Proceedings of the 3rd European Conference on Intellectual Capital

Gabriela Atanasiu and Florin Leon
5. Learning by doing in <strong>the</strong> pre-accession phase
5.1 MATRA/PSO programme
The period 1998-1999, which preceded <strong>the</strong> signing <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> Bologna Declaration in 1999, coincided with
<strong>the</strong> development <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> MATRA/PSO Programme, regarding <strong>the</strong> bilateral cooperation between <strong>the</strong>
Kingdom <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> Ne<strong>the</strong>rlands and Romania, dedicated to <strong>the</strong> countries involved in <strong>the</strong> pre-accession
phase to <strong>the</strong> EU (Atanasiu, 2001).
Romania was on <strong>the</strong> list <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> 29 countries which signed <strong>the</strong> declaration regarding <strong>the</strong> formation <strong>of</strong>
<strong>the</strong> <strong>European</strong> Higher Education Area (EHEA), and this led to <strong>the</strong> initiation <strong>of</strong> actions to implement
quality management in this field, as an external and internal requirement to ensure a minimal
standard for quality in higher education. The idea to propose such a <strong>the</strong>me was immediately
acknowledged by <strong>the</strong> management factors in <strong>the</strong> MATRA/PSO programme <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> Ne<strong>the</strong>rlands, and it
was one <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> top selected projects in early 1999 in <strong>the</strong> pre-accession phase <strong>of</strong> Romania (Brătianu &
Atanasiu, 2000). The main objective <strong>of</strong> this project was to transfer knowledge and expertise in <strong>the</strong>
field <strong>of</strong> quality management <strong>of</strong> higher education in Romania, on national and institutional level <strong>of</strong>
universities, following <strong>the</strong> concept adopted by <strong>the</strong> <strong>European</strong> Commission since 1992 (Brătianu, 2002).
The whole project designed within <strong>the</strong> logical matrix created by <strong>the</strong> Dutch consortium formed <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong>
Royal Dutch Institute, CHEPS from <strong>the</strong> University <strong>of</strong> Twente, University <strong>of</strong> Utrecht and VSNU
(Engelkamp, 2003) was based on a “learning by doing” scheme, in terms <strong>of</strong> both project activities and
forming <strong>the</strong> group <strong>of</strong> participants in <strong>the</strong> field <strong>of</strong> quality in higher education. The concept <strong>of</strong> quality in
higher education was based on <strong>the</strong> model <strong>of</strong> quality elaborated by <strong>the</strong> <strong>European</strong> Foundation for
Quality Management presented in figure 3 (Atanasiu & Brătianu, 2005) and led to a first drop in
adding value to <strong>the</strong> individual team and organisational level <strong>of</strong> MCSERM.
Figure 3: Quality model
The flexibility <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> managerial approach during <strong>the</strong> project lifecycle, which ultimately led to <strong>the</strong>
successful implementation <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> project in <strong>the</strong> period <strong>of</strong> December 2000 – March 2003 has been very
important for <strong>the</strong> knowledge enhancement in PM <strong>of</strong> MCSERM team. These elements which help our
group to enhance <strong>the</strong>ir tacit knowledge in PM were as follows:
The SWOT analysis <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> external environment in <strong>the</strong> initiation phase, in order to make <strong>the</strong>
necessary adjustments depending on <strong>the</strong> evolution <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> position <strong>of</strong> stakeholders in <strong>the</strong> period
between defining and gaining <strong>the</strong> project and its actual execution;
The evaluation <strong>of</strong> risks associated with <strong>the</strong> project and adapting project management during <strong>the</strong>
lifecycle, respecting <strong>the</strong> programme objectives, initial budget and execution period;
The flexible managerial approach, with <strong>the</strong> redefinition <strong>of</strong> management procedures in case <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong>
changes to <strong>the</strong> external environment in order to minimise risk, but also to obtain <strong>the</strong> desired
results on short and medium term.
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