Organizational culture of the university and innovation companies as seen by students of Tomsk universities

This article falls under the case category and presents an applied research conducted by research and manufacturing company Mikran Jsc together with NRTSU. The aim of the article is to present the results of comparative study of organizational culture at four innovation companies in Tomsk and three Tomsk universities: NRTSU, NRTPU and TSU1. The research has helped in understanding the position and expectations of university graduates related to their future work at the company and compare them with company expectations. The topic of the research was organizational culture according to its understanding as an instrument of organization development and formation of employees' professional position. The main methodology of the research was the organizational culture theory by Cameron - Quinn and the main method used was OCAI questionnaire. In order to get additional information concerning students' expectations in relation with their future work the authors used specially designed questionnaire. The research has demonstrated that according to students' understanding university is concentrated on its internal problems, manageability and activity and personnel control. Students see significant internal differences and contradicting tendencies at the university culture: domination of rules and procedures, attention to preservation of traditions and relations and at the same time desire to take leading positions by solving complex tasks and using innovative approach. In general students see university culture as follows: innovation aspects are related to aspirations whereas communication and personnel management are defined by bureaucratic and clan mechanisms. The data concerning graduates' expectations demonstrate that they see the culture of ideal company as a mixture of value oriented clan and adhocratic culture: they would like to find themselves in a friendship oriented place of work, feel support understanding and mentorship of their peers. Students would like to see flexible and creative work environment and they are not prepared to enter organization with a rigid structure and control where relations are based on competition. .Analysis of employees and top managers of Mikran Jsc., top managers of Rolsib, SATK Ltd., Industrial Electronics Ltd. shows that engineering companies' culture demonstrates the trend towards increasing value of adhocratic and market cultures. Conducted research allowed for identifying the main competence deficit of the graduates and the gap between their expectations and company requirements towards personnel. Companies expect their employees to demonstrate high level of independence, self-organization, initiative, target orientation and ability to cope with risks and volatility whereas students are oriented towards comfort, security and safety and are willing to obtain support, care and provision from the company. Obtained results allow Micran Jsc. to alter its efforts on developing its employer's brand and develop effective cooperation with universities, their students and graduates. Research results can be useful for universities in developing their organization culture, educational policy and work on forming professional position and competencies of future specialists.