From leadership research to district action: Explicating collegiality and change management in neoliberalism during the dynamics of higher education institutions: A Systematic Literature Review using PRISMA Checklist

AI-assisted editorial implementation guide. Proposed district actions are separate from the original authors’ findings and recommendations. Independent peer review of this guide is not asserted.

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Evidence and transfer

Education-related source: verify which participants, institutions and outcomes were actually studied before district adoption. Source publication type: systematic-review. License and identity checks do not establish study quality or causality.

Original authors’ abstract, reproduced under the source license:

Background The neoliberal approach to higher education management has significantly transformed collegiality and university governance. This study identifies and analyzes how and where these changes have occurred, as well as their impact on the efficiency and competitiveness of universities. It addresses existing research gaps and provides new insights for adaptation strategies. Methods We selected all retrieved sources based on the keywords and analyzed all the documents we obtained. This study obtained data from Scopus retrieved on October 27, 2023. There are 416 sources were retrieved in Scopus Database within 1971 to 2023 publication year, then 662 documents were obtained. This study utilized bibliometric analysis to ensure a structured review of the literature on collegiality, change management, and neoliberalism in higher education. Results The findings show that organizational management, leadership, education, technology, curriculum, innovation, organizational change, decision-making, and human beings are significant trajectories of neoliberalism in higher education. Conclusions This study offers other constructs for accelerating leadership success in higher education. This relates to how change leadership can navigate changes resulting from neoliberal ideology.

Study methods

This research employs a systematic literature review methodology guided by the PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) Checklist to ensure comprehensive and transparent reporting ( Marlia et al., 2024). The systematic approach allows for rigorous examination of how neoliberalism influences collegiality and change management in higher education institutions through a structured evaluation of existing literature.

Limitations

This study is limited to case studies and critical analyses of literature. There may be a risk of publication bias because the study only included published articles indexed in Scopus, potentially overlooking non-indexed or seminal works that have historically shaped the discussion on neoliberalism and governance in higher education. As a result, some earlier foundational perspectives might not be fully captured within the dataset.

A 90-day district inquiry

Days 1–15 · Appraise. Read the source methods, recruitment, comparator, outcomes and limitations. Record how the study setting differs from your district and which claim the design can support.
Days 16–30 · Design. Choose one school improvement question with teachers. Protect a short shared planning cycle, agree an instructional change and use a common rubric for examining student work. Agree participation, privacy protections, baseline and stopping rules before starting.
Days 31–60 · Observe. Collect the pre-agreed measures, keep a log of implementation changes and invite confidential voluntary feedback. Preserve existing support for staff and learners.
Days 61–90 · Decide. Review implementation fidelity, teacher time and independently scored student work against a recorded baseline. Examine access differences and competing explanations before attributing changes to leadership. Make a dated decision to stop, revise or extend the inquiry.

Board decision brief

Present the local problem, source setting, evidence limits, intervention, responsible owner, total cost, measured changes and uncertainty. Separate staff perceptions, implementation measures and student learning outcomes.

Attribution and reuse

Makna Ani Marlia; Rahmi Fahmy; Hendra Lukito; Donard Games. Explicating collegiality and change management in neoliberalism during the dynamics of higher education institutions: A Systematic Literature Review using PRISMA Checklist. F1000Research (2024-01-01). https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.146044.5

Prepared 2026-11-07. Source authorship and DOI are preserved. The abstract and source passages are attributed extracts; this editorial guide is offered under the same CC BY 4.0 license.