Introduction
The changes in all aspects of human life are increasing. The movement towards globalization and access to free markets has made organizations to prepare themselves for rapid environmental changes. Managers consider culture as one of the key reasons for organizational change; lack of attention to it is one of the important reasons for organizations’ failure to adapt to the environmental changes [1, 2]. The internationalization of higher education is an effective strategy to meet the diverse needs of society. One of the factors determining the failure or success of internationalization is the organizational culture of universities. The present study aims to investigate the role of organizational culture-related factors in the internationalization of Iranian universities.
Materials and Methods
In this qualitative and applied study, the data collection tool was a researcher-made questionnaire as a self-report tool with 56 close-ended questions based on the information obtained by interviewing the participants (experts in higher education and those involved in internationalization of universities). Stratified random sampling was used to select participants. The sample size was determined 124 based on Krejcie & Morgan’s Table. In order to measure the validity of questionnaire, it was sent to 25 experts. After receiving feedback, the questionnaire was modified. The reliability using Cronbach’s alpha was obtained 0.981. SPSS version 24 and AMOS version 24 applications were used for quantitative data analysis. Data analysis was done using first-order and second-order factor analysis by structural equation modeling.
Results
The literature review and interviews with experts led to finding 608 concepts related to organizational culture for the internationalization of universities were identified. By open coding, 56 codes were obtained. By axial coding, the 56 codes were grouped into 10 main categories (factors). By selective coding, a core category was derived from the 10 categories. According to the output of AMOS and according to the fit indices, it was found that the internationalization model had a very good fit to the data. As shown in Table 1, the factor with the highest loading was “communication & interaction” (1.03) and the factor with the lowest loading was “human/physical/financial resources” (0.87).


Discussion
The results of the first-rank confirmatory factor model for each factors showed that, among the subscales of the management & leadership factor, “participatory management” had the highest factor loading. Among the subscales of the factor of human/physical/financial resources, “employee motivation system” had the highest factor loading. Among the subscales of the factor of faculty professors, “teaching and research ability of professors” had the highest factor loading. Among the subscales of the factor of language, culture and values, the “Persian-Islamic culture” and “type and priority of organizational values ​​in the university” had the highest factor loading. Among the subscales of the factor of communication & interaction, “the level of communication and interaction at the university level” had the highest factor loading. Among the subscales of the factor of educational, research and welfare services, “holding cultural and sporting events in the university” had the highest factor loading. Among the subscales of the factor of organizational growth and excellence, “the ranking of the university” and “considering the principles of the learning organization” had the highest factor loading. Among the subscales of the factor of creativity & innovation, “the use of creativity and innovation in the university” had the highest factor loading. Among the subscales of the factor of organizational structure, “information management” had the highest factor loading. Finally, among the subscales of the factor of students, “the cultural, ethnical, and personality characteristics of students”, had the highest factor loading.
For the internationalization of iranian universities, the most important factor with the highest ranking was communication & interaction, while the least important factor with the lowest ranking was human/physical/ financial resources. 

Ethical Considerations
Compliance with ethical guidelines
This study was approved by the ethics committee of Islamic Azad University, Rasht Branch (Code: IR.IAU.RASHT.REC.1400.035)

Funding
The study was extracted from the PhD thesis of the first author. 

Authors' contributions
Conceptualization and data analysis: Mohammad Reza Heidari, Mehrdad Goudarzvand Chegini; design, data collection, writing, editing & review: All authors.

Conflicts of interest
The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank all participants for their cooperation in this research.

References

1. Lohrasbi A. [The Relationship between Organizational Culture and Change Management in the Public Offices of Karaj (Persian)]. Res Edu Leadersh Manage. 2016; 3(9): 127-147. [DOI:10.22054/jrlat.2018.16738.1255].
2. Cameron KS, Quinn R, editors. Diagnosing and Changing Organizational Culture: Based on the Competing Values Framework. San Francisco; John Wiley & Sons; 2011. [Link]
3. Yari Khiyavi S, Alidoust Gahfarrokhi E, Jalali Farahani M. [A study of the relationship between organizational culture and organizational citizenship behavior in ministry of sport and youth (Persian)]. J Sport Manage. 2016; 8(2): 299-313. [DOI:10.22059/JSM.2016.59156]
4. Driskill GW. Organizational culture in action: A cultural analysis workbook. New York: Routledge. 2018. [DOI:10.4324/9780429427473]
5. Desselle SP, Raja L, Andrews B, Lui J. Perceptions of organizational culture and organizational citizenship by faculty in US colleges and schools of pharmacy.Curr Pharm Teach Learn. 2018; 10(4):403-12. [DOI:10.1016/j.cptl.2017.12.017] [PMID]
6. Sokhanvar M, Mosadeghrad A. [Organizational culture of selected hospitals of Tehran city (Persian)]. J Hosp. 2017; 16(2).46-57. [Link]
7. Ali Akbari Kia M, Amini Sabegh Z, Sadeh E. [Designing and explaining the ethics-oriented organizational culture model to promote office health using a mixed approach (data foundation theory- structural equation modeling (Persian)]. J Ministry Health Med Edu. 2020; 4(1): 66-74. [Link]
8. Amiri Ghale Rashidi N, Namazi shabestari A, Arab yarmohammadi A, Mazinani M, Masoud Sinaki S. [Survey on organizational culture based on the denison model; case study tehran university of medical sciences (Persian)]. J Hosp. 2019; 18(3):43-52. [Link]
9. Rezaie Farhadabad R, Ghasemi Y, Amin Mozafari F. [Exploring the relationship between disciplinary culture and other academic aultures: The case of Tabriz university
   (Persian)]. J Soc Probl Iran. 2015; 6(2):281-304. [DOI:10.22059/ijsp.2015.58562]
10. Pasandideh J, Ahmady G, Dehghanzadeh A. [Academic culture and its changes in Iran (Persian)]. J Edu Stud. 2018; 7:34-22. [Link]
11. Bagheri Heydari F. [Investigating the factors affecting academic identity among students: A case study of universities (Payame Noor, Azad and non-profit) (Persian)]. Cult Islam Uni. 2017; 5(4)17:587-600. [Link]
12. Ebrahimi R, Adli F, Mehran G. [The role of academic culture on the knowledge creation from perspectives of experts of the higher educational system (Persian)]. Q J Res Plan High Edu. 2015; 21(1):127-151. [Link]
13. Fathi Vajargah K, Arefi M, Zamani Manesh H. [Evaluating admission barriers of foreign students into universities and institutions of higher education (Persian)]. Q J Res Plan High Edu. 2012; 17(4):65-80. [Link]
14. Zahedpasha S, Niyaz Azari K, Taghvaee Yazdi M. [Analyzing the globalization of education; identifying the existing dimensions and status (Case Study: Islamic Azad Universities of Mazandaran province, Iran) (Persian)]. Edu Strategies. 2021; 14(4):208-219. [Link]
15. Knight J. A shared vision? Stakeholders' perspectives on the internationalization of higher education in Canada. J Stud Int Edu. 1997; 1(1):27-44. [DOI:10.1177/102831539700100105]
16. Knight J, de Wit H. Internationalization of higher education in Asia Pacific countries. European Association for International Education; 1997. [Link]
17. Ghasemzadeh F, Edalatian Shahriari J, Mohammadi M. [Designing model for the internationalization of iran's higher education (case study: One of the university payam-e-nour branch's in Gorgia) (Persian). J Islam Life Style Cent Health. 2019; 3(3):145-162. [Link]
18. Galavandi H, Hasani M, Moradi Z. [Analysis and evaluation of the country's universities status in the indicators of internationalization of higher education from the perspective of students (Persian)]. Q J Public Organiz Manage. 2018; 6(3):157-173. [Link]
19. Heidari MR, Goudarzvand Chegini M, Rezaee Kelidbari H, Rezaei Dizagh M. [Evaluation of effective organizational culture components of internationalization of universities in the country (Persian)]. J Med Edu Develop. 2021; 14 (43):48-63. [DOI:10.52547/edcj.14.43.48]
20. Fallah V, Yousefi R, Tahmasbzadeh, SS, 2016, [The Impact of organizational culture on the internationalization of the study university: islamic azad universities of Mazandaran province (Persian)]. Paper peresent: The fourth international conference on management, accounting, banking and economics in Iran's horizon 1404. 19 May 2017; Tehran, Iran.[Link]
21. Jafari S, Rahimian H, Abbaspour A, Ghiasi Nedooshan S, Khorsandi Taskoh A. [A model for internationalization of universities in the fields of humanities and social science (Persian)]. J high Educ Curriculum Stud. 2018; 9(17):67-91. [Link]
22. Valimoghaddam S, Kamali N, Mojtabazadeh M. [Design and validation of the internationalization model of higher education in medical sciences universities (Persian)]. Edu Strategies. 2021; 14(2):49-61. [Link]
23. Moosavi MM, Azizi M, Badizadeh A, Rezghi Shirsavar H. [Identifying the components of internationalization of higher education (case study: Medical services education industry) (Persian)]. J Healthc Manage. 2019; 9(4):7-19. [Link]
24. De Wit H, Altbach PG. Internationalization in higher education: global trends and recommendations for its future. Policy Rev High Edu. 2021; 5(1):28-46. [DOI:10.1080/23322969.2020.1820898]
25. Xuan Q. The Influence of organizational culture on internationalization of universities: A Case Study of mahidol university international college. J Hum Sci. 2018; 10(1):1-13. [DOI:10.20319/pijss.2015.s21.7281]
26. Palovaara K. The Impact of Globalisation on Organisational Culture. [BA. Thesis]. Metropolia: University of Wolverhampton; 2017. [Link]
27. Niehaus E, Williams L. Faculty transformation in curriculum transformation: The role of faculty development in campus internationalization. Innov High Ed. 2016; 41(1):59-74. [DOI:10.1007/s10755-015-9334-7]