A quick call with Erwin Muller about organisational development
Various meetings will be held over the next few weeks to discuss organisational development at Leiden University. On the agenda are a vision of organisation and management, an exploration of the central services organisation and a teaching logistics programme.
A range of stakeholders at the university will be consulted about the first aspects of this organisational development. They include the deans, vice-deans, directors of business operations at the faculties and managers of central services, as well as the University Council, the Board of Governors and various other bodies. Erwin Muller, Vice-Rector of Organisational Development, prepared the draft documents. We asked him to tell us more.
Erwin, what’s on the table?
'When I was appointed last year, one of my ambitions was to create organisational space. This means an agile organisation where staff can make good use of their talents and focus on their key tasks: from research and teaching to supporting these, and from policy development to its effective implementation. Based on recent discussions and analyses in various parts of the organisation, we have prepared draft documents on opportunities to achieve this.'
What is the aim of these documents?
'They are the starting point for a dialogue and consultation with a large number of stakeholders and should lead to recommendations for change. In this first phase, we are zooming in on scenarios for organising our central services and teaching logistics. Our draft organisational governance vision will also be discussed and will form an important basis for the choices we make. What will be our starting points? How will we collaborate at the organisation level? And how can we create clarity and transparency about our decision-making and student and staff participation?'
Why is it important that we work on this?
'We want to make a great contribution to society through our research and teaching, and to continue to do so – even in the event of sudden change. Apart from our desire to reduce the staff workload, we have realised we are unable to respond to unexpected developments. Take the cuts that are already affecting us but also those that will affect us even more. Or the geopolitical developments influencing our organisation. We sometimes get bogged down in the basics such as: Who is responsible for what? Who decides? How can we make shrewd decisions and commit to them? And how should we organise this change? We need an organisational structure and culture in which we work smarter together and operate in a less individualistic fashion, a structure and culture in which we build an agile, collaborative organisation with clear and transparent leadership.'
How does this relate to the cuts?
'We cannot see the vision for our university as separate from the cuts. The proposed organisational development should also create more efficacy and efficiency. Financial resources should be used as much as possible for research and teaching, our institution’s core task. We have to work on this together, make agreements and honour them. That’s how we can ensure our research and teaching flourish.'
You mention exploring the organisation of the central services as one of the plans. Will you also be looking at how the faculties are organised?
'We obviously need to look at that too – also in light of interdisciplinary collaboration. Collaboration between the central services and the faculties is crucial to our research and teaching. That will also be reflected in our organisational governance vision. And it is already mentioned in the teaching logistics programme. Standardisation and harmonisation play an important role. And topics such as developing a vision for our interdisciplinary research and teaching and our portfolio and project management are also already mentioned in the documents. But we cannot do everything at once and have to start somewhere.'
What will happen after the consultation phase that you are now entering?
'I should stress that the documents that we have are drafts. We will process all the feedback we receive and only then will our proposals enter the formal decision-making process. The space we are now creating to talk to others really is essential to creating a good basis for future change and achieving our ambitions. I hope to be able to provide an update on this in the summer.'
A quick call with
There's a lot going on at Leiden University. The university's latest news is added to the websites every day. In ‘A quick call with’, we ask a member of staff to tell us more about a relevant, topical subject at the university.