Subjective Assessment of the Effective Contract Impact in Universities on Improving the Indicators of Lectures` Research Work

Article shows the results of a sociological survey aimed at studying the opinion of the teaching staff on the impact of an effective contract on improving the research work indicators in universities in Russia and Belarus. The survey analyzes foreign and Russian evaluation of academic staff performance. A cross-sectional (single-point) study was the design. The focus of research was the academic staff of educational institutions that went over to an effective contract (Northern State Medical University, Russia) and without the implementation of an effective contract (Tobolsk Pedagogical Institute named after D. I. Mendeleev (branch) the University of Tyumen, Russia; National Institute for Higher Education and Belarusian State Pedagogical University named after Maxim Tank, Belarus), the overall number of respondents is 395. A semi-structured questionnaire created by the National Research University Higher School of Economics was used as a tool for sociological research. The study showed that both study groups are aware of an effective contract purpose and criteria evaluation frequency. Respondents from universities without an effective contract receive information from the Internet and have overestimated expectations of the future income level. Respondents of both groups underlined the importance of determining the greatest weight in calculating incentive payments for publication and grant activity, participation in scientific conferences. When implementing an effective contract, not all lecturers are ready to fulfill the criteria for research work, but they note the positive effect of its implementation on the indicators of scientific activity. In the group of respondents without an effective contract, one third expressed doubts about the significant impact of the implementation of an effective contract on improving the performance of research work. This article will be useful to the management of universities when calculating weighting coefficients according to indicators and criteria for evaluating the activities of the teaching staff for the appointment of incentive payments. An interesting study in the future may be a comparison of subjective assessments obtained in universities without an effective contract, and after its implementation in the same universities.