HUMANE

Heads of University Management & Administration Network in Europe

SEMINAR

University of Warwick

Friday 29^th to Saturday 30^th April 2005

HRM: Reorganising universities, a threat or an opportunity?

Abstracts

The University of Warwick: An Enterprising Administration

Jon Baldwin, University of Warwick (UK)

All universities are expected to demonstrate value for money in their administrative functions for justification to their academic communities. How does the administration at the University of Warwick seek to demonstrate value in the context of organisational change? This session will focus on the importance of the senior management team and the University of Warwick’s developing ‘Administrative & Services Departments Annual Review’.

Experiences with the merger between the two Manchester universities

Dugald Mackie, University of Manchester (UK)

In October 2004, UMIST (University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology) and the Victoria University of Manchester merged to create the University of Manchester, which in terms of financial turnover and numbers of full-time students is now the largest higher education institution in the U.K. Both predecessor institutions were legally dissolved which has allowed the new University to create new policies, procedures and structures in relation to the human resource management of its staff.

HRM policies and the role of the Unions

Dirk Mangeleer, Universiteit Gent (BE)

What kind of trends do we observe in the human resources policy in the universities of the Flemish community and particularly in the Ghent University. Universities in the Flemish community focus on core business, viz scientific research and education. A view on the evolution of the Staff establishment is an indicator of this policy. Tools, used for staff matters, are more and more implemented in the universities of the Flemish communities.

Improvement of the administration by self-evaluation

J.P. Schäfer, Universität Siegen (DE)

The topic of the seminar is, of course, very important for the future of our universities.

In Siegen, we are right now in the process of evaluating our administration as part of  an overall evaluation of the university.

Our internal evaluation is moderated by Mrs.  Hartmann from Hamburg, a leading expert in this field.

In my short speech I could say something about this process, the way it is being carried out and our expectations.

One important feature was to get together groups of staff members for a process of self-evaluation in a very open discussion and brain-storming (without the higher ranks of staff members).

After collecting critical opinions and suggestions, three major groups were created to put all this into a framework.

In February 2005 we had our first open meeting of the entire administration, moderated by Mrs. Hartmann and myself, where these three groups presented their lists of proposals. Separately, Mrs. Hartmann made interviews with the higher ranks of the administration and with the Rectorate of the University.

The process of self-evaluation is supposed to lead into a process of the balanced scorecard.

We have the aim to combine mainly four parts: doing our job effectively, economically, with a positive orientation to our clients and with employees who are satisfied with their job.

All the items listed up in the questions put to the speakers are part of this overall evaluation.

Of course, it will not be easy to find concrete and effective answers on a short-term basis.

What we in Siegen have done so far is, e.g., creating a position in the administration for personnel development and changing parts of the structure of the departments in the administration.

If this sounds interesting to you, I could prepare a short statement and then discuss this with our colleagues

Introduction to workshop I: The Dutch system of employment terms

Hugo Levie – VSNU (NL)

1. Introduction of the speaker

2. How are labour relations shaped in NL, what is since 1997 the role of the collective agreement, what is the role of the unions and what is their position?

3. Does the Ministry of Education have a special role regarding labour relations and conditions at Dutch Universities?

4. Human Resources management at Dutch universities: an uphill struggle for career management

5. Reorganisation at Dutch universities: a tool for change?

6. Topical issues:

Ø relevance of the collective agreement for academic staff

Ø job ranking as a basis for career management

Ø management of competence

Ø academic leadership

Introduction to workshop II: Challenges in reorganising university companies Esa Ahonen, Helsinki School of Economics (FI)

Helsinki School of Economics (HSE) organised its executive education (continuing education) in the form of a limited company called JOKO Executive Education Ltd. (JOKO) in 1996. In 1997 we started HSE Holding Ltd company that owns JOKO (that also has subsidiary in Singapore) and LTT-Research Ltd that operates in the field of applied business research. The total turnover of the companies was in 1996 approx. €3,5 Million and in 2004 it was approx. €10Million.

When we transferred the executive training operations from the university to the limited company (wholly owned by the university/special donated funds), all transactions were fully transparent and involved no subsidies. Staff was moved from state to the private company and terms of employment were adjusted to compensate differences in the terms. This will be described in more detail.

During the first years the company was growing rapidly, but in the beginning of the new century the market changed and turnover started to slide down. After a careful analysis we came to the conclusion that the company has to renew its competencies in order to be successful in meeting the new requirements set by the customers. We had to reduce our secreterial staff that had grown too much during the good years and hire new staff with higher competencies.

This was a very tough and interesting exercise with contradictory goals and tensions. The Board had to do relatively quick moves to avoid losses, but on the other hand it is always very difficult for state universities (including their companies) and state as general to reduce staff without getting much bad publicity. We managed the difficult situation well by using a mixture of actions resulting in lower personnel expenditure. Even if the process was slower that it would have been in most private companies, the result was good and the companies are back in the growth track.