The structure of the University management is expected to be
changed under a proposal for The Future Management Organisation
of the University
released today by disgruntled members of
smaller academic departments. While the proposal is currently in
its consultation phase, it suggests that the current management
organisation will lead to the University failing to meet its
Strategy and causes administrative problems.
The first issue highlighted in the report is that of funding. Senior Management positions are expensive to fund, and in the current funding climate, the report suggests that it may be better to get rid of the Senior Management as full-time positions, instead having the responsibilities taken on by willing members of the academic staff on a part-time basis.
Interestingly, some of the most vocal opposition to this idea (behind the current holders of the senior management positions, of course) has come from the Students' Union, who point out that the workload of the Senior Management is quite large, and would detract heavily from the academic duties of anyone trying to take it on part-time. One Union officer said:
It would be like trying to run DSU without sabbatical officers - while there would be some savings in costs from not having to pay the Senior Management their salaries, it would be overall detrimental to the University to an extent that the extra cash freed up would not compensate for. After all, their salaries are only a small fraction of the University total expenditure, just as DSU's sabbs are paid only a tiny fraction of the Union's expenditure.
The report suggests four possible solutions to the perceived problems.
- Do Nothing
(This option is said to be favoured by many within the University, who can't see that a rearrangement of existing problems will do anything but complicate matters further and reduce the morale of the senior management from its current high level.) - Make a token change by making each member of senior management a Budget Centre
- Group senior management together by similarity and deal with them as groups
- A system in which senior management positions are combined into groups as in option 3, but the current holders of these positions disappear, to be replaced with new people holding responsibility for combined roles.
Rumours suggest that only options 1 and 4 are being seriously considered by the working group on the restructuring, and that the composition of the working group makes it likely that option 4 will be chosen and forced through by the majority of members regardless of what anyone directly affected by this decision thinks.
The report will be available on the web at a secret and obscure (but publically accessible) location shortly, and parts of it make interesting reading. One of the advantages of the final option is given as:
This approach, in order to be effective, would certainly reduce the number of Senior Management staff at the University over a period of time and so some positive PR is bound to be created by this process.