Accepted Manuscript

Optimal Human Resource Planning with P-graph for Universities Undergoing

Transition

Kathleen B. Aviso, Anthony S.F. Chiu, Feorillo P.A. Demeterio, Rochelle Irene G.
Lucas, Ming-Lang Tseng, Raymond R. Tan

PII: S0959-6526(19)30913-8

DOI: 10.1016/j.jclepro.2019.03.213

Reference: JCLP 16217

To appear in: Journal of Cleaner Production

Received Date: 07 January 2019

Accepted Date: 19 March 2019

Please cite this article as: Kathleen B. Aviso, Anthony S.F. Chiu, Feorillo P.A. Demeterio, Rochelle
Irene G. Lucas, Ming-Lang Tseng, Raymond R. Tan, Optimal Human Resource Planning with P-
graph for Universities Undergoing Transition, Journal of Cleaner Production (2019), doi: 10.1016/j.
jclepro.2019.03.213

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 ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT

Word count: 7,736

Optimal Human Resource Planning with P-graph for Universities

Undergoing Transition

Kathleen B. Avisoa,*; Anthony S. F. Chiub,e; Feorillo P. A. Demeterio IIIc;

Rochelle Irene G. Lucasd; Ming-Lang Tsenge,f, Raymond R. Tana

aChemical Engineering Department, Gokongwei College of Engineering, De La Salle University,
Manila, Philippines
bIndustrial Engineering Department, Gokongwei College of Engineering, De La Salle University,
Manila, Philippines
cFilipino Department, College of Liberal Arts, De La Salle University, Manila, Philippines
dDepartment of English and Applied Linguistics, Brother Andrew Gonzalez FSC College of Education,
De La Salle University, Manila, Philippines
eInstitute of Innovation and Circular Economy, Asia University, Taichung, Taiwan; fDepartment of
Medical research, China Medical University, Taiwan

Abstract
This study deals with the problem of human resources planning due to the additional workforce
requirements of research activities. In practice, planning of human resource expansion is
seldom done in a systematic manner, thus leading to sub-optimal results. In this work, a P-
graph model is developed as a decision support tool to aid in planning expansion of staffing
levels for Higher Education Institutions. Many higher education institutions in the developing
world are undergoing the transition from being teaching-intensive to becoming increasingly
research-oriented. This shift is widely recognized as an important adjustment to the need for
universities to play a greater role in creating knowledge capital, which is an essential
component to fuel the next phase of growth of developing countries. Research universities are
an essential resource for facilitating eco-innovation in industry. New targets that involve
increased research output tend to put strain on institutional processes and resources that were
previously configured to meet the demands of teaching-intensive organizations. The model
formulation is based on an input-output framework that reflects interdependencies among
different employee categories. The use of the model is illustrated with a representative case
study of a typical Higher Education Institution in the Philippines.

Keywords: Higher Education Institution (HEI); Human resource (HR) planning; Input-Output
Model; Optimization; P-graph
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Highlights:

• University research fuels eco-innovation in industry.

• A P-graph approach to human resource planning in universities is developed.

• The model can facilitate increased institutional research intensity.

• A representative case study of a typical Philippine university is presented.

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Optimal Human Resource Planning in Universities Undergoing

Transition with P-Graph

Introduction

Higher education institutions (HEIs) play an important role in promoting sustainability through
their core functions of research, instruction and outreach. Current international trends show
increased emphasis on sustainability in university culture (Adams et al., 2018), organizational
structure (Soini et al., 2018) and information systems (Goni et al., 2017). Integration of
sustainability in the institutional mission helps shape student attitudes (Dagiliūtė et al., 2018),
and potentially paves the way for sustainable entrepreneurship that translate research output
into commercial green technologies (Fichter and Tiemann, 2018). In universities, a strong
research foundation has been found to be linked to knowledge transfer and industry
engagement success rate (Sengupta and Ray, 2017). Similar correlations are found at
national scales between research output and technology innovation (Wang and Wong, 2015).
Knowledge transfer can then drive eco-innovation that will provide new solutions to
environmental or regulatory issues faced by industry (Pham et al., 2019). For example, new
technologies for recycling of waste electronic products will be essential to conserve finite
mineral resources and to operationalize Circular Economy (CE) policies (Amato and Beolchini,
2018). Such trends are well established in mature research-intensive HEIs in developed
countries, but will also be needed in the developing world in order to enable emerging
economies to develop along sustainable growth trajectories (Lee et al., 2018). Such gains can
be made possible through the knowledge-based (scientific or technological) outputs
(Hamdoun et al., 2018) as well as social influence (i.e., through education and public
engagement) (Lin et al., 2016). Thus, there is a need for HEIs in developing countries to take
on a greater role in building knowledge capital through research on sustainable technologies.

For HEIs, becoming research-intensive is desirable not only for the prestige that such status
brings, but more so for the capacity that it gives to contribute to the socio-economic and
cultural developments of their home countries through the continuous generation of
knowledge and innovations, as well as formation of more critical, creative and productive
citizens. Most of the leading research-intensive universities at present were either established
as research universities right at the outset, or were teaching-intensive universities that were
re-designed as research universities before the onset of the current age of mass and universal
higher education. However, in developing countries, which more often than not came out from
long periods of colonization, the establishment of research-intensive universities also involved

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the re-designing of selected teaching-intensive universities into research universities, but

already during the era of mass and universal higher education (Altbach and Salmi, 2011). This
means that such selected teaching-intensive universities were already burdened with huge
numbers of academic staff and students, making their transition into research universities
more challenging, requiring more financial resources and political will power, and more
importantly sharper human resource planning. Sloppy or non-existent human resource (HR)
planning will only result to dysfunctional combinations of teachers, researchers,
administrators, students and support staff. This situation may be reflective of what is
happening in countries such as the Philippines, where the few universities that are venturing
into such re-designing had concentrated their efforts in increasing the numbers of their
research faculty members without giving due attention on whether they had the proportionate
numbers of research-capable students and support staff. Thus, HEIs that are currently re-
designed, or will be re-designed, into research-intensive universities will benefit from a
planning tool that can peer into their current HR configuration and project at any given
development phase their optimal combinations of teachers, researchers, administrators,
students and support staff relative to their targets and financial considerations.

It has been found that globalization and internationalization in higher education institutions is
accomplished through the achievement of academic excellence, innovation and research
productivity. Nonetheless, many institutions fail to realize the importance of HR management
for the creation of a knowledge economy (Chatterja and Kiran, 2017). The core function of
human resource management is to iterate organizational strategy into human resource
prerogatives. Hence, human resource plays a major role in the fulfilment of organizational
vision and aspiration (Noe et al., 2003). The main function of HR planning in an HEI is to
ensure that the staffing complement is sufficient for the institutional plans and policies.
Effective HR planning in HEIs needs to consider both direct and indirect staffing requirements
(Yousif and Shaout, 2018). In an HEI undergoing transition to a research university, an
extensive review of the functions of its staffing levels is imperative to address the growing
targets. Rigorous analysis of the nature of the work assigned to the institution’s personnel is
essential. Furthermore, HR management should also consider the different processes and
management strategies to contribute to the growth of the organization (Kucharcikova et al.,
2015).

Strategic HR management is imperative in the attainment of an institution’s competitive edge

(Allui and Sahni, 2016). There is relatively sparse literature on the use of systematic decision
support tools to aid in human resource planning in HEIs. Early examples of methods used
include goal programming (Feuer, 1985) and simplified population balance models (Wei,

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1998). Optimal organizational structure and task allocation is critical for fostering an innovative
work culture (Fonseca et al., 2019). Thus, effective decision support tools for HR management
in HEIs need to have a strong structural component that accounts for workflow linkages. Input-
output (IO) models present a promising approach. IO models were first developed for
economic systems analysis (Leontief, 1936). This framework is discussed in great detail, along
with many extensions, by Miller and Blair (2009); it can be readily implemented in
spreadsheets or equation-based modelling software (Tan et al., 2018a). Correa (2002)
proposed the application of IO models to the analysis of large-scale social systems. In
subsequent works, the IO approach was used for HR planning problems in organizations
(Correa and Craft, 1999). In this approach, the fundamental problem was to determine the
correct staffing levels for different employee categories or office units, given organizational
workload. The IO framework is able to account for workload resulting from the demands of
both external and internal customers. This methodology has been applied to determining
staffing levels in libraries (Correa and Correa, 1996), municipal offices (Correa and Guajardo,
2001) and hospitals (Correa and Parker, 2005), among others. For organizational systems
with zero degrees of freedom, unique solutions for correct staffing levels can be determined.
For systems with positive degrees of freedom, optimization models based on the IO matrix
can be formulated. For example, a fuzzy optimization model was developed by Aviso et al.
(2018) to determine optimal personnel reassignment during a temporary crisis in an
understaffed organization. A subsequent work used the P-graph framework to solve a similar
problem (Aviso et al., 2017); this approach results from the capability of representing the
optimization of IO systems as a Process Network Synthesis (PNS) problem (Aviso et al.,
2015).

In this work, a P-graph model for HR planning in HEIs in transition towards becoming more
research-intensive is developed. The common practical response in such institutions is
increased recruitment of faculty researchers. However, such transitions also require
augmentation of staffing levels in administrative support offices in order to manage the
increase in overhead workload for managing research projects. The IO framework provides a
means of quantifying interactions among staff categories in order to account for both direct
and indirect workload changes; the use of P-graph then allows optimal (and near-optimal) HR
plans to be developed. The methodology developed in this work is intended to provide a static
snapshot of ideal staffing levels for short- or medium-term projections, and does not account
for dynamic effects accounting for factors such as turnover, retirement and international
mobility. The rest of this paper is organized as follows. The next section gives an overview of
the P-graph framework as it applies to HR problems. A formal problem statement is then given.
Then, a representative case study is solved to illustrate the P-graph approach. The alternative

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staffing schemes generated are discussed from a practical human resource management
perspective. Finally, conclusions and prospective research directions are given.

P-Graph Framework for HR Planning

P-graph is a mathematical framework for solving PNS problems, originally in the area of
chemical plant design, but more recently for a broad range of problems characterized by a
common structure (Tan et al., 2018b). It is based on five axioms that are common to all PNS
problems (Friedler et al., 1992a). Efficient algorithms for generating combinatorially feasible
networks have been developed using the information implicit in the five axioms (Friedler et al.,
1992b). P-graph also allows the determination of the maximal structure, which differs from
superstructures used in many Process Integration (PI) problems because it is generated with
mathematical rigor that eliminates the risk of human error (Friedler et al., 1993).

The P-graph framework consists of three component algorithms:

 Maximal structure generation (MSG) is the rigorous, automated generation of a
structure that is the union of all combinatorially feasible network structures.
 Solution structure generation (SSG) is the rigorous elucidation of all combinatorially
feasible network structures.
 Accelerated branch-and-bound (ABB) is the efficient determination of an optimal
network based on a predefined objective function. The computational efficiency of ABB
can be attributed to the use of information inherent in PNS problems to exclude
redundant solutions from the search space.

The P-graph framework can also generate the n-best solutions of a PNS problem, a capability
that is particularly useful for practical problems. In practice, solutions that are not
mathematically optimal in the strict sense may only be marginally inferior to the true optimum,
and should be examined closely and considered for implementation. The P-graph approach
has been applied to problems similar in structure to the original PNS problem for plant design;
a review paper by Lam (2013) discusses such applications, with an emphasis on supply chain
optimization. Geographical and topical trends in P-graph applications were discussed by
Klemeš and Varbanov (2015). Varbanov et al. (2017) examined further trends and potential
directions in a subsequent paper. Notable applications of P-graph for organizational problems
include optimization of business process workflow (Tick, 2007) and workforce reallocation
(Aviso et al., 2017).

The use of P-graph in the context of HR planning is the direct result of its similarity to IO
models as established by Aviso et al. (2015). The equivalent mathematical model for the P-

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graph framework is discussed in the Appendix. Interactions among different staff categories
in an HEI can be represented as an IO bock diagram (Figure 1a) or alternatively as a P-graph
(Figure 1b). In this modelling framework, all work is measured in terms of person-hours, which
are assumed to be proportional to actual output (e.g., number of research papers published)
based on average staff productivity levels. The streams can represent typical interactions, or
internal transactions, that signify typical demands that each type of employee makes on
colleagues. For example, support staff provide various types of administrative support to other
employees such as the administrators and the faculty; administrators supervise faculty and
the support staff; etc. Each type of employee, for example a faculty member, can also be
viewed in isolation, in block diagram form (Figure 2a) or P-graph form (Figure 2b). The input
streams represent demands that the average faculty member (or any staff category) places
on other employees, as measured in person-hours. Such demands on other employees’ time
will be indicated by negative numerical values, as they signify “consumption” of other people’s
productive output. The output streams represent different types of work output of the average
faculty member (or any staff category), also measured in person-hours. Work output is
indicated by positive numerical values.

<Insert Figure 1a. and 1b.>

<Insert Figure 2a. and 2b.>

Formal Problem Statement

In the proposed methodology, the problem addressed via the P-graph model can be formally
stated as:
 Given a set of homogeneous categories of HEI staff, within which work assignments
are assumed to be fully interchangeable, and for which average productivity and salary
level is also fixed;
 Given a set of workflows or tasks, which are associated with staff categories as inputs
or outputs;
 Given that each staff category has a constant ratio of workflow inputs and outputs,
based on the employee’s job description and interactions with co-workers;
 Given the current staffing levels and workflow outputs;
 Given that the HEI has a predefined set of net output for each of the workflows that
arise from strategic targets;

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 The objective is to determine the staffing level in each category to deliver the required
net output at minimum cost. The resulting recommended staffing levels are intended
to be used as benchmarks or targets for HR management.

In addition to the generic assumptions used here, additional case-specific assumptions can
also be added, as will be illustrated in the next section.

Case Study on a Typical HEI in the Philippines

The Philippine higher education system consists predominantly of teaching-oriented
universities that were historically established to educate a professional workforce for a largely
local job market. For example, only eight Philippine HEIs appear among the 500 institutions
listed in the 2019 QS Asian University Rankins. Current efforts by the national government via
the Department of Science and Technology and the Commission on Higher Education to build
a knowledge-based economy has led to initiatives to increase research intensity in these HEIs.
Hence, the transition from a teaching-intensive to a research-intensive institution is actually
becoming a trend in as far as this handful leading Philippine HEIs and the numerous Philippine
state universities and colleges are concerned. Bernardo (2003) suggested Philippine HEIs
need to consider two things to achieve such a transition. Firstly, HEIs should invest in
developing their research capabilities through training their faculty members, providing
research infrastructure, hiring more research support staff and formulating workable research
policies. Secondly, these institutions should be able to identify research areas where
collaborations with external partners can be further explored. As such, Philippine HEIs must
examine their research development programs to be able to develop their own specific niches
to contribute to the globally placed knowledge production system that is currently taking place.

For the typical HEI, there are seven staff categories, as given in Table 1. Note that faculty
members are further classified as pure teaching, pure research and combined
research/teaching.

<Insert Table 1>

Staff categories are modelled as operating units in P-graph. The P-graph models used in this
work are all available upon request via communication to the corresponding author, and can
be run using the software P-graph Studio hosted by the University of Pannonia (P-graph,
2019). Based on typical job descriptions, six types of interaction between the different staff
categories are identified, namely, general supervision/management, research mentoring,
research, teaching (including consultation), knowledge transfer and support. All workflows are

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measured in person-hours per week, with the number of person-hours being proportional to
the actual output demands (e.g., the average number of person-hours needed to produce one
scientific article as research output can be estimated empirically). The interactions between
staff classifications can be viewed as “transaction costs” of working within an organization,
and are modelled as material streams in P-graph. Examples include routine tasks such as
meetings, sending or reading e-mails, and other similar activities. The interactions are
summarized in Table 2 where negative entries indicate inputs or need while positive entries
indicate output or productivity of a staff category. The equivalent P-graph model is shown in
Figure 3 which can be better understood with the accompanying nomenclature found in
Table 3. As initially discussed, the staff categories which are indicated as column headings in
Table 2 are represented as rectangular boxes (or process units) in Figure 3, while the nature
of interaction or function which can be found in the rows of Table 2 are represented by circular
nodes in Figure 3. Fictitious nodes to represent the actual count of the workforce are also
indicated, this includes the nodes labelled as FAC to represent faculty who can provide
different types of functions, SS to represent support services and ADMIN to represent human
resources who function entirely as administrators. For example, a faculty who is entirely
involved in teaching (e.g. 2nd column in Table 2) can provide 36 person-hours/week of teaching
service. However, the teaching faculty will require 2 person-hours/week of supervision and
12 person-hours/week of support services. This is represented in the process unit labelled
FAC_T where an outgoing stream labelled 36 u/y is directed towards the blue colored node
labelled TEACH to represent the 36 person-hours/week of teaching provided by the teaching
faculty. Similarly, input streams labelled as 2 u/y comes from the node labelled as
SUPERVISION and 12 u/y from the node labelled as SUPPORT to represent the 2 person-
hours/week and 12 person-hours/week requirements respectively. To generate Figure 3, the
same procedure is done for all the remaining staff categories in Table 2. The properties of the
nodes and process units can be adjusted in the P-graph studio software to indicate minimum
and maximum limits as defined by the problem specifications.

The average weekly salary for each staff category is reflected in Table 4. Note that the
approximate exchange rate is PhP60 = €1. Additional assumptions used here are as follows:
 Legal restrictions force HEIs to retain their personnel.
 The retained personnel can be trained to gain improved skills to allow them to assume
new tasks pertaining to research and knowledge transfer.

<Insert Table 2>

<Insert Table 3>

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<Insert Figure 3>

Baseline Scenario
Using SSG, it is possible to identify 86 different structures, indicating that different
combinations of these staff categories can exist in the HEI. Due to space constraints, these
potential structures are not shown here. The baseline scenario assumes the following:
 the minimum weekly total output for teaching is equivalent to 18,000 person-hours
 the minimum weekly total output for research is 1,500 person-hours
 the minimum weekly total output for knowledge transfer is 500 person-hours
 there are no teaching assistants and no faculty that have purely research duties

The minimum weekly total output corresponds to a university with an output profile of 90 %
teaching, 7.5 % research and 2.5 % knowledge transfer. Upon optimization, the baseline
scenario results in an academic staff requirement of 628 faculty members, of which 417 have
only teaching duties, 79 have combined teaching and research, 132 faculty administrators.
Also, 248 support staff are needed. This structure generates 18,000 person-hours of teaching,
2,000 person-hours of research and 500 person-hours of knowledge transfer. The cost of
personnel salaries (including employee benefits) is PhP 20.877 M per week (€ 347,956 per
week), or PhP 1,085 M per annum (€ 18,093,712 per annum). The last row in Table 4
summarizes the total personnel cost associated with each staff category. The detailed
allocation of workflow for the baseline scenario is summarized in Table 5 and illustrated in P-
graph form in Figure 4.

<Insert Table 4>

<Insert Table 5>

<Insert Figure 4>

Suppose that the HEI seeks to increase research output by 300% over a planning horizon of
five years, under the assumption that such an increase will require a proportionate level of
increase in research person-hours. The new requirements and assumptions are as follows:
 the minimum weekly total output for teaching is 18,000 person-hours
 the minimum weekly total output for research is 6,000 person-hours
 the minimum weekly total output for knowledge transfer is 500 person-hours

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 the total number of faculty and support staff employed should be more than the
baseline scenario
 a maximum of 500 teaching assistants may be hired while an unlimited number of
research faculty can be employed

The HR problem that faces management is to determine the most cost-effective means of
achieving this target, by identifying possible ideal staffing schemes and their associated costs
in salaries and employee benefits. It is possible to use the capabilities of P-graph to generate
structurally distinct HR plans, each of which represents an option to be considered for
implementation. These alternatives can be evaluated based on cost, as well as non-
quantitative aspects that cannot be directly integrated in P-graph. Key features of the four HR
scenarios generated using the P-graph model are described in Table 6. Each scenario is then
discussed in detail in the following subsections. In all the succeeding scenarios, the HEI
retains its current employees due to legal restrictions. A summary of the different scenarios is
shown in Table 7.

<Insert Table 6>

<Insert Table 7>

Scenario A: Cost-Optimal Staffing Plan

The cost-optimal network can be generated simply by directly minimizing total salaries and is
illustrated in Figure 5. This solution requires a slight shift in workforce structure such that there
are now teaching assistants and research staff. For this scenario only 1 additional teaching
assistant is necessary. There should be 448 faculty dedicated to purely teaching duties, and
25 research faculty without teaching duties. There is also a requirement for 115 research staff
plus 155 faculty administrators. This new structure maintains the faculty count at 628. There
is now a need to employ research staff, teaching assistants and identify faculty dedicated to
just conducting research. The general support staff requirement has increased to 287, which
is a 15.7 % increase from the baseline. The latter increase is difficult to deduce intuitively, but
in practice, failure to do so can result in process bottlenecks within the HEI. This new structure
meets the desired teaching and research outputs, and results in 692 person-hours for
knowledge transfer. Total cost of personnel salaries increases to PhP 20.61 M per week
(€376,785 per week), or 8.29 % increase from the baseline.

<Insert Figure 5>

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While this is a cost-optimal solution, it can be seen that the segregation of teaching and
research functions can have serious repercussions on the quality of education, as it effectively
hinders the bulk of the student population from learning from the top researchers of the HEIs.
Furthermore, excessive reliance on research staff (who generally have lower salaries than
faculty) may threaten the long-term sustainability of the research growth of the institution.
Thus, the capability of P-graph to generate alternative structures becomes valuable for HR
planning. In this case, 23 additional near-optimal structures which provide options for the kind
of HR structure an HEI will prefer.

Scenario B: Use of Teaching Assistants

The near-optimal structure shown in Figure 6 demonstrates a HR profile which employs
teaching assistants, but does not have research staff. This network was identified from the 23
near-optimal structures generated using the assumptions in Scenario A. However, it is
possible to restrict the optimization model to this particular network topology where the
maximum research staff and faculty with dual duties of research and teaching are set to zero.
The total faculty population is still 628. Of this total, 268 faculty (43%) are assigned to perform
purely teaching roles and 195 (31%) to purely research roles. The remaining 165 (26%)
function as faculty administrators. The faculty pool is now supported by 177 new teaching
assistants, who can absorb the teaching load previously assigned to research faculty. This
structure results in a total cost of PhP 25.04 M per week (€417,358 per week), and meets the
output requirements of 18,000 person-hours of teaching, 6,000 person-hours for research and
1,500 person-hours for knowledge transfer. The cost of salaries is 19.95% higher than the
baseline scenario. This scheme offers the prospect of stronger long-term research, as it relies
on research faculty to increase output levels. It can be argued that this HR plan is still subject
to a similar weakness as Scenario A, in that research knowledge will have limited capacity to
trickle down into the curriculum.

<Insert Figure 6>

Scenario C: Expansion of Faculty Talent Pool

This scenario relies on aggressive expansion of the faculty talent pool through recruitment,
and does not consider hiring teaching assistants and research staff to handle the increased
requirements for research productivity. Similar to the structure in Scenario B, this network was
identified from the 23 near-optimal structures generated using the assumptions in Scenario A,
the network is shown in Figure 7. As a result, the total number of faculty needed to meet the
minimum requirement for research is now 750, which is a 19.4 % increase from the baseline
scenario. Furthermore, an additional 71 personnel have to be hired to function as pure

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administrators. The main feature of this structure is having the personnel work only on
dedicated roles, where 500 faculty (67%) are involved purely on teaching and 250 faculty
(33%) are focused purely on research. A total of 331 support staff are needed to support these
activities, which is a 33.5 % increase from the baseline. This network results in a total cost of
PhP 29.25 M per week (€487,500 per week) with 18,000 person-hours of teaching, 6,000
person-hours for research and 1,500 person-hours for knowledge transfer. The total cost of
staff salaries is 40.10% higher than in the baseline scenario.

<Insert Figure 7>

Scenario D: Integrated Research and Teaching

For this scenario, the faculty members are expected to perform multiple functions (i.e. both
teaching and research) in various proportions. The network was also identified from the 23
near-optimal structures obtained using the assumptions of Scenario A and the network is
shown in Figure 8. This scenario maintains the faculty population at 628, as in the baseline
scenario. However, they are now expected to both be engaged in teaching and research.
Furthermore, an additional 74 personnel should be hired to act as pure administrators, along
with 186 teaching assistants. The latter are needed to take up the teaching load so that faculty
can spend more work hours on research. Furthermore, the number of support staff should be
increased to 337, which is a 36 % increase from the baseline. As a result, this HR structure
has the total cost of PhP 29.95 M per week (€499,120 per week), and can provide 18,000
man-hours for teaching, 7,536 man-hours for research and 1,884 man-hours for knowledge
transfer. This scenario thus exceeds the minimum man-hour requirement for both research
and knowledge transfer, but total salaries increase by 43.44%.

<Insert Figure 8>

Qualitative analysis of intangible aspects of this HR plan suggests that it may be the most
sustainable one among the four scenarios. First, reliance on faculty to do research (including
research mentoring) ensures continuity of research, through the training of early career
researchers (i.e., junior faculty) by their seniors (Carpintero, 2015). Development of the talent
pool in this manner, while more costly in the short-term, will ensure the long-term sustainability
of gains made in research output. Training of junior faculty will ensure that the HEI staffing
becomes robust in the face of disruptions due to turnover or retirement, which needs to be
considered as part of HR dynamics (Wei, 1998). Integration of teaching and research
functions, even in varying proportions, ensures that knowledge generation within the HEI
remains strongly linked to the students’ educational experience. In particular, contact with

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active researchers will thus ensure that the HEI produces graduates who understand the
process of innovation and knowledge generation. Such additional knowledge ultimately
translates into better career prospects and mindsets as educated citizens.

Implications for HR Management in HEIs

HEIs play a critical role in establishing an ecosystem that enables innovation-drive
development through generation of both human and knowledge capital. These influences are
reflected, for example, in the Global Innovation Index (Cornell University, Institut Européen
d'Administration des Affaires, and World Intellectual Property Organization, 2018) and other
similar country-level assessments. Given the importance of HEIs in national development,
governments typically stimulate upgrading or merging of institutions, or else create entirely
new ones based on strategic needs (Salmi, 2009). Of these options, upgrading an existing
HEI is typically the least costly path, but is also subject to management constraints such as
institutional culture and inertia. Institutional reforms need to be managed to ensure acceptance
by the university personnel and stakeholders (e.g., students and alumni), and should also be
adequately supported by rigorous projections. The model developed here is intended to
provide support for both strategic decision-making and communication.

The absence of systematic HR planning in many HEIs means that the increasing number of
faculty researchers, with their increasing capacity to undertake research, is not accompanied
with proportionate increases in the number of research staff and support staff. Thus, the
capacity of support units (e.g., finance, legal or procurement offices) can become a bottleneck
during a period of rapid growth in research intensity. Such bottlenecks can result in friction
among co-workers and demoralization among researchers, and may cause compliance issues
for the institution (e.g., project delays and cost overruns). Hence, the computer-aided
capability to generate a menu of HR planning scenarios could benefit not only HEIs in the
Philippines, but also universities with a similar macro-environment that are undergoing a
similar transition from teaching-intensive to research-intensive institutions. In practice,
university leaders need to be able to map out medium-term plans projecting directions over a
period of approximately 3–5 years. Such a time frame is sufficient to allow for policy directions
to trickle down through the management levels, so that decisions for staff recruitment, training,
and reclassification can be done with adequate lead time. The P-graph model can generate
alternative HR plans to be considered for implementation, and the final plan selected serves
to provide benchmark or targets for staff recruitment and reassignment to suit strategic goals
of the HEI.

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The model as presented here assumes that general staffing categories cut across the entire
institution. The resulting staffing plans are thus high-level benchmarks for use at the level of
central university administration. However, in principle, the same modelling framework can be
applied at a higher level of resolution to reflect individual departments or offices. The current
model has some limitations that can be dealt with in future variants. For example, each
generated HR plan represents a static benchmark, but a multi-period variant spanning multiple
decades may be desired in some cases. Variations in employee age and productivity are also
not reflected. Other aspects not directly incorporated in the model can arise in practical
situations. For instance, in many HEIs in developing countries, university lecturers may lack
an appropriate doctorate degree; thus, completion of such degrees by young staff can be
considered within a time frame that is sufficient for Ph.D. studies. Such training results in
improvement in productivity which will result in changes in the model coefficients over the
course of time. The impact of internationalization through short- or long-term employment of
foreign staff also needs to be integrated, as this is an essential aspect of modern higher
education.

Conclusions
A P-graph model was developed for optimal human resource planning in HEIs in transition
from being primarily teaching-intensive towards becoming more research-oriented. Such
transitions are needed as HEIs need to play a role in developing both human and knowledge
capital for achieving sustainability in developing countries. Thus, strengthening the capacity
of HEIs can play an important role in forming sustainable development paths of emerging
economies through scientific research and knowledge transfer to stimulate eco-innovation in
industry. The model developed here takes into account the interdependencies among general
staff categories, so that appropriate staffing levels can be identified to support institutional
targets. A case study representative of a typical HEI in the Philippines was solved to illustrate
the model’s capabilities. Implications for cost-effective human resource management were
also discussed. The findings show that there are different strategies which can be
implemented to achieve targets for increased research productivity. These strategies can look
at employing different HR structures such that top management can identify the required
human and financial resources. An examination of the different options will require an
assessment of management priorities since selecting the kind of HR structure can potentially
influence institutional culture and sustainability.

Future work can focus on developing and applying different model variants. For example, it is
possible to develop a multi-period variant to account for annual adjustments in strategic targets
of an organization. Robust model formulations can also be developed to allow for uncertainties

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in staff performance levels; this approach can also be coupled with Monte Carlo simulation so
that alternative staffing strategies can be simulated in silico. Temporal aspects to account for
staff training, turnover and attrition can also be incorporated, along with other widely
recognized indicators of HEI quality (e.g., international mobility and research income). It is
also important for the model to be field-tested for actual applications in developing countries.

Acknowledgement
This work was supported by the Philippine Commission on Higher Education (CHED) via the
Philippine Higher Education Research Network (PHERNet) Sustainability Studies Program at
De La Salle University. We are also grateful to the P-graph Studio software team based at the
University of Pannonia, Hungary.

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Appendix
The P-graph model for staffing allocation can be formulated into the equivalent mixed integer
linear program as follows:
min 𝐜T𝐱 A-1

Subject to:

𝐀𝐱 = 𝐲 A-2

𝐲𝐋 ≤ 𝐲 ≤ 𝐲𝐔 A-3

diag(𝐛)𝐱𝐋 ≤ 𝐱 ≤ diag(𝐛)𝐱𝐔 A-4

bj ∈ {0,1} ∀j A-5

The objective (Eq. A-1) is to minimize the total cost incurred resulting from the salary of the
staff. This is a product of the salary per person per week which is contained in the salary vector
(𝐜T) and the total number of personnel per staff category as indicated in the total workforce
vector (𝐱). As each type of staff performs their tasks, their activities will include routine work
and interacting with other staff classifications which can be represented by the interaction
matrix, 𝐀. Depending on the quantity and type of available workforce, the entire organization
thus generates the net output of work as indicated by the net output vector, 𝐲, (Eq. A-2). The
net output of work should meet the targets set by the organization as defined by the lower (𝐲L)
and upper (𝐲U) demand vector targets (Eq. A-3). Furthermore, the total number of staff per
category should be within the defined lower (𝐱L) and upper (𝐱U) workforce limits (Eq. A-4)
where 𝐛 is a vector of binary variables (Eq. A-5) which indicates whether a certain workforce
category j is present (bj = 1) or not (bj = 0).

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Table 1. Summary of HEI staff classifications and functions

Human Resource Classification Functions

Faculty General academic staff with teaching, research and extension
functions; the relative proportion of these functions can give rise
to further subcategories.

Teaching assistant Contractual staff engaged to assist in teaching-related functions.

Research staff Contractual staff engaged to assist in research-related functions.

This category includes postdocs and research associates, but
excludes graduate students.

General support staff Staff employed for various organizational support functions (e.g.,
finance, procurement, legal, etc.)

Faculty with administrative Administrators appointed to part-time management functions,

functions while still retaining partial faculty duties.

Pure administrators Administrators appointed to full-time management functions.

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Table 2. HEI staff interaction matrix in person-hours/week

Teaching Assistant
Faculty (Research)
Faculty (Teaching)

Pure Administrator
Faculty (Teaching/

Research Staff

Administrator/
Support Staff
Research)

Faculty
General 2 2 2 2 2 4 15 40
supervision
Research 0 6 3 0 4 0 2 0
mentoring
Research 0 24 12 0 36 0 8 0

Teaching 36 0 18 36 0 0 12 0

Knowledge 0 6 3 0 2 0 2 0
Transfer
Support 12 12 12 8 10 40 30 60

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Table 3. Nomenclature for P-graph Representation of Case Study

P-graph Representation Label Meaning

ADMIN Human resource hired as administrators

FAC Human resource hired as faculty

SS Human resource hired as support staff

RES_MENT Research mentoring function

SUPERVISION Supervisory function

SUPPORT Support function

KNOW_TRAN Knowledge transfer function

RESEARCH Research function

TEACH Teaching function

AD_FAC Faculty with administrative, teaching and

research duties

FAC_R Faculty with only research duties

FAC_T Faculty with only teaching duties

FAC_TR Faculty with both research and teaching duties

GSS General Support Staff

PURE_AD Human resource with purely administrative duties

RS Research staff

TA Teaching assistant

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Table 4. Baseline Salary and Number of Personnel

Teaching Assistant
Faculty (Research)
Faculty (Teaching)

Pure Administrator
Faculty (Teaching/

Research Staff

Administrator/
Support Staff
Research)

Faculty

Total
Number of 417 0 79 0 0 248 132 0 876
personnel

Salary per 27 36 33 12 12 10.8 33 45 N/A

person
(thousand
PhP/week)

Total Salary 11.250 0 2.594 0 0 2.674 4.358 0 20.877

(M PhP/week)

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Table 5. Baseline scenario total workflows (in person-hours/week)

Teaching Assistant
Faculty (Research)
Faculty (Teaching)

Pure Administrator
Faculty (Teaching/

Research Staff

Administrator/
Support Staff

Final Output
Research)

Faculty
General 833 0 157 0 0 991 1,981 0 0
supervision

Research 0 0 236 0 0 0 264 0 500

mentoring

Research 0 0 943 0 0 0 1,057 0 2,000

Teaching 15,000 0 1,415 0 0 0 1,585 0 18,000

Knowledge 0 0 236 0 0 0 264 0 500

Transfer

Support 5,000 0 943 0 0 9,906 3,962 0 0

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Table 6. Key Features of four HR scenarios

Scenarios Features
A Extensive use of research and staff personnel to assist faculty
B Extensive use of teaching assistants to free up faculty
C No dedicated teaching assistant or research personnel
D All faculty have multiple functions to perform (e.g. teaching and research)

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 Baseline

Scenario B
Scenario A

Scenario D
Scenario C
Number of Faculty

0
500
268
448
417
(Teaching)

Number of Faculty

0
0

25

250
195
(Research)

Number of Faculty

0
0
0
79

628
(Teaching/ Research)

Number of Teaching

0
1
0

186
177
Assistant

28
Number of Research

0
0
0
0

115

Staff

Number of Support
Table 7. Summary of scenarios

337
331
298
287
248

Staff
ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT

Number of
0
0
165
155
132

Administrator/ Faculty

Number of Pure
0
0
0

74
71

Administrator

Cost (in M PhP/week)

29.947
29.250
25.041
20.607
20.877
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Figure 1a. Block diagram for interactions between staff categories in an HEI

ADMINISTRATION SUPERVISION
(SUPERVISION)

FACULTY RESEARCH
(RESEARCH)

SUPPORT SUPPORT STAFF

(SUPPORT)

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Figure 1b. P-graph representation for interactions between staff categories in an HEI

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Figure 2a. Block diagram for a staff category

INPUT OUTPUT
STAFF CATEGORY
STREAMS STREAMS

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Figure 2b. P-graph representation of a staff category

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Figure 3. Equivalent P-graph representation of Table 2

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Figure 4. HR structure for baseline scenario

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Figure 5. HR structure for Scenario A

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Figure 6. HR structure for Scenario B

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Figure 7. HR structure for Scenario C

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Figure 8. HR structure for Scenario D

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