UNIVERSITY OF GREENWICH MAW

1. UNIVERSITY OF GREENWICHMAW Mike Sharp, HOD

2. THE UNIVERSITY STARTING POINT • Community of over 24,000 students (Head count) • 600 (ish) academics. • 3 campuses • Greenwich • Avery Hill - Eltham • Medway – Chatham (30 miles out so travel time may be a factor!) • Organised as 10 subject based Schools with Departments, no faculties! (Good / Bad who knows?) • Heads of department line manage academic staff and are responsible for work load allocation. • Relatively research intensive, (70/133 Guardian 2009), so it not all about teaching and related activity!

3. TYPICAL MAW MISSION / VISION • “For the University to have an academic workload process model recognised internally and externally which is consistent in practice, achieves effective management of staff time and demonstrably conforms to the key policy principles of equity, transparency and value.” (To somewhat Bowdlerise Salford’s vision.) • The why question is answered for us in the mission, • We simply do not have a process that delivers the key principles of equity (fairness), transparency and value across the University. • We do have: • Buy-in from the TOP, quietly! UCU in partnership, HOS / HODs aboard. • Workload Envy across the University, not corrosive. • AND

4. A project starting point. • 4 out of 10 Schools with some ‘Formal’, more or less, models. • BUT none of these seem generic enough as they have been built around the idiosyncrasies of the School and, more telling, the head of school’s drives and goals. Not even all School wide, some only departments! • All spreadsheet based with different ‘value’ units. (Hours / Units) • Rising recognition that something must be done and that what is done adds VALUE to our core business streams of teaching and research. • Challenges include: • Possible review of post 1992 contracts! (Will we all arrive at the same place at the same time?) • 2 brand new Deputy VC post holders (Resources and Learning), both critical champions. Early days but the noises are good. • Joint school of Pharmacy, with University of Kent, run on a five year ‘ownership’ cycle. (Remember Transparency and Equity!) • Leadership / Unions • Being sure what VALUE means.

5. So cautiously forward … • We have learned a lot by watching others progress and seeing other implementations. Particularly: • Transparency and Equity is like Motherhood and Apple pie you can’t ‘diss’ it. So we can at least all agree on this one starting point. • On-going dialogue is crucial to making it work, vision can be part of the dialogue. • Never use the word ‘standardised’, Language is very important. • Keep a long term continuous improvement vision from the start, ‘better than it was but still not perfect’ approach. • Avoid starting from syllabus plus (Allegedly) or any other timetable system, work load is not just about time tables. • Keep a clear distinction between what the system / model does do and most importantly what it does not. • The system probably does not tell the absolute truth! • Issues you didn’t spot in other peoples work will come out of the long grass at you. • It will take 3-5 years to roll out and win hearts and minds.

6. What do we propose to do now? • Ground work done, University seems ready. SO • Start a project: • DRAFT Objectives: • Work in partnership with UCU. • Wrap the vision into the Universities strategic plan. • Establish a project team, perhaps led by a DVC • Test existing internal models against each other and external models. • Prepare requirements for our model and its system. • Setup and run a pilot in one, possibly two schools. (1 STEM & 1 Non STEM) • Roll it out across the University and a University wide model in place and operational by 2013-2014! • Key principles: Plagiarise best practice both models & systems, Under promise and Over deliver. • Long and winding road that leads to your MAW

7. the UNIVERSITY of GREENWICH If you have been, thank you for listening