More than just a discussion club

It was originally intended to be temporary. But the collaboration went so well that the group decided to continue. The department heads have got the direct influence on the faculty administration that they have long wanted.

"It’s incredibly important that we, in the role of recipients, also can influence what we are receiving. Now we’ve really been down in the engine room," says one member of the group, Erik Østergaard Jensen, who is department head at the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics.

Administration Centre Manager Niels Damgaard Hansen can also see the advantages:

"When we involve the department management team directly in the decisions and priorities that concern the administration, they gain ownership of the decisions and must subsequently take the flak for them. You can’t have it both ways and I expect them to support a joint decision, even if that person as an individual might disagree with the decision."

Not necessarily in everybody’s interest

It has certainly not been a discussion club. The group has had to make tough decisions and prioritise, while the decisions made have not necessarily been in everybody’s interest.

"It has been painful and we have absolutely not been in agreement, so emotions have been heated and we’ve really had some discussions."

"It's correct that we haven’t necessarily been in agreement. But ST is also a large organisation with very different needs from department to department and everyone has understood that. It’s not been about optimising the situation for your own department. There has been a holistic approach and I think that we have reached solutions that have been well-prepared and highly qualified," says another of the department heads in the group, Thomas Skjødeberg Toftegaard from the Department of Engineering.

More or less communication

One of the things that has given rise to discussions around the conference table is communications.

"There’s no doubt that this has been one of the areas where we have disagreed most of all. Some of us want more communication and others less. There are different communication needs at the faculty's departments. So this is something we have discussed intensively," says Niels Damgaard Hansen.

"We have discussed the faculty and it’s support for communications. I think we’ve found a good solution that means we retain some of the key competences at the faculty, so these can support the various local needs," says Erik Østergaard Jensen.

On this same subject, Thomas Skjødeberg Toftegaard says:

"We are one of those areas that needs to be visible, so we’ve given communications a relatively high priority. But we have not been in agreement here."

The group’s influence was subsequently felt by ST Communication, which was reduced by six employees on the basis of the group's recommendations.

Professionalism and respect

Even though the administration's work has been the subject of discussion in the group, Niels Damgaard Hansen emphasises that the tone has been characterised by both respect and trust. He was the person who initially asked for the working group to be made permanent.

“While it’s a fact that the group only contains the department heads and dean besides myself, I will always make sure that the administration’s professionalism is taken into account through the division managers," he promises.

Diversity and understanding

Thomas Skjødeberg Toftegaard is also satisfied with the permanent solution. He points out that the committee’s work is particularly good at creating understanding across a multifaceted organisation such as ST.

"I think making the committee permanent is a good idea. In an organisation as large as ST, it’s important that there is foundation all the way down to departmental level, and it can be difficult to have an understanding of the faculty’s diversity."

Qualified decisions

With the organisation of the administration centres as part of the faculty, Erik Østergaard points out that there isn’t far from decision to implementation:

"ST is a huge organisation where changes are taking place all the time. We’re a dynamic organization and decisions may well be made that simply cannot wait. The fact that the administration centre manager is now part of the faculty management team means that we can quickly implement decisions made by the faculty management team, so they no longer need to be sent up to the senior management team and back down again. This makes us more flexible and dynamic. The working group can also come to play an important role by qualifying the decisions made by the faculty management in terms of their implementation."

Facts

What’s the background?

The group consisting of the dean, administration centre manager and department heads at ST is the result of a process that Rector Brian Bech Nielsen started after his appointment in 2013, with the aim of solving the problems that have characterised AU since the reorganisation of the university in 2011.

An internal expert group was commissioned to uncover where the problem lay. When the group presented its report in June of last year, it concluded that centralisation and standardisation had gone too far at Aarhus University.   

On the basis of this conclusion, the senior management team presented a proposal for solving the problems. After the management's proposal had been submitted for consultation at the university, the rector presented the senior management team's final decisions at a public meeting in October last year. 

Since then it has been up to the management of the four faculties to find local solutions to local issues on the basis of the decisions made by the senior management team.

Translated by Peter Lambourne