Personnel policy in universities in dynamic institutional environment: differentiation or standardization?

This paper considers the results of research dedicated to study the range of features of universities contemporary personnel policy. This policy is currently transforming under the influence of range of institutional changes. What types of responses do universities demonstrate to meet the transformations? The following proposition was done: increasing pressure of government and society on universities can be considered as a trigger for organizational adjustment initialization. It could lead either to standardization or to differentiation of general and functional strategies including personnel management. The expert survey has been done (15 expert from universities situated in 10 regions of the Russian Federation). It allowed for marking the scopes of standardization and differentiation of universities personnel policies as well as the range of response to institutional changes (reactive, proactive and status quo).