Applying the open government principles to the university’s strategic planning: A sound practice

Abstract

This paper describes an innovative experience based on the citizen participation as a fundamental principle of the Open Government, regarding the strategic planning in higher education institutions. Such innovation lies on two main pillars: the stakeholders’ approach (versus the traditional product-service orientation) and a web platform based on UserVoice® and Wordpress® software. The web platform was designed not only for building up a consensual strategic plan in a medium-sized Spanish public university, but also to monitor and control it once implemented. During the participation stage, all the proposals were openly discussed and voted by the whole university community. One year later, the online platform for monitoring the Strategic Plan was re-launched in order to rate, comment and vote the values reached by the key performance indicators. The adoption of such technological tools turns into a sound practice of governance for sustainable strategic management, by encouraging the collaborative workflow, participation, reflection and learning. Moreover, it promotes the stakeholders’ identification with corporate goals and enhance their commitment to the university’s strategic plan.