HUMANE
Heads of University Management &
Administration Network in Europe
SEMINAR
Universidad de Córdoba
Friday 18th
to Saturday 19th May 2001
Summary
|
One of the Working Groups set up by HUMANE as
part of its TNP activity set out to review the subject of space management in
European Universities. This work had in turn been inspired by initial
consideration of various environmental topics.
Distinctions between such closely related topics risk being artificial,
and the seminar was designed both to discuss the precise findings of the
Working Group (as at May 2001), and to consider other linked issues which might
be developed in the future.
The HUMANE Space Management
Questionnaire
Christine Challis (London School of Economics) and Luciano Galan (Universidad Autonoma de Madrid)
This introductory session
gave an analysis of the main results and issues raised by a survey which had
been circulated to all member institutions of the network. It opened by
outlining the main objectives of the group:
(i)
to
provide comparative information to support members of HUMANE in the task of
managing the university estate effectively as part of their role in the
implementation of institutional strategy;
(ii)
advancing
common interests across the higher education sector in Europe and keeping in
touch with best/good practice in universities or university institutions;
(iii)
awareness
of strengths and weaknesses of the estate, of use of space and the
environmental impact;
(iv)
to
identify European-wide space management issues in universities, to draw to the
attention of governments and other authorities.
The Group had been co-ordinated by Christine
Challis and Luciano Galan. Other members of the Group were: Françoise Granger
(Ecole Normale Superieure de Lyon), Anne-Grete Holmsgaard (Danmarks Tekniske
Universitet), Gaetano Serafino (Universita degli Studi di Firenze) and two
colleagues with professional responsibilities in the field: Chris Kudlicki
(Head of Estates at LSE) and Betty de Keizer (Universiteit van Amsterdam). This composition gave a broad range of
national experience and specialist involvement
The Group had circulated a comprehensive
questionnaire to members of the HUMANE network to gather information on how
space is managed in the different universities or university institutions; to
establish whether the estate strategy is an integral part of the university’s
academic and development; to identify trends, gaps in knowledge about the
estate, best practice, extent of benchmarking, and innovative approaches to
space and environmental management.
Fifty-two (52) responses had been received from
universities or university institutions in over 15 countries. The statistical
analysis of replies which was presented to the seminar was based on 50 replies
as two had not arrived in time to be included.
The questionnaire had provided a great deal of material,
and a large amount of statistical data
which had needed careful analysis. In
fact, the practical comment – even at an anecdotal level – had often turned out
to be more important or significant than the strictly statistical
analysis. It had also become apparent
that some concepts meant different things in different languages and cultures,
and this had led to some disparities in initial answers. Words like “ownership”, “budget”, or “waste”
could mean different things. Even the
idea of a strategic plan could range from a formal document to a set of
aspirations.
A full copy of the questionnaire and of the
major findings will be part of the report submitted to the Commission following
the third year of the HUMANE Thematic Network activity. In the interim, the main points to emerge
from the survey could be summarised as follows.
·
Two
thirds of institutions responding had an annual income of less than 200 million
euros, with 37% at less than 100 m euros.
Responses were thus from smaller, rather than larger institutions.
·
On
average, institutions had 16,668 full-time students (73% of total), 2,613
part-time (11%), 1915 distance learning (8%) and another 1,874 (also 8%)
registered but not attending.
·
The
median figure for student numbers was 12,375 – that is, half of institutions
were above this figure, and half below.
Of those with fewer than the median, two thirds had fewer than 36
separate buildings, while one third had more than 36. In the larger institutions the proportions were reversed.
·
Average
staff figures were 1,129 full-time equivalent academic staff and 1,146
non-teaching or research staff. One of
the strongest correlations in the whole survey was that there is one member of
staff (all categories) for every seven students. The median figure for staff was 2,000.
·
The
great majority of institutions had a strategic plan, although 14% did not.
·
Of
all institutions, 74% had an estates strategy – and more usually it was the
smaller ones.
·
Only
24% of respondents had a strategic environmental plan – and the
relatively high percentage of those with commercial partnerships suggested that
private enterprise might be a motivator here.
·
Only
a third of institutions participate in benchmarking exercises.
·
More
than half of all institutions have three or more locations/campuses.
·
About
half of all buildings had been built in the last 30 years, with a major
concentration built between 1970 and 1990.
However, the fact that 12% of buildings dated from before 1900 showed
that there should be a special interest here.
·
On
average well over 60% of gross internal area was devoted to academic purposes,
while 5% was given over to office use for central administration.
·
Space
requirements are expanding for most institutions, and stable or declining for
only 21%. Space requirements for those with 3 or more locations are expanding
faster than for those with only one or two locations.
·
The
introduction of IT has required re-organisation of space and services, at some
considerable cost. The biggest changes envisaged in future in this area concern
the building of new pc rooms and the provision of open access to such rooms.
Better space management is seen as the key, rather than increasing network
capacity.
·
The
two most frequent methods of space intensification were sharing of facilities
between departments and increasing the length of the teaching day. Desk sharing and remote working were at the
bottom of the list.
General discussion of these and related issues
led to various observations on the comparability of terms or contexts
throughout Europe. For example, ownership of buildings was something which varied
with national systems. In Germany,
universities did not own their own buildings - therefore, if German
universities were prominent in the survey the average figure would be
distorted. Meanwhile, since the
questionnaire had asked whether universities owned all their buildings,
there was a risk that a negative answer might cover various situations and
percentages. These and other comments
were noted for future reference. In
general terms, the participants were impressed by the sorts of figures which
were given, and saw them as a very useful means of placing their own
institutions in context.
Changing
environments for learning: integrating the physical and
virtual estate
Andrew Harrison (Director of Research & Methods, DEGW Architects and Consultants, UK)
Andrew Harrison set his
presentation in the context of globalisation and new mobile communications
technologies which called for new models of workplace and property management.
He illustrated ways in which new types of businesses are emerging and
traditional organisations are completely re-inventing themselves. Work is no longer “nine
to five”.[1]
We live in a “24/7” performance culture.
Global organisations are always open for business. Access to information, speed
and flexibility become key success criteria. There is increased outsourcing of
non-critical activities and organisations are re-defining their core assets.
In the last decade there
had been a resultant shift from thinking of real estate as a necessary overhead
to seeing it as a key tool in the re-design of the business process, and now as
something that can constrain the organisation’s choices and threaten its very
survival. Andrew’s argument was that the core assets of many organisations now
are intangible: their customer base, their knowledge base and the
power of their brand.
Similarly, the role of the workplace in many organisations is being fundamentally re-thought. Opportunities for sharing space, for incorporating working from home and other locations, and the use of information technology to allow the creation of virtual workplaces will all significantly affect the amount, location and type of space occupied by organisations.
The question for participants was: Is a similar
radical re-think of the use of space in higher education also occurring? Recent
analysis of space utilisation in British HEIs has repeatedly found low levels
of utilisation of teaching spaces. Typical utilisation figures of 20% or 30% in
the mid-1990s had hardly improved since that time. It was Andrew Harrison’s
contention that low utilisation is a cultural issue, not an estates issue as
such – as long as departments were allowed to see space as a “free good”, and
to maintain conservative views on timetabling, this would remain a problem.[2] Meanwhile the utilisation of research space,
departmental space and informal interaction spaces is often ignored, with
(arguably) too much emphasis on teaching rooms.
The context of higher education is also changing
fundamentally, with increased diversity in terms of how learning takes place
and how it is supported across space and time. How is the university estate
responding to these changes in teaching and learning practice? The need to integrate physical and virtual
space is now crucial.
The presentation went on to discuss new
paradigms for HE real estate delivery, offering case studies of innovative
physical and virtual learning environments, and looking at the implications for
the utilisation of real estate. A key issue will be the continuing importance
of ‘place’ for HE institutions in the future as the experience of being
at university provides opportunities for interaction and networking as well as
for skills development. IT-based learning will be supplemented with a much
richer mix of interaction spaces. The
ability to re-configure space rapidly will be a major example of introducing
changes in attitude about the academic workplace..
Ways of encouraging cultural change might
include research partnerships with commercial organisation, which would expose
academic staff to new ways of working, and also the creation of mixed user
groups which might look at new ways of working before a new project is
launched, thus removing the sense of threat which often accompanies new
arrangements. Any new design and
construction projects should include explicit programmes of change management.
In the course of discussion the analogies
between academic life and commercial organisations were explored. While most participants found these useful,
several members took issue with the assumptions about increased flexibility,
pointing out that – especially in institutions with very old buildings – there
was no scope for altering intended purpose.
What use could be made of a medieval chapel when it was not being used
for religious or other ceremonial occasions?
Moreover, it was recognised by all, including the presenter, that place
was vital in establishing the university as something with which to identify,
often representing a link to tradition and history and definitely being part of
a brand image.
Space Management in Germany
with special reference to Baden-Württemberg
The seminar moved on to more detailed or
particular references to individual countries.
Dietmar Ertmann explained that in Germany, university policy is a matter
for the Länder (regional States). Therefore one might have 16 different
approaches on particular issues. In most of the German Länder the
university does not own its property (with the exception of endowments). The
funds for construction and maintenance are not part of the university‘s budget
but are managed by the state property agency (Vermögens- und Hochbauamt). Construction and maintenance work is subject
to intense negotiation between the university, the state property agency and
the finance ministry to which that agency reports:
·
For
small repairs the agency will give the university a financial limit within
which the university can directly mandate builders. Each individual order must
not exceed 2,500 euros.
·
Maintenance
jobs up to 75,000 euros can be negotiated with the agency on an annual basis.
For that purpose the estate agency receives a maintenance budget according to a
percentage of the reconstruction value of the buildings within its district.
·
Smaller
construction work (up to 375,000 euros) can also be directly negotiated with
the state agency on the basis of its discretionary budget.
Major
construction works costing from 375,000 euros to 1.5 Million (m) euros have to
be budgeted in advance by the Finance Ministry. Finally, construction work costing
more than 1.5 m Euro will be co-financed by the Federation (Bund) and the
Länder. Fifty per cent of the money comes from Federal funds. This means that a
project has to be approved not only by the Land authorities but also by the
Federation. The planning period is at least one and a half years.
Dietmar outlined the small number of exceptions
to these general rules, most notably in Berlin, where since re-unification the
three universities had a budget previously sufficient for only two, and where
the legal provisions had been relaxed to allow universities to sell land or
property in order to supplement their income.
As Dietmar explained, the general system is not
exactly geared to the most economical
use of space. Economies made in the use of space do not necessarily translate
into savings in the university’s budget, with the exception of heating and
electricity charges. The conference of German university administrators had
urgently asked for a new space management system in their Frankfurt declaration
from September 2000. Some Länder (Berlin, Rhineland-Palatinate and
Lower-Saxony) had already implemented various changes. Some institutions try to
pave the way for a proper system of facilities management, while others try to
use private sponsorship to circumvent the heavy state structures.
In Baaden-Wurtenburg the State budget for
building work was of the order of 300 m euros per year – around 10% of the
total budget for higher education in the Land.
The Land government had decided that, of this 300 m euros, 75 million
would be reserved for major construction work, 125 million would be for
small-scale building work, while 100 million would be set aside for
maintenance. This latter sum
represented about 1% of a 10 billion euro market value.
The advantages of such a scheme, with ear-marked
funds, were that it guaranteed that some financial provision would be made,
whereas in general, as American colleagues might say, “maintenance ain’t
sexy”! The budget makes sure that work
is done without the risk of competition from other areas. Generally, architects and builders work well
together.
The disadvantages were that universities were
still dependent on another agency to agree the work, and dependent also on the
political atmosphere at any given time.
The ultimate decision on which work was to be done lay with the agency,
and this could mean that the restoration murals might take precedence over the
glass-fibre connections which a university might regard as a more central
strategic aim. Universities in Baaden-Wurtemburg
had requested a greater element of ownership, for example in undertaking minor
works at their own discretion, or arrangements for creating “matching
funds”. Dietmar also drew attention to
the problems where SME’s were exempt from penalty clauses in work done for
universities. This led to
inefficiencies, since in the event of any scheduling conflict builders would
naturally concentrate on work which was subject to such penalty provision.
Estate Management within the
University Sector in Sweden
Curt Karlsson, Linköpings Universitet,
Sweden
In Sweden, a new system of estate/space
management had been established in 1993. Universities have not been allowed to
own and run their own buildings since 1830, and until 1993 one of the central
agencies of the State, The National Board of Building, was responsible
for the supply of buildings for universities and colleges. This agency was strictly controlled by the
government. Every investment worth mentioning had to be approved by Government
(and quite often by Parliament, too). The process was extremely rigid and slow
and in many ways also inefficient - the needs often changed during the process,
so that even brand-new buildings were a little out of date when the first
tenants moved in. Besides, since the universities did not pay any rent, the
buildings were effectively free of charge, with the result that the demands of
space and quality became much higher than they would have been if a price
mechanism had been in operation.
At the beginning of the 1990s, the Swedish
Government changed from input to output control of the universities as well as
of other authorities within the State sector. The process of investment in
buildings described above was completely inconsistent with a system
characterised by management by objectives. The National Board of Building, one
of the cornerstones of the public sector in Sweden, was replaced by two
State-owned companies and one small agency, the latter responsible for
buildings of special cultural value, castles, diplomatic estates abroad etc.
One of the two companies, Akademiska Hus, was set up solely to offer
suitable premises for teaching and research within the university sector. All
State-owned property concerning the university sector was transferred from The
National Board of Building to Akademiska Hus, and formal rental agreements were
established between the universities and the company.
The new company has formulated the following
business concept:
“Akademiska Hus offers
universities and colleges attractive and efficient study and research
environments. The company is at the forefront in the development of these
environments and its operational platform is long-term ownership and
management.”
The owner of Akademiska Hus, the Swedish State,
has formulated three goals, one concerning the demand of the rate of returns
of capital invested in the company, one concerning the solidity, and
one concerning the yearly dividend. Having done so, Government has left
it to the universities and Akademiska Hus to decide upon investments and rental
agreements. The old, extremely centralised system has been replaced by a very
decentralised system. And it works very well, of course somewhat better in
theory than in practice but still so well that it is very appreciated among the
universities (and regarded with a slight suspicion within the Ministry of
Finance as the power over the investments and some flexibility has been
distributed to the universities and is no longer available within the
Ministry).
An important part of the system is that
Akademiska Hus has not been given any monopoly position as a supplier of
premises to universities and colleges. The company has a fairly strong position
with regard to the older and bigger universities, because their buildings in
most cases were owned by the Swedish state and were transferred to the company
when it was set up. But the buildings of some colleges were owned by private
companies or city or council authorities and still are. And when a university
wants a new building it is free to turn to any suitable estate company to get
the best conditions. When Linköpings university opened a new campus in its twin
city, Norrköping, it had established rental agreements there with Akademiska
Hus and with two private companies and the city council - a perfect market
situation.
As a consequence of the rental agreements, an
internal rental system had also been introduced, so that academic departments
have to pay for offices, laboratories and other premises on a yearly basis and
teaching premises on an hourly basis. The need for premises has been
considerably reduced by using these price mechanisms. But Curt Karlsson’s
message was that still more could be done in this area.
Space
Management in Ancient Buildings
Steve
Cannon, University of Aberdeen
Steve Cannon opened his
presentation with a deliberately retrospective look at the development of the
University and its campus. The creation
of a centre for higher education in Aberdeen had been the mission of Bishop
William Elphinstone. As the Bishop of Aberdeen, he recognised the need for
somewhere to educate the clerics and lawyers needed in Scotland. The idea found
favour with the young King James and in 1495 Bishop Elphinstone received the
Papal Bull from Pope Alexander VI. It took the Bishop until 1505 to secure the
funds and construct the fabric of the college itself. Much of Kings College
still remains today.
The University first opened with 36 staff and
students. Five hundred years later the University has in excess of 12,000
students. The University operates a
modular degree structure. It offers 697
different degree programmes and 2,160 different courses. Each year there are 60,000 course enrolments
and 66,167 degree assessments. Academic
activity takes place on 3 campuses covering 264 hectares.
Steve Cannon pointed out that this introductory
detail was necessary to understand the constraints which were imposed by
physical surroundings, and to appreciate the challenges posed in operating a
modern university in ancient buildings. The situation meant that the University had to reconcile a
conflict between the requirement to preserve a unique physical environment
whist allowing change and development in response to needs and circumstances. After presenting a pictorial tour to illustrate
the range of buildings in the University’s portfolio, Steve offered three short
case studies to demonstrate how ‘ancient’ buildings had been adapted for modern
use. This involved issues of
architectural heritage (and conservation areas) and the needs of legislation
dealing with disability.
The session also examined the ways in which the
introduction of new timetabling software had allowed the University to maximise
the use of existing space.
Polish Example
The final formal session of the seminar
comprised a discussion of the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland. It had been planned to have a discussion of
estate audit and cost benchmarking, based on a paper prepared by Dr T Skarbek
(Administrative Director) and Dr W J Brzeski (Director of Asset Management),
but in the event the presenters were unable to attend the meeting and the
discussion was led by Mr Chris Kudlicki, head of Estates at the London School
of Economics. The full text of the
planned presentation had been circulated, and amounted to some 18 pages. The main issues raised in the paper were as
follows:
·
The
number of historic buildings
·
The
university’s location in the city centre, but also in dispersed sites around
Krakow
·
Insufficient
facilities
·
A
large space (47%) allocated to administration and other service areas
(including corridors, etc)
·
A
lack of background information about the estate
·
A
claimed shortage of relevant management skills
·
High
maintenance costs.
It was immediately recognised in discussion that
in the absence of the authors there might be some risk of misunderstanding or
wrong assumptions. For example, the
idea that 47% of space was devoted to administration might look like an easy
target – but since this actually included corridors or “useless” space such as
stairwells, the actual administrative space would be much less.
The paper noted the fact that an already
difficult situation of a university adapting after many centuries of organic
growth had been compounded by the current transition of Poland to Western
democracy and a market-based economy.
There is growing competition for students and dwindling funds. (This
situation was clearly recognised by participants!). The University estimated that it could increase the number of
full-time students by 50% without damaging the level of education – but it was
not clear how this aim would fit with the idea that the present amount of space
per student/staff member was very low at 3 m2 per person. Moreover, the accommodation in the city
centre was in many cases unsuitable for modern tuition or conditions, and some
classes now had to be held in privately-owned buildings. A second campus had been built in the 1960s
but – in common with buildings of that era all over Europe – presented problems
of its own.
The University thus aimed to expand from about
80,000 m2 to over 200,000 m2 in the next decade. The figures given suggested that some 53% of
space was devoted to teaching or research, with the remainder on administration
and storage/corridors, etc. The growth
would be at a “Third Campus”, where 114,000 m2 of new space would be
built in two phases before a further 121,000 m2 brought the total of
additional space to 235,000 m2.
Student numbers would meantime grow from 30,000 to 50,000.
The University wished also to rationalise its
current use of space, and to derive a better return on assets. There would be significant re-location of
facilities. The University had engaged
a team of Canadian expert advisers, whose main conclusions are given here.
·
Give
up the bulk of privately rented buildings in the Old Town, to save on cash
flow.
·
Re-development
of Second Campus to provide good office and administrative use
·
Rationalise
use of campus buildings, in such a way as to generate income – this might
involve selling buildings to turn them into hotels, or turning spare land into
car parks.
·
Facility
management should be rationalised into one organisation.
It was recognised that a major problem had been
the lack of awareness of estate asset management issues over a period of 50
years when centrally-planned State dirigisme had treated buildings as mere
functional objects. Moreover, even when
democracy returned following the Solidarity break-through of the 1990s there
was a tendency to embrace decentralisation as the apparent answer to all
problems, whereas in fact this new tendency had merely been superimposed on the
existing structures, and had actually compounded the problems.
Seminar participants recognised the temptation
to seek advice from a strong free-market model such as North America, but also
felt that the financial and governmental constraints encountered in some shape
or form throughout Western Europe would have allowed sensitive and culturally
sympathetic advice from colleagues in this area. For example, the requirements
of UK universities to produce precise models of running costs for various
buildings might have offered good experience when the Jagellonian university
admitted that it had no formal procedures for collecting the relevant data in
its own survey. The survey had to some
extent fallen foul of the decentralisation effect, in that different types of
person were asked to do it in different areas, and there was a lack of facility
managers to deal with the treatment of precise data. Other anomalies were revealed, such as the fact that payroll
department was paying the wages of caretaking staff, or that in some cases
central administration was paying for heating costs in departments while a
Faculty might be paying for capital improvements. Definitions such as “useable area” or “total area” had also been
vague, and open to various interpretations.
All these factors made benchmarking all the more difficult.
Participants recognised that, mutatis mutandis,
these anomalies would be found wherever any university undertook the first
steps in an analytical process. The
fact that it was now being done in Krakow was seen as an essential part of the
evolution towards asset management, and the proposed definitions of different
kinds of area showed considerable promise. The managers were to be
congratulated not only on the initiative but also in the honesty with which
they had laid out their perceived problems.
This was entirely in keeping with the main philosophy of HUMANE, which
was to learn from joint discussion of common problems, as opposed to imagining
that any university was a model for others.
The seminar had opened with a civic reception in
the gardens of the Alcazar Palace, and concluded with a guided tour of the
Cathedral-Mosque, with its dizzying juxtaposition of Christian and Moslem
architecture. This tour was followed by
a visit to the archeological site of the Madinat-al-Zahra. Over a thousand years old, the city had been
an ambitious seat of power for the Caliph of the time – and a splendid example
of space management for administrative purposes! These various visits, together with a tour of a second campus,
and in addition to extreme hospitality by the University in gifts and meals, led
to a very full schedule.
[1] This expression (as when academic colleagues refer to administrators as having a “nine-to-five job”!) refers to the traditional office culture of working from nine a.m. to five p.m.
[2] It was interesting that one university represented at the seminar had tried to introduce new timetabling software, but had had to delay its implementation at an advanced stage of planning because the rigidity of departments over changing their traditional times of classes had brought the process to a halt.