ABSTRACT
Following incorporation, the trend in further education colleges had been to reduce the proportion of expenditure spent on academics while increasing the proportion of administrative and support staff. To some extent this was unavoidable. Colleges needed to take on staff to do jobs, such as personnel and finance, which were previously undertaken by the local authorities. There was also, however, the view that relatively highly paid academics were undertaking a range of tasks which could be performed more cost effectively by other staff. ‘Horses for courses’ became an important principle in achieving greater financial efficiency.
