This 12 months one of many large Folks and Tradition highlights has been the renewing of our Athena Swan Silver Award, in recognition of our success and progress in selling gender equality and inclusion. Particularly, the report highlights our achievements with communications throughout the division, versatile working, and the promotion of latest senior females to each chair and professorship ranges.
We’re now engaged on delivering our Future Motion Plan, the place we’ll be specializing in enhancing the inclusion in addition to profession improvement of various teams within the division, together with new or rising PIs, college students, dad and mom, minoritised teams and folks outdoors researcher roles. We may also be taking a look at systemic gender inequalities comparable to pay gaps.
A lot of what’s in our Future Motion Plan was knowledgeable by final 12 months’s workers survey and we are actually already looking forward to the following workers survey arising within the spring.
One other of our main initiatives this 12 months is the launch of functions for open-ended contracts. We all know that fastened time period contracts have lengthy been a problem for a lot of workers, each professionally and personally, and we’re glad to have the ability to supply a scheme whereby open-ended contracts can now be utilized for in lots of circumstances.
Our PI lunches, aiming to present PIs an area to debate key points, study from one another and community extra successfully, have been nicely attended. Over the previous 12 months now we have centered on subjects together with good analysis tradition in teams, PDRs and profession conversations and inclusive workers recruitment prime suggestions in addition to how to achieve success in grant functions and tackling scientific forms. We have now obtained constructive suggestions on these peer to see conferences and at all times interested by listening to concepts for future subjects.
Prior to now time period now we have moved from month-to-month to termly Folks and Tradition themes to be extra strategic and centered on key areas while making certain we give consideration to vital ongoing areas of curiosity and causes, comparable to Black Historical past Month and incapacity consciousness. Over the previous couple of months our theme has been connections and there was some unbelievable work to assist develop and enhance connections throughout the Division, comparable to internet hosting connection and well-being workers and pupil cafés, Christmas crafting, writing retreats and a concentrate on profession improvement in grant functions, introduction of the scholar buddy scheme and launching our new division Linkedin web page the place we will maintain everybody updated on our actions.
Thanks to everybody who has been concerned in these actions and to all these concerned in and contributing to our Folks and Tradition work.
