In my fairly short career so far I’ve been in departments that have closed, ones that have been restructured and in places where voluntary and compulsory redundancies occur so here are my tips for dealing with these sort of issue:

1 – Get your head out of the sand

Anyone who has been watching Brian Cox’s Wonders of the Universe recently will realise that change is inevitable, and as the ‘arrow of time’ moves on, all things will eventually change. Recognising this helps massively in being prepared to deal with these situations.

2 – Communicate!

A lack of communications from others can have a negative impact, while effective communications can have a positive one. From a purely pragmatic standpoint, you need details about the change, so that you can determine how it affects you. Don’t just sit back and wait for things to happen.

3 – Keep doing your job

Although times of change can be very uncertain try to avoid the temptation of ‘if I might not have a job why should I bother’ attitude. If you keep on with your work you never know who you might impress, particularly if others are not putting in 100%.

4 – Be Positive

Keeping a positive attitude can help you deal with the uncertainties of change. For example, instead of worrying about changes you will have to make, focus instead on how you can leverage your existing skills and experience. Looking for opportunities in the new organisation, and becoming involved, will hasten your adjustment.

New goals

Just like the 1^st of January, it’s now the time for resolutions for us in higher education. What will my resolutions be for this academic year? Let’s see: to be as effective as I can in my job, to boost entrepreneurship as much as I can among academics and students, to adapt to the new structure as best as I can, and generally to serve my office’s purposes in the best possible way.

New responsibilities

There are plenty of those already. I have been assigned the project management of a couple of entrepreneurship competitions, the organization of a major profile-raising entrepreneurship event in November, the conduct of some important research, and the sole responsibility to help out the academics of a specific department with their external funding applications. So I can’t complain about those.

New students

I have always felt that one of the most exciting parts of working for a university is the fact that there are new students every single year, with new goals, dreams and expectations, which you have to find new ways to address every single time.  This constant renewal is what makes life here more interesting and unpredictable, and what helps us develop and improve.

So I am definitely looking forward to another academic year and I hope that I will have accumulated invaluable experiences by the end of it.

What does this mean in practice?

In practice, we are going to have a challenging year ahead. Lots of colleagues have left or will be leaving in the next few months – some have chosen to, some have had to be made redundant. At the same time, lots of new people will be joining to take on the new roles that are opening up, whereas some will be just changing positions internally. Until all the changes are in place – which is estimated to take about a year – there is no way we can avoid some sort of confusion, uncertainty and maybe a little bit of chaos in practical terms.  Just a simple example of what I mean: if a person I would regularly cooperate with is now gone, and even worse, if their position doesn’t exist anymore under the new structure, then who do I speak to if I need help? And for a central department like ours, where cooperation with a vast range of departments is the norm, this may prove even more challenging.

So how do we manage change?

Bring in external consultants? Run special courses? Just play it by year and take things as they come? I wish I had the answer to that and it’s likely that it’s not going to be just black or white. For the time being, and until the changes are fully implemented, nobody can predict the future. I think the best response to change is to just keep a smile on our face, be positive to change, and do the best we can under the circumstances to do our job as best as we can.

Enterprise seems to be the most neglected and underestimated area of activity for academics – especially the most traditional ones. It’s not teaching, it’s not research or publishing work, it sounds suspiciously business-y, so it’s not for them, they may think.

On the other hand, universities are spending substantial resources on the promotion of various forms of enterprise that will lead to third stream income generation. This supplements first and second stream income, which comes from government funding and tuition fees. With third stream activities, higher education institutions are looking to externalise their academic knowledge and expertise, and link with the public and private sectors to form mutually profitable partnerships. This is the big scheme of things, which universities hope will eventually make them more independent of government funding.

But how much do academics know about it?

Surprisingly, it seems that little is currently being done for this message to be communicated to academics, so many of them don’t even know about it. Compounding this problem is the fact that academics have little time to do anything other than research and teaching. Even more surprisingly, contribution to third stream income generation is increasingly becoming a pre-requisite for academic promotions, although many academics still don’t know about it.

And this is where the paradox lies: on the one hand, universities expect academics to participate in activities that will help their institution financially if they aspire to reach higher career levels more quickly. The higher the academic level, the higher the requirement for involvement in such activities is supposed to be. On the other hand, few academics are aware of this requirement and of the positive impact it can have on their career development. Also, contrary to what universities expect, it is usually the lower level academics who are the most willing to get involved in enterprise and income generating activities. Higher-level staff often appear much more reluctant. Traditional perception of their role as non-commercially-focused, resistance to change, lack of awareness about new trends in higher education, a busy workload and heavy responsibilities, or simply job burn-out are some of the most common reasons for their lack of involvement in third-stream activities.

Whose responsibility is it?

This is a difficult question with an equally difficult answer. It seems like it’s often left in the hands of Business and Enterprise Offices to “educate” academics on those all-important issues, inform them about the latest developments and find creative ways to communicate to them that third stream activities are worth a shot despite their time limitations. My office has dynamically started campaigning for enterprise with events, competitions, workshops, seminars and one-to-one meetings. It will be very interesting to see the outcomes and impacts of these efforts, and whether enterprise will become more of a familiar ground for our academic community in the years to come.