The need for strategic planning of the internationalization process in universities is inevitable. The key stakeholders in higher education institutions (HEIs) are expected to be involved in the strategy-making process. It is argued that international office professionals (IPs) are one of these key stakeholders and need to be part of strategy development. The study aims to explore IPs’ conceptualization of internationalization, their needs, and roles in the universities, as well as their perceptions of strategic planning, management, and institutionalization of internationalization in European and Turkish universities. In this qualitative research, 23 semi-structured interviews with IPs showed that they are not sufficiently involved in the strategy-making process and could not contribute to this with their expertise as expected. This non-involvement observed in both settings has led them to imitate quantitative global strategies similar to that of universities, like increasing the number of international students. Moreover, the comparative analysis showed that European universities utilize more democratic and participatory decision-making than Turkish universities, which have little or no participation of IPs in decision-making in internationalization.

对大学国际化进程进行战略规划的必要性是不可避免的。高等教育机构 (HEIs) 的主要利益相关者预计将参与战略制定过程。有人认为，国际办公室专业人员 (IP) 是这些关键利益相关者之一，需要成为战略制定的一部分。该研究旨在探讨知识产权人对国际化的概念、他们的需求和在大学中的作用，以及他们对欧洲和土耳其大学国际化的战略规划、管理和制度化的看法。在这项定性研究中，对 IP 进行的 23 次半结构化访谈表明，他们没有充分参与战略制定过程，也无法按照预期利用其专业知识为战略制定过程做出贡献。在这两种环境中观察到的这种不参与导致他们模仿类似于大学的定量全球策略，例如增加国际学生的数量。此外，比较分析表明，欧洲大学比土耳其大学采用更加民主和参与性的决策，土耳其大学很少或根本没有知识产权参与国际化决策。