Colleagues,
In her recent newsletter Andrea announced changes in ULT responsibilities. These arise from a review of Professional Services designed to make our support functions more agile, efficient and customer focused. Over the last few weeks heads of service have been talking to all the staff affected by these changes and I am now able to share these changes with colleagues across the University.
Why are we making these changes now?
In 2015/16 we streamlined our academic structures, removing the faculties to enable more agile decision making and achieve a better alignment of our schools with the academic strategy. The review of Professional Services has been a similar exercise intended to ensure our support functions are equipped to provide our students and staff with the best service possible.
At the same time we are facing a number of challenges arising from possible changes in government funding, changes in UK visa regulations, increasing competition in the sector and of course Brexit. We have already taken action to increase our resilience in the face of these challenges. The recruitment chill along with the changes we are announcing today will help protect jobs and put the university on a stronger footing.
Over the coming months we will continue work on improving our processes, implementing the Professional Service Standards and generally looking for better ways of working. I believe that one of the best ways we can achieve this is to work together across services and across the University, recognising the common aims that connect all of us, and collaborating to help our institution flourish.
What changes are we making?
You can view the
changes in ULT portfolios which Andrea has already announced. The full details of the other changes we are making are listed below.
Student & Academic Services (S&AS)
The functions currently carried out by S&AS are being redistributed across Professional Services. This will enable us to provide greater focus to priority areas such as student recruitment while helping to increase efficiency by grouping similar activities together. We will not be replacing the Director position currently held by Cathy Lambert after she leaves the University at the end of October.
Recruitment, Admissions & Administration
- UK & EU Student Recruitment, Admissions and Visa and International Support will form a new Recruitment and Admissions service led by Alan McLachlan and reporting to Iain McIntosh.
- Student Systems and Process Improvement will move to Information Services.
- Student Administration will move to the School Support Service.
- Widening Access will form a new Widening Participation service reporting to Sandra Cairncross.
Student Wellbeing
- Student Counselling, Mental Health & Wellbeing, Disability & Inclusion and Student Funding are moving to the new Wellbeing service reporting to Sandra Cairncross.
- Market & Student Intelligence will move to Planning & Business Intelligence. Student Communications will join the Student Administration team in the School Support Service.
Quality & Standards
- The Quality and Standards team will move to the Department of Learning & Teaching Enhancement.
- Student Complaints will move to Governance Services.
Employability & Opportunities
- This team will now form a service reporting to Sandra Cairncross.
External Relations & Communications (ERC)
- ERC will divide into two separate services: Development & Alumni led by Karen Goodman and Marketing, Brand & Communications led by Leanne Mabberley. Both new functions will report to Iain McIntosh. We will not be replacing the Director position previously held by Karen Cairney.
Property & Facilities
- This service will now report to Iain McIntosh.
School Support Service
- The School Support Service will now report to Gerry Webber.
Information Services (IS)
- Business systems teams in HR, Finance, Property & Facilities and Student & Academic Services will move across to IS.
Governance & Compliance
- A new service called Governance & Compliance led by David Cloy, will bring together the current Governance Services team and compliance related activities. Health & Safety will move across from HR and Procurement will join from Finance. In addition Student Complaints will move across from the Quality & Standards team in Student & Academic Services.
Planning & Business Intelligence
- Planning & Business Intelligence, led by Andrew Quickfall, will report directly to Gerry Webber.
Strategy Hub
- The Strategy Hub, led by Anita Ogilvie, will move from the Principal’s Office reporting directly to Gerry Webber.
Edinburgh Institute (EI)
- The activities currently carried out by Edinburgh Institute are being redistributed to other areas of professional Services. EFL (English as a Foreign Language) will move to International Operations. Discussions with other staff in EI are continuing and further announcements will be made in due course. We will not be replacing the Director position currently held by Graham Birse after he leaves the University at the end of October.
Robin Mackenzie Partnership (RMP)
- RMP will continue to report to the School of Engineering & the Built Environment.
Timescales
- Some of these changes have already taken place. We expect the remainder to take effect on or before 1 November 2016.
We realise that some of you would have liked to have known about these changes earlier however we thought it was important to discuss them with those directly affected first. This has allowed us to take account of preferences and make changes as discussions were taking place.
I would like to thank colleagues for their hard work to help to make sure these changes happen smoothly. If you have any questions or feedback please contact
myself,
Kerry Dewar (HR Director) or
Campbell Millar (Project Manager).
Best regards
Iain