Predicting the Emerging Organizational Structure of the 21st Century American University: Lessons from the U.S. Hospital Experience

Abstract

Higher education faces challenges to its core paradigms, a scenario that has existed in the hospital industry since the 1980s. In response, hospitals developed new structures, radically altering health care. Parallels between these industries are striking, both worlds influenced by institutional theory and dominated by highly educated, specialized practitioners wed more to their professions than their organizations. This paper proposes that the hospital experience provides guidance for an evolving 21st century higher education process, predicting that current silo-mentality structures will evolve into models characterized by major curricular reform, inter-organizational asset sharing, and network development that optimizes a dwindling resource base.