Annual strategy day: continuing to build one institute
On 24 June, members of the Executive Board, unit chairs, department heads and education and research coordinators gathered to strengthen the basis for collaboration within the institute. This included discussions on how we can better organise ourselves, and what clear agreements we can make to deal with issues.
Opportunities for collaboration
The day began with inspiring presentations from each department or unit about their main priorities and goals. The presentations were clarifying and offered a glimpse into the activities within of our institute. This led to a better understanding of each other's work and revealed opportunities for collaboration on topics such as social safety, talent development, team science and scientific integrity.
Hemmo Smit: 'A nice initiative that ties in with today's theme is 'Psychology Connected'; an informal meeting held quarterly in which a few speakers are interviewed on a specific topic. This is open to all employees of the institute.'
Ambitious and realistic plans
After lunch, participants worked in groups with the task of presenting an ambitious and realistic plan around a specific theme. This resulted in surprising and feasible proposals.
The most popular proposal was to make a joint calendar of all research and educational events that are also of interest to other units. This would allow us to get to know each other better and learn from each other.
Gert-Jan Lelieveld: 'I see opportunities to create more overlap in working with social partners. Sometimes social partners are relevant to several departments.
For me, one institute is also reflected in how we make decisions. Now there is an executive board with portfolios of education and research within each department and the same goes for the institute. As coordinators, we are involved in this process. I'm glad that we now act together and decisions are made more broadly.
The Executive Board, together with interested colleagues, will concretise the plans conceived during the strategy day. This is how we continue to build one institute.
In these challenging times, it is important to have our foundations in order for matters that concern us all, such as recognition and rewards, open science, social safety and scientific integrity. Now is the time to further strengthen these foundations together, so that we become stronger and more resilient as an Institute and we can find and support each other as colleagues.
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