[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
It\u2019s almost a year since I wrote my Viewpoint blog – Slowly emerging from upheaval \u2013 an opportunity to do things differently<\/a>.<\/p>\n In it I talked about what we\u2019d learned during COVID-19 and the importance of using this valuable knowledge and wisdom to develop new ways of working. So, one year on, how are we doing?<\/p>\n I firmly believe that our PS hybrid working pilot has been a huge step forward. When we launched this back in June 2021, I said it was an experiment, that we\u2019d be discovering the possibilities and pitfalls as we went along.<\/p>\n There is much more for us to know and understand but we have listened to your feedback, refined our approach, and as of 1 September 2022, PS hybrid working<\/a> has moved from pilot phase to business as usual.<\/p>\n In other words, PS hybrid working is very much here to stay.<\/p>\n The challenge now will be getting the balance right between what works for our University and our community of students, staff and stakeholders; what works for teams; and what works for individuals.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n We also need to think carefully about the kind of working spaces we will need on campus in the future so we can provide you with places to work which embrace technology, social and collaborative working spaces and are inclusive for all.<\/p>\n We\u2019re currently carrying out a space feasibility study in the John Owens and Christie Buildings to see how we can adapt some of our oldest buildings \u2013 we will keep you updated on progress later this year.<\/p>\n You can be sure that we are still listening and learning and are always keen to hear your thoughts, please comment below or contact hybrid@manchester.ac.uk<\/a><\/p>\n I\u2019ve noticed other things I mentioned in my blog, like having shorter documents and lowering consumption, have begun to take effect. I\u2019m pleased to say that the volume and length of reports coming to the various Governance groups I\u2019m part of have reduced significantly. I\u2019d be keen to hear from you about whether that\u2019s the case for the groups you\u2019re part of?<\/p>\n It still feels to me like we have too many meetings. I\u2019d ask you to take a close look at the meetings you\u2019re part of and ask yourself:<\/p>\n Mixing online, hybrid and in-person meetings continues to make a positive impact on our travel spend and environmental footprint and we have made a permanent reduction to our travel budgets across PS Central Directorates as part of our long-term commitment to lower consumption.<\/p>\n I think we can all agree that issues like meeting and email overload and stopping activities that no longer add value, remain stubbornly difficult to shift. Sometimes these are caused by less than optimal processes and structures which we\u2019re addressing with our transformation and change projects.<\/p>\n But they are also the result of some aspects of our culture which are deeply engrained and will take time to change. Fortunately, I believe that each of us taking a few small actions to change our behaviours and ways of thinking, can and will, have a huge impact.<\/p>\n Sometimes it\u2019s difficult to know where to start to make a difference to long-standing challenges, which is why we\u2019re now asking all teams across the PS to develop their own Working Together Charter \u2013 whether you intend to work in a hybrid way or not.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n These Charters will lay out how you want to work together as a team. As a Professional Services Leadership Team (PSLT) we could have written a list of rules and behaviours for everyone in the PS to follow.<\/p>\n But I don\u2019t think that \u2018top down\u2019 approach would have worked \u2013 especially when so much of what we need to change is about continuing to build on the trust and empowerment many of you talked about in the PS hybrid working survey, which we carried out earlier this year.<\/p>\n Instead, we\u2019re asking all PS teams to develop their own Charter using some really helpful guidance and templates<\/a> and thinking carefully about aspects like technology, ways of working, communication and collaboration and inclusion \u2013 all of which can have a direct impact on our well-being.<\/p>\n We\u2019re asking teams to complete their Charter by 30 September 2022, but I recognise that some areas, like those involved in our big transformation programmes, might need a little longer. That\u2019s ok, I\u2019d rather you take your time to work together to produce a Charter everyone in your team can pledge to support, than rush something through that just doesn\u2019t work.<\/p>\n I\u2019m pleased to share with you our PSLT Working Together Charter<\/a> which outlines how we as a group of PS leaders<\/a> intend to work.<\/p>\n We created this as a team by having a number of conversations, sometimes difficult and challenging but always respectful and constructive, until we arrived at a Charter we all felt able to sign up to and act on consistently.<\/p>\n I put our new Charter to the test a couple of weeks ago when I went on leave and pledged not to continue working in the background whilst I was spending time with my family. I delegated responsibility to PSLT members who acted as my deputies and this definitely helped me to feel like I was having a proper break.<\/p>\n I\u2019m not saying that by having a Charter everything about the way we work will suddenly be perfect and we must all have the courage to call out actions that we think go against the promises we\u2019ve made in our Charters.<\/p>\n I firmly believe that by making a pledge to ourselves and our colleagues we are taking a huge step forwards.<\/p>\n As they say, actions speak louder than words, so I\u2019ll be keeping you updated on how PSLT is getting on.<\/p>\n Patrick Hackett<\/strong> [\/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":" It\u2019s almost a year since I wrote my Viewpoint blog ‘Slowly emerging from upheaval \u2013 an opportunity to do things differently’<\/p>\n In it I talked about what we\u2019d learned during COVID-19 and the importance of using this valuable knowledge and wisdom to develop new ways of working. So, one year on, how are we doing? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":521,"featured_media":2402,"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\"]<\/p> 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> [\/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> [related-posts-thumbnails]<\/p> [\/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>","_et_gb_content_width":"","_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3533","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pslt","category-registrar"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3533","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=3533"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3533\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3700,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3533\/revisions\/3700"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2402"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3533"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3533"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.manchester.ac.uk\/viewpoint\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}PS Hybrid Working<\/h3>\n
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Documents and consumption<\/h3>\n
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Working Together Charters<\/h3>\n
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Introducing the PSLT Working Together Charter<\/h3>\n
Registrar, Secretary and Chief Operating Officer<\/strong><\/p>\nRelated<\/h1>\n
Related posts:<\/h3>
Malcolm Whitehouse: Becoming a digital University together<\/h2><\/div><\/div><\/a>
Colette Fagan and Angus Hearmon: Investing in research support at our University<\/h2><\/div><\/div><\/a>
Patrick Hackett: Slowly emerging from upheaval - an opportunity to do things differently<\/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>