Proposed changes
The proposed restructure of existing Professional Services (PS) support for researcher development would establish a new single team based in the Directorate of Research and Business Engagement to coordinate and manage training and personal and professional development for researchers. The proposed team would ensure the provision of high-quality training and development across the University, in order to meet the needs of PGRs, research staff, research fellows, early career researchers and research supervisors.
The proposed changes would affect the following areas:
- Research Degrees and Researcher Development Team, Directorate for Research and Business Engagement (RBE)
- Researcher Development Team, Faculty of Science and Engineering (FSE)
- Researcher Development Team, Faculty of Humanities (FOH)
The proposals will result in a change to the number of posts required and their nature.
- 5 posts are in scope of the change.
- 3 posts in scope and at risk.
- There is proposed reduction of 2 posts at Grade 7.
- There is a proposed increased 0.8 FTE resource requirement at Grade 6.
A voluntary severance scheme will be available to those in scope and at risk. If the reduction of 2 posts is not achieved through voluntary severance (or redeployment or retraining where possible), the University will seek the approval of the Board of Governors to move to compulsory redundancy.
Staff in the Faculty of Biology Medicine and Health (FBMH) currently based in the Centre for Academic and Researcher Development (CARD), who deliver some Researcher Development services as a small part of their role, are not affected by this proposed change but will be subject to a later review of CARD to be conducted within the Faculty.