Abstract

The main subject of this study is to examine the relationship between university rectors’ political viewspersonality traits and choice of strategy and corporate entrepreneurship. However, this study does not onlyinvestigate the relationships between the theoretical aspects of the cases, at the same time it is also important todemonstrate the political views of rectors which has many prejudices and assumptions about it because of thenon-democratic appointment process of rectors in state universities in Turkey. The study also tries to picturestrategy preferences and entrepreneurial behavior of state and private universities. A questionnaire consisting of55 questions was prepared for the study, and all rectors of 105 state and 64 private universities in Turkey wereasked to participate in the survey. The answers were obtained through face-to-face interviews and e-mail. 64rectors participated in this survey, 7 responses were invalid. Our research offers several clear findings: Firstly,rectors are more liberal in universities that implement differentiation strategies. Secondly, normative rectors aredistant to new business venturings. Thirdly, innovativeness is compatible with a differentiation strategy as hasbeen revealed many times in pertinent literature. When we glance at additional findings of the survey, it attractsattention that foundation universities prefer administrators who are liberal in their world view, but moredeliberate and normative in their business lives. Besides, it was observed that foundation universities usedifferentiation and focus strategies significantly more often than state universities, and that their levels of newbusiness venturings are higher than those of state universities.

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