[et_pb_section bb_built=”1″ fullwidth=”off” specialty=”on” _builder_version=”3.17.6″][et_pb_column type=”2_3″ specialty_columns=”4″][et_pb_row_inner admin_label=”Row”][et_pb_column_inner type=”4_4″ saved_specialty_column_type=”2_3″][et_pb_post_title _builder_version=”3.17.6″ featured_placement=”above” locked=”on” \/][et_pb_text _builder_version=”3.17.6″]<\/p>\n
Usually at this time of year our campus is buzzing with excitement and optimism as students from all over the world descend on Manchester, taking full advantage of the opportunities that our University and the wider city present. It\u2019s also one of the busiest times for colleagues with all hands on deck to support our on-going research activities and to make sure our students feel welcome and help them adjust to their new life.<\/strong><\/p>\n This year it feels distinctly different. I came into my office in the John Owens Building last week and it was strangely quiet. The car parks were only half full and there were few people walking about \u2013 it felt quite odd. It was good, however, to be back on campus and to spend some time meeting colleagues who have been preparing for the arrival of our students. I met Katy Woolfenden and the team in the Library and visited the Alan Gilbert Learning Commons where \u2013 like the rest of the campus \u2013 measures have been put in place<\/a> to create a COVID-safe environment for our staff and students. I also met some returning students who said they were pleased to be back and keen to pursue their studies.<\/p>\n I\u2019m impressed by the monumental efforts that all of our colleagues have made to welcome our new and returning students. 2020 has been a difficult year for many of us, but particularly for young people who have had their studies disrupted, faced confusion over their A level results and then suffered delay and uncertainty over whether they had secured their university place. And now, after all that, they arrive in Manchester only to be told that in response to high local infection rates we are moving much of our teaching and learning online<\/a> for the next few weeks.<\/p>\n As you will see from the daily figures that we are publishing on our website<\/a>, some of our students and a small number of staff have tested positive for COVID and more are having to self-isolate. This is not the start to the academic year that any of us would have hoped for, but I am really proud of the high quality care and support that colleagues are providing for our students and each other in this challenging and fast-moving situation.<\/p>\n Some people say that surely we should have known this would happen and that we should never have \u201ctold\u201d our students to come. The Government has made it clear that schools and universities should continue to operate as normal so as not to disadvantage this generation of students even further. In this context, it is our responsibility to be as accommodating and agile as possible as we try to deliver the University\u2019s core mission and meet the expectations of all of those students who have chosen to study with us. That is what we are all trying to do.<\/p>\n Although we are in the middle of the toughest of times, I am overwhelmed and humbled by the commitment, hard work, collegiality and creativity our colleagues demonstrate on a daily basis. I want to thank each and every one of you for doing all you can to make sure we fulfil our University\u2019s purpose. Thank you to those colleagues who have been here working on campus since March \u2013 like our residences staff, security, estates and facilities and student support colleagues. These colleagues are once again on the front line, working tirelessly to ensure that our students are safe, looked after and not alone.<\/p>\n Thank you to everyone working in student recruitment and admissions who had to navigate their way through the A-level confusion of the summer to ensure we were able to make offers to our students. Thank you to teaching and learning colleagues who have pulled out all the stops working in partnership with our academic colleagues to get our teaching and learning online. Thank you to colleagues who organised virtual graduation ceremonies during the summer and welcome week activities. And to those making arrangements to support the travel arrangements and welcome for our international students. And, of course, thanks to everyone who has continued to support our research effort throughout.<\/p>\n I realise that losing around 430 Professional Services (PS) colleagues through our recent voluntary severance scheme has only added to the pressure and workload for some colleagues. I would ask you to bear with us whilst we do all we can to identify the pressure points and assign additional PS staff to those areas delivering critical activities. We have not pushed forward with our Reshaping PS plan for the time being so we can focus on the here and now.<\/p>\n And we are listening to you \u2013 the findings from the What works?<\/a> survey where you said you wanted more opportunities to work flexibly has led us to decide to develop a new flexible working policy to enable more colleagues to work in a blended way. Further details on this will be available by the end of this year. We are also considering a range of options so that we can provide more support for home working.<\/p>\n You can hear more about these topics at the next PSLT open meeting which will take place on Thursday, 15 October. Please join us<\/a> and feel free to ask any questions of me or my colleagues. Alternatively, you can email me any time at Registrar@manchester.ac.uk<\/a>.<\/p>\n Please do take care of yourselves too, and find the ways which are right for you to look after your wellbeing and to step away from work. You may find our staff wellbeing<\/a> pages on StaffNet a helpful resource.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_post_nav _builder_version=”3.17.6″ prev_text=”Previous” next_text=”Next” in_same_term=”off” locked=”on” \/][et_pb_comments _builder_version=”3.17.6″ custom_button=”on” button_text_color=”#ffffff” locked=”on” \/][et_pb_text admin_label=”Related posts” _builder_version=”3.17.6″ locked=”on”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column_inner][\/et_pb_row_inner][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_3″][et_pb_sidebar admin_label=”Subscribe” _builder_version=”3.17.6″ area=”et_pb_widget_area_3″ locked=”on” \/][et_pb_sidebar _builder_version=”3.17.6″ area=”sidebar-1″ show_border=”off” locked=”on” \/][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Usually at this time of year our campus is buzzing with excitement and optimism as students from all over the world descend on Manchester, taking full advantage of the opportunities that our University and the wider city present. It\u2019s also one of the busiest times for colleagues with all hands on deck to support our on-going research activities and to make sure our students feel welcome and help them adjust to their new life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":521,"featured_media":2398,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"[et_pb_section bb_built=\"1\" fullwidth=\"off\" specialty=\"on\" _builder_version=\"3.17.6\"][et_pb_column type=\"2_3\" specialty_columns=\"4\"][et_pb_row_inner admin_label=\"Row\"][et_pb_column_inner type=\"4_4\" saved_specialty_column_type=\"2_3\"][et_pb_post_title _builder_version=\"3.17.6\" featured_placement=\"above\" locked=\"on\" \/][et_pb_text _builder_version=\"3.17.6\"]\r\n\r\n When I\u2019m out and about meeting staff I hear much debate about the why, what, when and how of change in our University. I wanted to share my thoughts on this often contentious topic \u2013 and hear your views too.<\/p> Early in 2020 we will launch our University\u2019s new vision and strategic plan \u2013 Our future. In order to fulfil Our future we need to ensure that we are in a financially sustainable position so that we have the funds to invest in the new staff, facilities and infrastructure which will be needed to bring our plans to life.<\/p> Our Financial Statements<\/a> for 2018\/19, which have been published following approval by the Board of Governors, confirm that more than 95% of our \u00a31.1bn income is spent on our core goals - on our staff and our students - to deliver research, education and social responsibility; with the remainder invested in the long term sustainability of our University. You can find a summary<\/a> of the Financial Statements on StaffNet.<\/p> However, this is a testing time for UK universities, due to the many external factors that have an impact on us - current home tuition fees are falling in real terms, whilst our costs (not just pay but non-pay too) are increasing. There are further and even greater tuition fee funding risks outlined in General Election manifestos as well as a range of Brexit-related risks that could affect our operations. The Office for Students (OfS) demands that we demonstrate both value for money for our students and our financial sustainability (in the sense of being able to invest to deliver our ambitious strategy, rather than survival). There are, of course, also ongoing unresolved national issues around pay and the continuing challenges around funding pensions in the higher education sector.<\/p> Our Financial Statements show an improved operating surplus (3.7% of income compared to \u00a324.7m (2.3%) in 2017\/18), with a rise in income from tuition fees, education contracts and research. As I mentioned earlier, we re-invest the surplus we achieve each year in activity in line with our strategy. Recently our funds have been used to create some new academic and Professional Services posts; to invest in key infrastructure including IT; to invest in some new buildings like our student accommodation at Unsworth Park; to improve the student experience by funding more full-time Residential Life staff and to upgrade a range of buildings and research and teaching spaces and resources. Increasingly it is also invested in environmental sustainability and meeting our ambitious carbon targets. So even when we are making difficult decisions in some parts of the University we continue to invest our surplus.<\/p> Whilst we have reported an operating surplus, our Board of Governors expects us to deliver a much larger surplus than this (at least 5%) if we are to be sustainable in the long-term. Our strategic change programme (including IT Modernisation<\/a>, the Student Experience Programme<\/a>, and the Research Lifecycle Programme<\/a>), alongside our continuous improvement plans, will ensure that we create the financial headroom to invest in people and facilities. The strategic change programme will also enable us to embrace new technologies and new ways of doing things that better support all our staff and students to be the best that they can be.<\/p> Yes, this means that some individual roles will change. New roles (some that we haven\u2019t yet identified) will be created and some roles will no longer be required. I appreciate that this will cause some uncertainty and where that is the case we will do everything we can to support staff, but the alternative is that we never change anything. If we fail to take advantage of advances in technology and develop more joined-up ways of working we will ultimately find ourselves outdated in the eyes of future students, funders and other stakeholders. Staff want to work for a progressive and successful institution, of which they can be proud. This means we cannot stand still.<\/p> When I talk to staff and students I often hear their frustrations about how difficult it be can be to get some straightforward things done, grappling with paper-based, manual and repetitive processes, on outdated systems and infrastructure, all of which serves to increase staff workloads. Everyone wants to do a good job, but regularly feel that our world-class status is earned in spite of our internal systems and processes, not because of them.<\/p> To deliver our new vision and strategic plan we will need to embrace new opportunities and face challenges with courage and determination. That will sometimes mean we have to make tough decisions and no-one is claiming it will be easy or that mistakes will not be made along the way. But where we do have tough choices to make we will commit to implementing changes fairly and with compassion to support the wellbeing of all our colleagues.<\/p>\r\n\r\n[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_post_nav _builder_version=\"3.17.6\" prev_text=\"Previous\" next_text=\"Next\" in_same_term=\"off\" locked=\"on\" \/][et_pb_comments _builder_version=\"3.17.6\" custom_button=\"on\" button_text_color=\"#ffffff\" locked=\"on\" \/][et_pb_text admin_label=\"Related posts\" _builder_version=\"3.17.6\" locked=\"on\"]\r\n\r\n [related-posts-thumbnails]<\/p>\r\n\r\n[\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column_inner][\/et_pb_row_inner][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=\"1_3\"][et_pb_sidebar admin_label=\"Subscribe\" _builder_version=\"3.17.6\" area=\"et_pb_widget_area_3\" locked=\"on\" \/][et_pb_sidebar _builder_version=\"3.17.6\" area=\"sidebar-1\" show_border=\"off\" locked=\"on\" \/][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_section]","_et_gb_content_width":"","_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,10,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3424","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pslt","category-registrar","category-slt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3424","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/521"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3424"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3424\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3449,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3424\/revisions\/3449"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2398"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3424"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3424"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3424"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Related<\/h1>\n
Related posts:<\/h3>
Colette Fagan and Angus Hearmon: Investing in research support at our University<\/h2><\/div><\/div><\/a>
Patrick Hackett: Introductory message<\/h2><\/div><\/div><\/a>
Clive Agnew and Simon Merrywest: NSS results<\/h2><\/div><\/div><\/a><\/div>
Improving our financial performance will help to deliver our ambitious future plans, but we must also increase our capacity to create the funds and time to invest in our core goals. One of the ways we can do this is by changing what we do and how we do things.<\/p>Related<\/h1>\r\n