & Kramer, 2004; Zaccaro, Rittman, & Marks, 2001). Leaders must have the capacity to champion change for their teams and ensure effectiveness in the midst of change (Gill, 2002; Graetz, 2000). However, leadership need not be singular or even a formal role in teams; sharing in leadership responsibilities throughout change may be critical in ensuring effectiveness (Carson, Tesluk, & Marrone, 2007; Pearce & Conger, 2003). Third, we consider the context of change. Although universities have multiple defined leadership structures, they are best understood as complex networks, in which change must be mediated through multiple relationships at multiple levels in the institution. In the same way that organizational culture (Schneider, Ehrhart, Mayer, Saltz, & Niles-Jolly, 2005) and structure (Silverman, 2012) can impact lower level activities, within the university as a whole, there are factors that pervade (e.g., university or college leadership), which have the potential to impact change efforts attempted within smaller facets of the university. Change as a Team Effort Many – if not most changes in organizational settings are not executed and developed by individuals, but by teams (Coghlan, 1994). Individuals that work together to problem solve have the potential to generate new and better ideas (Wuchty, Jones, & Uzzi, 2007) through the enhanced pool of knowledge that comes from different people on team (Horwitz & Horwitz, 2007). However, beyond simply putting together a team, one factor that contributes to the breadth of available knowledge is the team’s diversity. When team members come from different areas of expertise or backgrounds, members have access not only to those individuals’ reservoirs of knowledge and experience, but also to those individuals’ external networks of knowledge and experience (Perry-Smith & Shalley, 2014; Reagans, Zuckerman, & McEvily, 2004). Therefore, teams stand to benefit when they can diversify their membership. Within a university there are at least two key sources of diversity for teams that are attempting to institute change. The first is gender diversity. There is a skewed distribution of women in higher education (STEM fields in particular; (Beede et al., 2011; Shih, 2006). Within engineering specifically, only 22% of faculty are women (Gibbons, 2011), and women are thus less likely to be part of any change efforts. However, research suggests that women can greatly contribute to innovation (Bear & Woolley, 2011), and enable more effective teams (Woolley, Chabris, Pentland, Hashmi, & Malone, 2010). Therefore, when endeavoring to develop innovative ways of instituting change, women may be key players. Therefore, we predict the following: H1: Teams that include women will be more effective than teams without women. The second source of diversity comes from the knowledge held by the members. There are important differences between the faculty and staff at a university in terms of experience, education, and functional expertise. These differences allow for individuals to take different perspectives on issues that enable the team be more creative (Horwitz & Horwitz, 2007). Given the interdependence between faculty and staff, creating change that involves both groups will lead to change efforts that are more inclusive, and more accepted. Therefore, we predict: H2: Teams that include both faculty and staff will be more effective than teams without this source of diversity. The Leadership of Change Understanding how leaders manage the change process in their team is foundational for instituting effective change. Because leaders are viewed as having the most significant influence among members, it is often seen as incumbent upon the leadership to champion change (Kotter, 1995). This begs the question: which leadership styles are more effective for the acceleration of change? In a teamwork context, we turn to understanding how a leader’s manner of interacting with others may influence effective change. Social styles refer to individuals’ observable patterns of behavior when interacting with others (Merrill & Reid, 1981). An individual’s social style has two dimensions. Assertiveness refers to an individual’s influence over others, whereas responsiveness refers to a person’s display of emotions towards others. Individuals can thus be classified into four categories, as shown in Figure 1: expressives (high assertiveness and responsiveness), drivers (high assertiveness, low responsiveness), amiables (low assertiveness, high responsiveness), and analyticals (low assertiveness, low responsiveness). Figure 1: Social Styles The type of style a leader employs may impact how change efforts are developed within a team, and there may not be one style that “fits all”, but rather, the interaction between a leader’s social style and the context may be critical (Hackman & Wageman, 2007). By considering leadership in context, we may better understand whether some styles of leadership are more effective than others. Therefore, in exploring leader social styles, we pose the following research question: Are some leadership styles better than others when initiating and promoting