Identification and analysis of the profile of the managers of accountancy courses in the states of São Paulo and Santa Catarina

Abstract

The expansion of higher education, the greater external control through assessments and the regulation resulting from the Law on Guidelines and Bases of Education, combined with the use of technology, challenge the higher education institutions to develop an effective management. Managers are those who have to respond to these challenges. Coordinators of undergraduate courses must perform tasks and activities in order to keep the institution competitive vis-à-vis internal and external environmental pressures. The article identifies and analyzes the profile as well as the intra-entrepreneurial characteristics and actions of managers of accountancy courses in the states of Santa Catarina and São Paulo. This is a descriptive research project in the form of a survey. A questionnaire adapted from Walter et al. (2007), which is based in Mastella (2005) and in Dornelas (2003), was used for the collection of data. The main findings show that the managers are male and have a degree in accountancy. Moreover, their job as managers is their main activity. In terms of actions, they have little interaction with the surroundings of the undergraduate course as well as a rather internal and endogenous view in which operational activities related to the students’ and teachers’ needs predominate. They have an intra-entrepreneurial profile according to the criteria of Dornelas (2003), and their main difficulties are related to risk-taking, which Meyer Jr. (2000) and Kurako et al. (1993) consider an important intra-entrepreneurial trait.

Key words: intra-entrepreneurial profile, course managers, higher education.