Indonesian Higher Education
Building Leader Competencies towards World Class Quality
Dyah Kusumastuti and Sri Astuti Pramaningsih
Widyatama University, Bandung, Indonesia
Keywords: Effective Leadership, World Class, Higher Education, Competencies.
Abstract: Global competitive advantages have shifted from cheap manufacturing to managing knowledge. If Indonesia
wishes to partake in this 21st century competition, it will have to revolutionize its knowledge industry. Pivotal
in this is the effective leadership and management of its higher education institutions (HEIs). The issue is that
Indonesian HEIs have been shackled by practices that prevent creativity and innovation, the very
characteristics needed to effectively manage knowledge. The research reported here aims to identify
competencies that would meet the requirements above and then seek if Indonesia has such HEIs leaderships.
This would allow appropriate conclusion to be derived in respect of upgrading HEIs’ leaderships across the
country. Extensive literature survey was conducted to identify those competencies recognized by global
leadership experts. Seven Indonesian HEIs listed in QS and Ministry of Research, Technology and Higher
Education rankings and 40 of their leadership level officials are chosen as sample to gauge the current status
in this respect. Statistical data processing is used in analyzing survey responses from the sample. The results
identified 15 competencies grouped into three clusters of dealing with Self, with People and with Job. From
the survey of the sample of Indonesian HEIs’ leaders, it is found that serious and extensive leadership training
for HEIs’ leaders in Indonesia is urgently needed.
1 INTRODUCTION
Economic priorities underscore the development of
any nation and in its competitiveness in securing a
share of the world markets for its products and
services (Porter and Kramer, 2002). Natural resources
and cheap labour no longer provide advantage as
shown by the constant motion of manufacturing
locations of world brands. This has a direct effect on
the kind of human capital formed in the country.
Therefore, education, particularly higher education
leaderships need to understand the consequences of
such inevitable changes and thus prepare themselves
and their institutions accordingly.
Various models of excellence in higher education
exist with World Class University (WCU) being
quoted frequently although no consensus on its
definition subsists (Salmi, 2009). Nevertheless no
excellence is achievable without synchronized and
well-coordinated team work led by effective leaders.
Higher Education with its pervasive societal
impacts is no exception to this requirement. Historical
reality in Indonesia however (Suryadarma and Jones,
2013) prevented potential HEI leaders to be
developed until now. In the meantime HEI
management the world over continues to evolve.
Indonesia therefore needs to develop such leadership
in an accelerated fashion. This study is an attempt to
assist in that direction by identifying competencies
that make effective leaders in HEIs and assess by
sampling a number of Indonesian HEIs, the exacting
path to be taken.
Historic misfortunes (Kusumastuti, 2015;
Suryadarma and Jones, 2013) had succumbed
Indonesian education chronically to a pedagogy of
rote learning or learning by memorization. This is an
antithesis to the 21st century requirements for critical
thinking, creativity and innovation (Idrus, Ng, and
Jee, 2014). There has also been an explosion of
technology application in education and Indonesia’s
economic level precluded a foray into it. Against such
debilitating background Indonesia being a big
country with the fourth largest population in the
world also faces profound challenges in modernizing
its education and higher education (Nuffic,
2015).There are more than 4000 HEIs across the
archipelago of about 5000 KMS across and many
more basic and secondary schools micro-managed
Kusumastuti, D. and Pramaningsih, S.
Indonesian Higher Education - Building Leader Competencies towards World Class Quality.
In Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on Islamic Economics, Business, and Philanthropy (ICIEBP 2017) - Transforming Islamic Economy and Societies, pages 473-477
ISBN: 978-989-758-315-5
Copyright © 2018 by SCITEPRESS – Science and Technology Publications, Lda. All rights reserved
473

centrally causing substantial discrepancies between
curriculum and regional needs until recently
(Suryadarma and Jones, 2013).
All these together caused subservient mentality
generally but detrimentally in education. Leadership
in things other than what the government approved
was frowned upon. Therefore all those qualities
demanded of HEIs’ leadership now did not exist and
if they did few if any would overtly reveal it. That this
had gone on for a very long time, it therefore becomes
an exceedingly challenging cultural problem to
address.
It is timely therefore to find out the characteristics
and competencies required of those who lead such
changes in HEIs and whether there are already such
leaders in Indonesian HEIs. This is the gist of the
research reported here.
The implication of this study is extremely
important in developing Indonesian HEI leaders so
that they internalize the characteristics and
competencies that have been found favorable in
hauling-up higher education (HE) in the country
towards better global recognition.
Given the rapid technological development
especially in information technology HEIs’ leaders
will also need to be reasonably flexible to be able to
anticipate the future that is and increasingly becoming
unpredictable.
In addition HE is unique among professions in
that it deals with animate raw materials in its
processes and produces animate and expectedly
knowledgeable and thinking outcome that will
influence policies, decisions and even the survival of
communities and nations.
As a result HEIs must inevitably be led by those
who have special qualities to allow them and the
people within them achieve the desired results. It is
found that preferred HEIs’ leaders would have
academic as well as management skills and
experience (Boyatzis, 2009; Boyatzis, Smith, Van
Oosten, and Woolford, 2013; Brooks and Normore,
2010; Caliguiri, 2006; Porter and Kramer, 2002;
Spendlove, 2007).
2 LITERATURE REVIEW
Understanding the competence of Higher Education
Institution leaders about globalization, that every
concept is globalization where leaders must keep
abreast of HEI, this will be very meaningful for the
new generation. So leaders must embrace global
competencies so that HEI to be relevant for 21st
century need to have competencies with moral,
pedagogy, information, organizational, economic,
cultural and financial reflection (Normore, Brooks,
and Silva, 2016).
According to Boyatzis (2009) Emotional-Social
Competencies Intelligence includes 4 main
competencies are as follows:
2.1 Emotional Intelligence
Competencies
2.1.1 Self-Awareness
Understanding one's strengths, weaknesses,
limitations, values, and motives. Individuals who are
self-aware are truthful about themselves and realistic
about achievement. The self- awareness contain s
Competency Emotional self- awareness: recognizing
one’s emotions and their effects.
2.1.2 Self-Management
The ability to control feelings, facilitate mental
clarity, and provide controlled energy. The self-
management contains Emotional Self Control,
Adaptability, Achievement orientation and Positive
outlook.
2.2 Social Intelligence Competencies,
Contains
2.2.1 Social Awareness
The ability to empathy and understanding of others,
awareness and the ability of the organization to serve
the needs of others, including adjusting to the feelings
of others and easily approachable others. Social
Awareness contains Empathy and organizational
awareness.
2.2.2 Relationship Management
Concerns the skill at inducing desirable responses in
others. This ability includes influencing, inspiring
and developing others, including change management
and conflict management and creating teamwork.
2.3 Resonant Leadership Theory
Resonant leader. Being ‘‘resonant’’ means being in
tune or in sync with others around you. She engages
people around her, those reporting to her and others.
They feel it and respond in kind, sparking an
environment of open dialogue, mutual respect and
ICIEBP 2017 - 1st International Conference on Islamic Economics, Business and Philanthropy
474

trust (Boyatzis et al., 2013; Goleman, Boyatzis, and
Mckee, 2002).
By definition resonance is a condition where
amplitudes are maximized through superimposition
of interacting (sound) waves. The term Resonant
Leadership was introduced) used this definition to
illustrate similar facilitative interactions between a
leader and her/his followers that maximize the
beneficial impacts for the organization, the leader and
the individuals. In order to achieve it is only evident
that the leader should be empathetic, motivational,
has a high emotional intelligence and communication
skills to enthuse her/his followers/staff towards
her/his strategic plans and directions in such a way
that they assume ownership of the plans and keen to
see them successful. This leadership is highly
relevant to HE due to the nature of academics who are
normally already self-motivated but also normally
work in isolation. A resonant leader would be able to
superimpose his positive traits on those of the
academics’ to form a formidable unit that should
maximize the HEI’s performance.
The vision becomes essential in resonant
leadership creating a culture of change and positive
difference bringing independent and organizational
growth.
Individuals who are passionate about what they
are doing, send out messages that others around can
intuitively sense and process. Actions such as
excitement, hard work, and dedication become a
template that leaders can use to build resonance with
those around them. Resonance becomes a way of
life as opposed to an abstract goal; people
demonstrate obvious, tangible care and concern for
one another and at the same time, they are direct and
hold each other accountable for getting the job done.
This style of leadership becomes necessary in
organizations where leaders promote growth and
change. Expectations become high for both the leader
and the follower and eventually, this contributes to
the success of the organization.
A comprehensive definition of
internationalization was given by Knight (1999) as a
process that integrates international dimension into
learning function, research and organizational
services. Therefore in the attempt towards WCU,
university leaders also need to be inspirational,
visionary, possess a philosophy of success and
excellence, culture of constant reflections, strategic
plans that translate vision to realistic programs and
targets and beliefs in learning organizations that
change with shifting opportunities.
The successful leader will at least need to be
creative, innovative, self-informed, empathically, a
good communicator, experienced in general
management as well as in higher education
management, in teaching, learning and research.
Given the inexorable technology development all
leaders will also need to be aware and able to evaluate
those technologies that could affect any aspects
without the need to become an IT expert themselves.
Contemporary views of competence entail
“notions of active citizenship, innovative
communication and information technologies, critical
thinking, and linguistic and cultural diversity”
(Kusumastuti, 2012). Competencies are
characteristics related to knowledge, attitudes,
dispositions, and behaviour, native or acquired, which
indicate an individual’s ability in a given area. These
are needed to effectively perform in a role. Core
competencies are prerequisites for all role profiles
while specific competencies are required for some
role profiles.
3 METHODOLOGY
There are two interrelated phases carried out in this
investigation, namely, a literature survey on
leadership and competencies of effective leaders, and
gathering and analysing responses on a questionnaire
distributed to a sample of 40 leaders from seven
selected HEIs in Indonesia.
The ordinal questionnaire was designed with each
identified competency being asked at three levels.
Then in distribution to seven selected universities
with University Leaders respondents, Dean and Head
of department.
From the results of the questionnaire selected the
needs of popular competence in statistics for top
leader university. It is expected that the sample would
provide the current status of Indonesian HEIs’
leaders’ competencies which could then be measured
against what are required in order to establish gaps
that need to be addressed. The sample HEIs is
selected by virtue of their favourable rankings in Q-
Star 2014 and in the Indonesian National HEIs
rankings.
4 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
The study results indicate that HEI leaders need to
have 15 competencies under three ability sets in
Dealing with Self, with People and with Job as shown
in Table 1.
Indonesian Higher Education - Building Leader Competencies towards World Class Quality
475

Table 1: Leadership competencies requirement in HEI.
Competencies
Dealing with Self Dealing with
People
Dealing
with Job
Self Awareness
(
SA
)
Teamwork (TW)
Planning
(
PL
)
Self-Management
(SM)
Communication
(CO)
Execution
(EX)
Personal Mastery
(PM)
Conflict
Management (CM)
Improving
Organization
(IO)
Adaptability (AD)
Managing People
and Coaching (MP)
Manageme
nt System
(MT)
Creative Thinking
(CT)
Self Confidence
(SC)
Entrepreneu
rship (ET)
Source: Research Data.
Table 2: Competency and behavior description for strategic
level.
1. Self Awareness. Shown knowing self, understanding
limitations of self, calculating effects of self on others,
controlling self, able to articulating objectives, values
embraced, adopting positive outlook, using instincts in
decision making.
2.Self-Management : Showing positive behaviors,
expressing care, maintaining calmness under pressure,
ca
p
a
b
le to utilize othe
r
s’ talents an
d
a
b
ilities
3.Personal Mastery : Creating avenues and means for
exchanges of information, knowledge, skills, expertise,
learning, experiences among stakeholders involved in
the or
g
anization
4.Adaptability: Creates strategy within changes
5.Creative Thinking:
Creating a vision for the future and developing a
framework to achieve it. Inspiring creative thinking. Able
to reframe problems to allow others to see the problems
from different perspectives. Conducting breakthroughs
towa
r
d excellent o
r
g
anizational
p
e
r
fo
r
m
ance
6.Teamwork: Creates collaborative policies toward
national achievement and conducive environment for
coo
p
e
r
ation an
d
tea
m
wo
r
k
7.Communication: Develop open communication
culture, two-way communication, communicating mutual
vision, take advantages of media to communicate with
im
p
acts to all le
v
els within an
d
outsi
d
e the o
r
g
anization.
8.Conflict Management : Offer alternative solutions and
thei
r
conse
q
uences
9.Managing People and Coaching : Create a lifelong
learning culture in the organization; develop talent pool
lea
d
e
r
shi
p
at all le
v
els; c
r
eate a knowle
d
g
e culture.
10.Self Confidence: Confident as speaker in meetings
at HEI’s
11. Planning: Effectively manage progress towards
achieving o
r
ganizational ta
r
gets
12.Execution:Mobilize HEI’s asset, exploit new
technolo
gy
to
r
aise ca
p
a
b
ilit
y
13.Improving Organization: Create adaptive climate to
ensu
r
eo
r
ganizational
r
egeneration
14.HE Managemnet System: Establish a management
s
y
ste
m
fo
r
a
q
uality HEI
15.Entrepreneurship:Create an entrepreneurship
en
v
i
r
on
m
ent at the HEI.
Source: Research Data.
This analysis further found that major
discrepancies occur in six competencies namely
Though the university leader (Rektor in
Indonesia) is pivotal in an attempt to bring the
university towards global recognition, given HEIs’
predominant service nature, leadership of
departments is equally important at their narrower
scopes. Therefore, analyses similar to that done for
university leaders will need to be conducted for each
of the departments to assess the Job-Person
competencies ‘fit’s and identify the critical
competencies.
While the study shows that competence levels and
discrepancies can be statistically analyzed, the sample
size of HEIs and the consequent number of
respondents are small and limited only to the
country’s best HEIs. As a result, enhancement of the
study will need to be done with more HEIs and
respondents. Perhaps a series of HEIs groups be
selected from the best, medium and worst HEIs so
that information will be available about the worst
situation of Indonesian HEIs in respect of
competencies held by their respective leaders. This
information will help in designing more appropriate
training programs.
The question remains however on whether
Indonesian HEIs’ leaders can be trained to acquire the
prerequisite competencies of a WCU given the
history of HE and HE management in the country.
Fortunately, moves, policies and decisions by the
current government (since 2014) provide assurances
for positive, meaningful and sustained changes to
improve the situation. In turn these will increase HEIs
leaders’ confidence that competencies training will
do well for themselves, for their jobs, for their HEIs,
for their community and for the country as a whole.
In the end the various leaderships in an HEI play
crucial roles in their numerous respective areas.
Failure in any one of these areas or functions will be
detrimental to the quality of the whole HEI. This is
consistent with the multiplicative nature of quality in
that a low quality level in any of the elemental
functions of the HEI will bring down the quality of
the whole HEI (Idrus, 2008).
ICIEBP 2017 - 1st International Conference on Islamic Economics, Business and Philanthropy
476

5 CONCLUSIONS
The aims of this study were successfully achieved.
Fifteen leadership competencies required for
effective management of HEIs are identified. Using
statistical analysis of responses from a sample of 7
leading Indonesian universities and 40 respondents
thereof shows gaps between job-required
competencies and those possessed by rectors of the
sample HEIs. More studies are needed to evaluate
discrepancies at the other leadership levels of HEIs.
Training programs to uplift the competencies of
incumbents and future appointees are recommended.
Given the pervasive influence of HE in the
community and the country, any improvement in the
quality of a country’s HEIs will impact on the
country’s economic development and progress
(Dreyfus, 2008). The Development is not only
training. Assessment of managerial and planning
skills for subsequent work should be an important
part of developing individual contributors.
Development does not begin when someone is
promoted to a Higher Education leader. The process
of performance management can be designed so as to
enhance leadership competencies. Skills of people
can be developed. Even managers who report it
interpersonally are not sensitive at the beginning of
their careers they finally learn how to do it and
overcome this. Practice is the most important factor
in using ability effectively.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This study is supported by two Research Grants No.
042.06.1.401516/2016 from the Ministry of
Research, Technology and Higher Education, and No.
1508/K4/KM/2017 from DRPM, the Directorate for
Research and Community Service.
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