During her years at Aalborg University, Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard experienced an increasingly poor working environment. As a staff representative, she saw colleagues who developed tinnitus, anxiety, and \u2014 in some cases \u2014 just quit their jobs. She ended up developing stress herself.<\/p>\n
\u00bbYou know … stress does something to people,\u00ab Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard says.<\/p>\n
The problems culminated in an inquest by the Danish Working Environment Authority in 2016 after a critically poor working environment was assessed among academic staff. The conclusion was \u2013 after a report by the consultancy firm CRECEA and focus group interviews \u2013 that there were multiple factors at work in the poor working environment among academic staff: This included poor communication between the University\u2019s central offices in Aalborg and the eight departments in Copenhagen, an absentee management, and the increasing amounts of time spent on administration.<\/p>\n
An evaluation of the academic staff’s working environment at Aalborg University’s Copenhagen unit carried out by CRECEA in 2018 showed that it was \u00bbdifficult to set up lasting working relationships, especially with the administrative support functions in Aalborg …\u00ab.<\/p>\n
\u00bbI get a sense of d\u00e9j\u00e0 vu,\u00ab says Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard referring to the UCPH plan to place more administrative employees into what was initially dubbed service centres, but which they are now working on calling something else.<\/p>\n
While the reform\u2019s programme steering committee reckons that it’s the name that it is the problem, Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard thinks that it’s the whole concept. She is not the only one who has this assessment: She has been a member of one of the user groups involved in the design phase of the administration reform. She experienced a general agreement on the inexpediency of merging technical and administrative functions into three large administrative units.<\/p>\n
Proximity is not something on a screen<\/p>\n
Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
\u00bbProximity is not something on a screen,\u00ab she points out and elaborates: \u00bbUntrained eyes might be able to reduce our work to a row in an Excel spreadsheet. But there is a lot of work involved in this one row. These \u2018cutback warriors\u2019 will think: ‘Oh well, everyone can just do it themselves \u2013 register holidays, days off and so on. It’s a piece of cake’. But people can’t.\u00ab<\/p>\n
Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard mentions other examples of tasks that she believes will be more difficult to solve if she was not in the vicinity. There are the study caf\u00e9s that are set up on courses with high fail rates \u2013 where older students are hired in to provide extra teaching. Here Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard and one of her colleagues take care of all the practicalities. There are the field trips, a regular part of the biology programme \u2014 where Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard and the course coordinator make sure that students’ special needs in the form of allergies, social phobias and the like are accommodated. And then there are all the multiple daily challenges that are overcome just by stopping by at an office. Just before her meet up with the University Post, she stopped by at an academic\u2019s office to set up a free evaluation of their course. They quickly took care of it.<\/p>\n
\u00bbThey have not experienced how it works in real life,\u00ab says Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard. She is referring both to the external consultants from BCG who originally drew up the report with the administrative reform proposal, and the university’s own programme steering committee.<\/p>\n
Substandard work, and deceit<\/h3>\n
It is one thing what it will mean for Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard and her colleagues if they have to work far from their known local setting and instead work in what-was-previously-called service centres. It is another thing what it will mean when, as a part of the administration reform, the number of technical and administrative full-time equivalent staff also have to be cut down.<\/p>\n
Here the experiences from Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard’s old workplace at Aalborg University are cause for her concern. At Aalborg University, it was not only the working environment that suffered as a result of the administration squeeze.<\/p>\n
There were also payments for expensive study trips which were criticized. Most recently, two managers at Aalborg University Business School were put on leave while its own finance unit looked into their own activities and dispositions. The two bosses had a total of DKK 750,000 in travel expenses in under three years.<\/p>\n
\u00bbWhen people are too busy, they can’t go into detail about what it is that is being signed off. Things happen too quickly,\u00ab says Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard, who was not employed during the period the managers in question did their criticized travelling. But it is these kinds of cases that will hit UCPH if the administration is weakened.<\/p>\n
\u00bbThey may think they can get rid of us all through cuts. But this will cost them dearly in the end. That’s my big concern,\u00ab she says.<\/p>\n
She points out that she does not just worry about deliberate cheating. She reckons that the risk of blunders will increase if the result of the administration reform is that academic staff and students are forced to handle more work themselves via self-service solutions. This will reduce the number of people involved in each individual case \u2013 be it exam and project submissions, settling of outlays and expenses, and the administration in connection with study start.<\/p>\n
\u00bbThe point of there being several checks on things is not to bother people,\u00ab she says. \u00bbThe practice is to make sure that things are delivered correctly. We check and double-check so that fewer mistakes are made in the first place.\u00ab<\/p>\n
\u00bbEveryone mattered\u00ab<\/h3>\n
Although Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard looks to the upcoming administration reform with concern, she still hopes that she herself has a job after the reform.<\/p>\n
\u00bbI’ll stay as long as I can, because I’ve probably never had as good a group of colleagues as I have now. I really appreciate my colleagues, and we have an incredibly good working relationship. We are good at giving each other feedback,\u00ab she explains.<\/p>\n
I have always felt that in UCPH you were able to participate and to speak your mind<\/p>\n
Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
And then there are also her academic staff colleagues.<\/p>\n
\u00bbI’m happy working here. I am really interested in the research they are doing. This is a part of the joy of it. To be able to help those who are doing research on something that is exciting and valuable for nature, for biodiversity, for the climate and for society in general.\u00ab<\/p>\n
At the time of this interview, there are only a few days left until the administration reform is passed by the the Board. But Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard still has hopes that management will change course and acknowledge that what is proposed in the current draft will not function optimally. This is, she says, the \u00bbbest\u00ab outcome. And she rounds off the conversation:<\/p>\n
\u00bbI’ve been to other educational institutions, and I’ve always wanted to go back to UCPH. Partly because there is a flatter hierarchy. I have always felt that you were able to participate and to speak your mind at UCPH. You got the feeling that everyone mattered. But now it feels like all of this is gone.\u00ab
\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard knows what back-to-back restructuring drives and cuts can do to a workplace. Now she is concerned that the administration reform at the University of Copenhagen will lead to shoddy work, and even deception.","use_post_excerpt":false},{"acf_fc_layout":"Byline","is_author":true,"contributors":false},{"acf_fc_layout":"Content","content":"<p>An adage from the Danish philosopher S\u00f8ren Kierkegaard pops up in Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard\u2019s mind when she describes her concerns with an upcoming administration reform. It is perhaps the most famous Kierkegaard quote of all: Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards.<\/p>\n<p>\u00bbThey say that.\u00ab Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard pauses. \u00bbBut there should be a limit.\u00ab<\/p>\n<p>By ‘limit’ she means that there should be a limit to managers\u2019 lack of learning from those who have lived (and reformed) before them. She wished, in other words, that the University of Copenhagen would learn from other people’s mistakes in its work on an administration reform that is expected to be adopted on 19 June.<\/p>\n<p>Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard is currently an employee at the Department of Biology, but has held several positions at UCPH. She has worked at the Rockefeller Complex under Geophysics and Astronomy, the former Theoretical Astrophysics Centre, and worked on the Board of Studies at the Faculty of Science.<\/p>\n<h3>Horror scenario Aalborg<\/h3>\n<p>But when the conversation turns to the administration reform, Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard talks about another university: She worked for five years at Aalborg University’s unit in Copenhagen almost ten years ago.<\/p>\n<p>\u00bbI went through exactly what I think we are seeing at UCPH: That everything is managed top-down. People further down the hierarchy have little influence on decisions being made.\u00ab<\/p>\n<p>At Aalborg University, it was not a comprehensive reform like the one that the University of Copenhagen is facing. But an ongoing process of restructuring and cuts. Several master’s degree programmes were shut down while Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard worked in the Aalborg University unit in the Sydhavn suburb of Copenhagen.<\/p>\n<p><strong>READ ALSO:<\/strong> <em><a href=\"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/administration-reform-how-will-it-affect-the-working-environment\/\">Administration reform: How will it affect the workplace?<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p>During her years at Aalborg University, Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard experienced an increasingly poor working environment. As a staff representative, she saw colleagues who developed tinnitus, anxiety, and \u2014 in some cases \u2014 just quit their jobs. She ended up developing stress herself.<\/p>\n<p>\u00bbYou know … stress does something to people,\u00ab Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard says.<\/p>\n<p>The problems culminated in an inquest by the Danish Working Environment Authority in 2016 after a critically poor working environment was assessed among academic staff. The conclusion was \u2013 after a report by the consultancy firm CRECEA and focus group interviews \u2013 that there were multiple factors at work in the poor working environment among academic staff: This included poor communication between the University\u2019s central offices in Aalborg and the eight departments in Copenhagen, an absentee management, and the increasing amounts of time spent on administration.<\/p>\n<p>An evaluation of the academic staff’s working environment at Aalborg University’s Copenhagen unit carried out by CRECEA in 2018 showed that it was \u00bbdifficult to set up lasting working relationships, especially with the administrative support functions in Aalborg …\u00ab.<\/p>\n<p>\u00bbI get a sense of d\u00e9j\u00e0 vu,\u00ab says Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard referring to the UCPH plan to place more administrative employees into what was initially dubbed service centres, but which they are now working on calling something else.<\/p>\n<h3>Real-life spreadsheet<\/h3>\n<p>While the reform\u2019s programme steering committee reckons that it’s the name that it is the problem, Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard thinks that it’s the whole concept. She is not the only one who has this assessment: She has been a member of one of the user groups involved in the design phase of the administration reform. She experienced a general agreement on the inexpediency of merging technical and administrative functions into three large administrative units.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Proximity is not something on a screen<\/p>\n<p class=\"quotee\">Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>\u00bbProximity is not something on a screen,\u00ab she points out and elaborates: \u00bbUntrained eyes might be able to reduce our work to a row in an Excel spreadsheet. But there is a lot of work involved in this one row. These \u2018cutback warriors\u2019 will think: ‘Oh well, everyone can just do it themselves \u2013 register holidays, days off and so on. It’s a piece of cake’. But people can’t.\u00ab<\/p>\n<p>Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard mentions other examples of tasks that she believes will be more difficult to solve if she was not in the vicinity. There are the study caf\u00e9s that are set up on courses with high fail rates \u2013 where older students are hired in to provide extra teaching. Here Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard and one of her colleagues take care of all the practicalities. There are the field trips, a regular part of the biology programme \u2014 where Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard and the course coordinator make sure that students’ special needs in the form of allergies, social phobias and the like are accommodated. And then there are all the multiple daily challenges that are overcome just by stopping by at an office. Just before her meet up with the University Post, she stopped by at an academic\u2019s office to set up a free evaluation of their course. They quickly took care of it.<\/p>\n<p>\u00bbThey have not experienced how it works in real life,\u00ab says Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard. She is referring both to the external consultants from BCG who originally drew up the report with the administrative reform proposal, and the university’s own programme steering committee.<\/p>\n<h3>Substandard work, and deceit<\/h3>\n<p>It is one thing what it will mean for Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard and her colleagues if they have to work far from their known local setting and instead work in what-was-previously-called service centres. It is another thing what it will mean when, as a part of the administration reform, the number of technical and administrative full-time equivalent staff also have to be cut down.<\/p>\n<p>Here the experiences from Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard’s old workplace at Aalborg University are cause for her concern. At Aalborg University, it was not only the working environment that suffered as a result of the administration squeeze.<\/p>\n<p>There were also payments for expensive study trips which were criticized. Most recently, two managers at Aalborg University Business School were put on leave while its own finance unit looked into their own activities and dispositions. The two bosses had a total of DKK 750,000 in travel expenses in under three years.<\/p>\n<p>\u00bbWhen people are too busy, they can’t go into detail about what it is that is being signed off. Things happen too quickly,\u00ab says Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard, who was not employed during the period the managers in question did their criticized travelling. But it is these kinds of cases that will hit UCPH if the administration is weakened.<\/p>\n<p>\u00bbThey may think they can get rid of us all through cuts. But this will cost them dearly in the end. That’s my big concern,\u00ab she says.<\/p>\n<p>She points out that she does not just worry about deliberate cheating. She reckons that the risk of blunders will increase if the result of the administration reform is that academic staff and students are forced to handle more work themselves via self-service solutions. This will reduce the number of people involved in each individual case \u2013 be it exam and project submissions, settling of outlays and expenses, and the administration in connection with study start.<\/p>\n<p>\u00bbThe point of there being several checks on things is not to bother people,\u00ab she says. \u00bbThe practice is to make sure that things are delivered correctly. We check and double-check so that fewer mistakes are made in the first place.\u00ab<\/p>\n<h3>\u00bbEveryone mattered\u00ab<\/h3>\n<p>Although Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard looks to the upcoming administration reform with concern, she still hopes that she herself has a job after the reform.<\/p>\n<p>\u00bbI’ll stay as long as I can, because I’ve probably never had as good a group of colleagues as I have now. I really appreciate my colleagues, and we have an incredibly good working relationship. We are good at giving each other feedback,\u00ab she explains.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>I have always felt that in UCPH you were able to participate and to speak your mind<\/p>\n<p class=\"quotee\">Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>And then there are also her academic staff colleagues.<\/p>\n<p>\u00bbI’m happy working here. I am really interested in the research they are doing. This is a part of the joy of it. To be able to help those who are doing research on something that is exciting and valuable for nature, for biodiversity, for the climate and for society in general.\u00ab<\/p>\n<p>At the time of this interview, there are only a few days left until the administration reform is passed by the the Board. But Charlotte Zoey S\u00f8ndergaard still has hopes that management will change course and acknowledge that what is proposed in the current draft will not function optimally. This is, she says, the \u00bbbest\u00ab outcome. And she rounds off the conversation:<\/p>\n<p>\u00bbI’ve been to other educational institutions, and I’ve always wanted to go back to UCPH. Partly because there is a flatter hierarchy. I have always felt that you were able to participate and to speak your mind at UCPH. You got the feeling that everyone mattered. But now it feels like all of this is gone.\u00ab<\/p>\n"},{"acf_fc_layout":"ArticleEnd"},{"acf_fc_layout":"Newsletter","lang_select":"en","identifier":"Newsletter","headline":"Get an email with our top stories","button_text":"Sign up here","class":""},{"acf_fc_layout":"OtherStories","headline":"","hand_picked_posts":false,"references":false,"category":false,"theme":false,"number_of_posts":"4","style":"default"}]},"taxonomyData":{"category":[{"term_id":5152,"name":"Working environment","slug":"working-environment","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":5152,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":2,"filter":"raw"}],"post_tag":[],"post_format":[],"expression":[{"term_id":14,"name":"Portrait Article","slug":"portrait_article","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":14,"taxonomy":"expression","description":"","parent":0,"count":796,"filter":"raw"}],"translation_priority":[{"term_id":5468,"name":"Optional","slug":"optional-en","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":5468,"taxonomy":"translation_priority","description":"","parent":0,"count":672,"filter":"raw"}]},"featured_media_url":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/dsc_4728_dxo2-1280x853.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165035","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/104"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=165035"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165035\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":165273,"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165035\/revisions\/165273"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/164986"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=165035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=165035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/uniavisen.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=165035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}