The reorganisation of EUR’s support services will be delayed by another month. Over the past few weeks, the participation bodies proved to still have many questions and objections – so many that it became clear the existing plan required further work and elucidation. One consequence of this delay is that staff members face an extra month of uncertainty regarding their future at the university.
The new version of the plan will once again be making the rounds of EUR’s different participation bodies. As a result, the final decision on the formation of the University Support Centre (USC) can only be taken in mid-April. Members of staff who are still uncertain about their position will also have to wait until mid-April before it becomes clear what to expect. This is the outcome of USC quartermaster Kees Lansbergen’s talks last week with the participation bodies.
Serious objections
Two weeks ago, a number of participation bodies expressed serious objections to the present USC plan. Taken together, the members’ various recommendations can be condensed into a list of 21 questions and points of criticism. For example, they believe that the dual objective of both reducing expenditures and achieving further improvement through reorganisation is unfeasible. They also expressed their concern about the workload in various parts of the organisation, which is heavy as it is, and asked all manner of questions about e.g. the financial underpinnings of the plan and the increase in employees’ salary scales.
Read more: Heavy opposition to reorganisation
Better perspective
Over the past few weeks, these questions and points of criticism were all dealt with during a number of meetings of the service committees (the participation bodies of EUR’s support services), the University Council committee responsible for HRM-related matters and Medezeggenschap 3.0 (the informal consultation platform for the involved participation bodies). These meetings ultimately led to the decision to organise a fundamental discussion regarding the principles of the aforementioned dual objective, as well as an agreement that Lansbergen will provide additional information and clarify a number of aspects of the existing plan. We can expect a ‘Reorganisation Plan 2.0’, as the quartermaster puts it. “This mostly involves including complementary information that allows us to put parts of the plan in better perspective,” according to Lansbergen.
New planning
Lansbergen expects the new plan to be completed by 18 February. The plan can then be reviewed by the different service committees in the second half of that month, after which – according to the new planning – it can be formally adopted by the University Council on 31 March. As a consequence of this changed schedule, the launch of the USC will need to be moved back from the original date of 1 April, to 1 May. “For me, the main drawback is another month of uncertainty for staff members. But at the same time, it’s also important that we all have an opportunity to carefully discuss the plan.” The employees are expected to hear which decision has been reached about their future at EUR in mid-April.
On Monday afternoon, all staff members received a newsletter informing them about the state of affairs. TF
