The faculty increases the focus on internal communication and employee involvement
As part of the work on the faculty's strategy and recommendations for employee involvement, the management group is now actively working to strengthen internal communication.
The management group at the Faculty of Science has for a period worked purposefully to outline a plan for developing and promoting the internal communication at the faculty and also strengthen the focus on employee involvement in decision-making processes.
Among other things, this has led the management group to actively take a position on any employee involvement and management communication at each individual decision point that appears on the agenda for the faculty's management meetings.
In addition, the process has led to the formulation of five goals and associated means to support efforts to improve internal communication at the faculty.
Goals
- We want to increase employee involvement in more decision-making processes We want to do so because it supports the community by ensuring wider support for the decisions, strengthening the decision-making mandate and making more qualified decisions.
- We want to create transparency and clarity about management decisions in the faculty's various management groups. We want to do so because it creates security while reducing myths and misconceptions.
- We will inform about most important points from councils, boards and committees. We want to do this because well-informed employees are better able to take initiative and act vigorously. At the same time, employees demand more transparency and greater insight into the bodies' work.
- We will communicate clearly about changes decided centrally at SDU and in the political system. We want to do this because it gives employees insight into and clarity about decisions made outside the faculty. This in turn should contribute to security and support employees' ability to act.
- We want to increase awareness of key news across departments. We want to do this because it supports the cohesion of the faculty and creates an eye for collaboration across the departments' researchers, lecturers and administrative colleagues.
Means
# 1 - Increase employee involvement in multiple decision-making processes
In decision-making processes, where it is appropriate for employees to be involved, it is recommended to do this through dialogue-creating forums. The current decision-making process can advantageously be announced by convening a meeting in the relevant forum or forums, so that employees are prepared for the opportunity to engage in decision-making processes that they find relevant through participation in forums.
In cases where there are no existing forums with a relevant composition of employees, the faculty's newsletter - possibly via the Dean's words - can be used to draw attention to the fact that a kick-off meeting is convened, (partially) open working groups or the like are set up.
Agendas for councils, boards and committees point out at each decision point that a decision should be made as to whether it is appropriate to involve others and, if so, who.
Decisions are also made in councils, boards and committees on how these are to be involved and who is responsible for ensuring the involvement. The decision on and the process for involvement is described in the subsequent minutes.
At the same time, councils, boards and committees are encouraged to develop the work of members and representatives to ensure that they represent the interests and views of their colleagues. This development is written into the terms of reference of the individual council, board and committee.
Read SDU's framework for Co-determination and involvement.
# 2 - We want to create transparency around management decisions in the faculty's various management groups
Decisions made in the management groups can be communicated in two different ways that complement each other effectively: through one-way communication and through dialogue-creating forums and channels.
The obvious channel for one-way communication is the news article, which is placed on SDUnet and also prioritized in the faculty's newsletter. Major decisions of a more decisive nature can also be unfolded in the words of the Dean. At departmental level, it is also recommended that department heads communicate via a counterpart to this.
Important management decisions in which employees have a special interest should also be presented in forums where dialogue is encouraged. Here, the Dean's Corner will be an obvious forum. Likewise, department meetings and scientific staff meetings will be obvious forums, as there is an opportunity to ask clarifying questions to the management team.
When rounding up management meetings, it is agreed which decisions are to be communicated to which target groups. Likewise, the most appropriate sender and method of communication are agreed.
Cf. Recommendations on good management - Theme 3, critical decisions and prior processes should be clearly communicated. What problem is solved with the decision? What is the purpose of the decision? What arguments were for and against? Why were the arguments for the decision weighted heaviest?
It is proposed that the faculty hold quarterly gatherings, which should support management communication at the beginning and end of each semester. These can be run virtually with the option to ask questions directly or submit questions in advance. The sessions are recorded and rebroadcast via newsletter.
# 3 - Inform about most important points from councils, boards and committees
After each meeting of the relevant councils, boards and committees, the respective body shall ensure that the minutes are supplemented by a note under the heading: "The [two or three] most important point (s) from the last meeting of [name of body]" .
The note briefly and accurately summarizes the most important points from the meeting. The starting point is the target group, so the summary covers the points that are most important to the recipients, as this is not necessarily the same as the most important points for the senders. There are links from the notice to meeting minutes, so that interested parties can find out more.
It is recommended that the relevant councils, boards and committees eventually have their own common page on SDUnet, to which the respective bodies are responsible to contribute with updates in the form of notices after each meeting.
At the bottom of the faculty's newsletter, a fixed point can also appear under the heading: “News from councils, boards and committees”, where one important point is highlighted by the newsletter editorial staff, which links to the possible overview with news from the included bodies.
# 4 - We will communicate clearly about changes decided centrally at SDU and in the political system
The faculty's management group relates to the further communication according to the same procedure as described in # 2.
# 5 - Increase awareness of key news across faculties and departments
he faculty's news flow is embedded on the departments' SDUnet pages, so that all the faculty's employees are exposed to the faculty's news when they enter SDUnet.
The departments' news dissemination via SDUnet is also optimized and streamlined, so that the sharing of research news and educational news in particular is facilitated. This work must also enable selected articles from the departments to be included in the faculty's newsletter.
By - to a greater extent - sharing this type of news in the future across institutes, we want researchers, lecturers and administrative colleagues to gain a better and more comprehensive knowledge of each other's work.