Patterns of Bureaucracy in Intercollegiate Athletic Departments

Abstract

The theoretical argument of the current research is that athletic departments have been effective in attaining their conflicting goals mainly because they have become highly effective in managing institutional rules. Neo-institutionalism (DiMaggio & Powell, 1991), loose coupling (Meyer & Rowan, 1977), and patterns of bureaucracy form the theoretical cornerstone of the current research. Sport management investigations about goals and processes of intercollegiate athletics (Trail & Chelladurai, 2000) offer an unique opportunity to investigate these sociological theories of management in sport contexts. The initial endeavor of the current research was to explore and describe relationships between intercollegiate athletics goals and processes and coaches' perceptions about how institutional rules have been negotiated inside athletic departments (patterns of bureaucracy). To attain this aim, first, I proposed a scale to measure different patterns of bureaucracy in athletic departments and tested its psychometric properties. Then, I investigated the structural relationships among intercollegiate athletics goals, processes, and patterns of bureaucracy. I received back 382 questionnaires from Division I coaches (response rate of 38.2%), 326 from Division II (32.6%), and 359 from Division III (35.9%). From these questionnaires some had to be eliminated due to either the irresponsible nature of the responses. A final sample of 907 (n divI = 322; n divII = 277; n divIII = 308) was used to test the hypotheses. For controlling for non-response error, late respondents were compared iii to early respondents. Late respondents did not differ from early respondent in any variable for all three divisions. Initial confirmatory factor analyses (CFA) showed acceptable fit indexes, but some items did not load sufficiently high in their constructs.After some refining, the new proposed bureaucracy scale presented good psychometric properties, as did the goals and processes scales. Multiple-group CFA indicated fully measurement invariance for bureaucracy and goals scales, and partial measurement invariance for processes scale.Single-group structural equation modeling (SEM) analyses showed that the correlation between developmental and performance goals was large and significant for all three divisions (r divI = .654; r divII = .660; r divIII = .582). The regression coefficient of developmental processes on developmental goals was large and significant for all three divisions ( divI = .924; divII = .909; divIII = .853). Also, the regression coefficient of performance processes on performance goals was large and significant for all three divisions ( divI = .902; divII = .780; divIII = .933). For all three divisions, developmental process was a significant predictor of all three types of bureaucracy: mock bureaucracy ( divI = -.313; divII = -.392; divIII = -.406), representative bureaucracy ( divI = .289; divII = .414; divIII = .411) and discordant bureaucracy ( divI = .226; divII = .331; divIII = .282). Multiple-group SEM analyses showed...