Model the Competencies and Abilities of Middle Education Managers: a Mixed Research

The purpose of this study was to design a competency model for middle managers in education for use in the assessment center. This research was of mixed type (qualitative-quantitative). First, in the qualitative stage, exploratory study was performed and the research approach was deductive-inductive. The research method is descriptive in the quantitative part and the correlation research design is structural equation modeling. The research community in the qualitative section was all experts, professors, and senior managers in the field of human resources in education and training. 22 experts were interviewed by snowball sampling method and 25 of them were selected in the Delphi section. The statistical population in the quantitative stage were all senior and middle managers of the Department of Education in Tehran who were selected as a sample by cluster sampling method of 462 people. The research instrument was a semi-structured interview in the qualitative stage and a researcher-made questionnaire in the quantitative stage. For data analysis in qualitative part, open and axial coding and Delphi analysis methods were used, and in quantitative part, descriptive analysis, correlation analysis and second-order confirmatory factor analysis were used. The results showed that the components of the competency model of middle managers in education and training for use in the assessment center are knowledge competence, professional competence, personality traits, executive competence, leadership competence, communication competence and perceptual competence. In the quantitative part, the results of the second-order confirmatory factor analysis with the covariance matrix approach confirmed the validity of the model.