The way managers do their job has changed significantly over time. This is connected to changes in the economy. Today, the economy is changing due to digital technology, environmental concerns, and the need to manage change. Contemporary trends reflected in professional and academic publications explore new approaches and challenges in management. This research has two aims. Firstly, it will analyse the research topics of master's theses in management at four Slovenian faculties belonging to three public universities. Secondly, it will assess how well they align with current trends in management.

Due to the large volumes of digitally stored text, text mining has recently become popular in various fields of research. Text mining focuses on extracting meaningful information from unstructured or semi-structured text data sets. In this study, the text mining approach is used to analyse the abstracts, titles and keywords of master's theses in Slovenian faculty. Firstly, information was gathered from public university archives, and then an investigation was conducted using the open-source machine learning programme Orange with the Text Mining add-on extension. The methodologies employed include word frequency analysis, topic modelling and keyword co-occurrence analysis. A comparative method was used to assess the extent to which the research topics reflected global trends. This was achieved by comparing trends exposed in bibliometric research articles. The research examined how closely the topics of Slovenian master’s theses in management reflect global trends and which themes dominate within institutions.

The results of the study suggest that research topics only partly reflect global trends. Topic modelling confirmed that certain research themes appeared more frequently within specific programmes of study and faculties, suggesting a possible influence of the institutional environment on the formation of research orientations. A comparative analysis of research trends such as digitalisation, sustainability and innovation in management showed that Slovenian master's theses largely follow global research directions.

This research represents the first systematic analysis of thematic trends in Slovenian master’s theses in management and public administration. It lays the groundwork for further comparative studies and contributes to the enhancement of academic research practices. Furthermore, it opens new opportunities for future research and cross-disciplinary comparisons. The study contributes to a deeper scholarly understanding of how institutional environments shape research orientations and highlights important considerations for the continued internationalisation of academic research in Slovenia.

Keywords: Trends, management, master's theses, text mining.