Our current President and Vice-Chancellor Professor Sir Christopher Snowden has announced his intention to retire in the spring of 2019.
The selection of a new Vice-Chancellor is a defining moment for any University. As leader of the organisation they are the outward face of the University and set the agenda for its future and the people who work and study in it.
How you can participate
A key part of our process is to ask all colleagues and students to help determine the key attributes of our next Vice-Chancellor. To enable you to do this we will be launching an online survey between 2 – 12 October.
There will be three open questions that each allow you to respond in your own words. All the anonymous responses will be analysed and the key themes will be distilled into a number of attributes. These will then inform the person specification that we use in the search for our next leader.
This information will be fed back to you in November as the search gets underway. There will be further updates on our progress via SUSSED over the coming weeks, so that you are kept aware of the process for recruiting our next Vice-Chancellor.
We would encourage all staff and students to participate in the consultation, as your input will help shape the future of our University.
Does a new leader mean a new strategy?
We need to be clear about both our ambitions and direction of travel and the necessary attributes required of a new leader to help us achieve them. The University’s Chair of Council, Philip Greenish, has stated that he expects our next Vice-Chancellor to pursue and build upon the successes of our current strategy:
“Our strategy and ambitions are clear, and we will ensure a smooth transition to [Sir Christopher’s] successor next year, who will continue our exciting transformation journey.”
How do you search for a new Vice-Chancellor?
Yesterday our Council formally approved the process for recruiting our new Vice-Chancellor. The first step is to create a Selection Committee (SC) whose role is to take responsibility for the search and selection of potential candidates. This will be led by the Chair of Council and comprise of three colleagues from Senate, three members of our University Council, Professor Mandy Fader (Pro Vice-Chancellor for Internal Partnerships) as senior academic leader for the search, a representative from Professional Services and a representative from the student community. An external advisor may be included if required.
The University will also seek expressions of interest from Executive Search partners to ensure we are attracting the very best global candidates. The SC will play a role in finalising the choice of partner.
A long-list of candidates will be drawn together by our Search partners. From this group the SC will create a short-list who will each be asked to undertake the formal selection process. The best candidate will then be recommended to the University Council to approve the appointment.
