The appreciative democratic voice of DEA: A case of faculty academic performance evaluation Muhittin Oral a, * , Amar Oukil b , Jean-Louis Malouin c , Ossama Kettani d a Graduate School of Business, Özye gin University, 34794 Istanbul, Turkey b College of Economics and Political Science, Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat, Oman c University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce, Bangkok, Thailand d Faculté des sciences de l’administration, Université Laval, Québec City, Canada article info Article history: Available online xxx Keywords: DEA Appreciative democratic voice Self and cross-efficiency Faculty evaluation Academic performance Judgmental decision abstract Data envelopment analysis (DEA) is in fact more than just being an instrument for measuring the relative efficiencies of a group of decision making units (DMU). DEA models are also means of expressing appreciative democratic voices of DMUs. This paper proposes a methodology for allocating premium points to a group of professors using three models sequentially: (1) a DEA model for appreciative aca- demic self-evaluation, (2) a DEA model for appreciative academic cross-evaluation, and (3) a Non-DEA model for academic rating of professors for the purpose of premium allocations. The premium results, called DEA results, are then compared with the premium points “nurtured” by the Dean, called N bonus points. After comparing DEA results and N bonus points, the Dean reassessed his initial bonus points and provided new ones e called DEA-N decisions. The experience indicates that judgmental decisions (Dean’s evaluations) can be enhanced by making use of formal models (DEA and Non-DEA models). Moreover, the appreciative and democratic voices of professors are virtually embedded in the DEA models. Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction This paper looks at DEA formulations from a different perspec- tive and defends their “appreciative democratic voice” dimension within a particular context of faculty performance evaluation. The term “appreciative democratic voice” deserves an opening expla- nation and its relation with the self and cross-efficiency DEA models, as well as the Non-DEA model that will be given later. The word “appreciative” accentuates the positive, and avoids the negative, when an individual, unit, department, organization, or a situation is being assessed, evaluated, or considered. The concept of appreciative approach, like “appreciative inquiry”, takes the idea of the social construction to its positive extreme [3]. According to Ref. [4] Appreciative Inquiry “AI” is about the search for the best in people, their organizations, and the strengths-enriched world around them. In its broadest focus, “AI” involves systematic discovery of everything that gives “life” to a living system when it is most alive, effective and flourishing, and most capable in economic, ecological, and human terms. As will be seen shortly, the self-efficiency DEA model as origi- nally formulated by Charnes et al. [1]; CCR model henceforth, has this very feature in evaluating a decision making unit (DMU). The term “democratic voice” refers to the participation of each DMU in affirmative self-evaluation with equal rights. In CCR model, each and every DMU has the same right in evaluating themselves favorably. The original CCR model, and many that followed after, is in fact much more than an instrument for calculating the relative efficiencies of each and every DMU. It reflects and conveys a strong message of being appreciative self-efficiency and optimist for all DMUs and thus resonates and accentuates a philosophy of favoring each and every DMU. In a sense, the value system of each DMU is taken into consideration subject to the constraint that no DMU takes on an efficiency value greater than unity. This feature of the CCR will be discussed in more detail in Section 3. As the practice of DEA applications has widely grown in many decision making contexts, some new concepts and formulations have emerged. One of them is the concept of cross-efficiency. For instance, Sexton et al. [22], Oral et al. [19], Doyle & Green [7,9], Green et al. [11], and Oral [18,17] offered the ways by which the appreciative cross-efficiency scores can be obtained and used. * Corresponding author. Tel.: þ90 5338182607; fax: þ90 2165649046. E-mail address: Muhittin.Oral@ozyegin.edu.tr (M. Oral). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Socio-Economic Planning Sciences journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/seps 0038-0121/$ e see front matter Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.seps.2013.08.003 Socio-Economic Planning Sciences xxx (2013) 1e9 Please cite this article in press as: Oral M, et al., The appreciative democratic voice of DEA: A case of faculty academic performance evaluation, Socio-Economic Planning Sciences (2013), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.seps.2013.08.003