April 15, 2015, by Tara de Cozar

Project Transform update

The first element of Project Transform, Enquiries Light, is set to launch on Monday 11 May — marking the first change to the University’s processes and technology connected to the student journey. The second GoLive covers areas including Admissions and takes place in September 2015.

The final GoLive focuses on the student record system from registration to graduation — aiming to create a modern, user-friendly system for students to manage their time at University. Launching in September 2016, the system will also enable staff to manage student information and support more efficiently, further improving relationships and interactions between students and the University.

As part of this work we need to consider how best to organise student-facing support to enhance our student services. We expect this process to also deliver efficiencies. Based on previous work undertaken by Capita we anticipate that once the new systems, processes and organisation design have been fully implemented there will be ongoing savings of around 23% of related costs.

As the project progresses we will develop a programme of support for staff going through these changes. This includes upskilling existing staff to work in changed roles on new systems, and providing clearly mapped career pathways.

Collection of data on APM job roles connected to the student journey is now complete — thanks to all who provided this. We now have a comprehensive picture of activities across the University.

Workshops have also given school and department managers the opportunity to feed in to the new organisation design models. Now, a smaller working group will further develop these models based on the discussions so far and on further consultation and evidence gathering. Members of the working group will report back to the broader community in due course.

A decision on which model will be taken forward is expected by July 2015. All job roles will be in place ready for the final stage of Project Transform – Go Live 3 – launching in September 2016, with the first stage of organisation change being to determine the senior management structure.

We recognise that there is an element of uncertainty around these plans, but expect a clear way forward by the start of the next academic session. We will keep you updated on progress, both through general University communications and via your school and department managers.

Thank you to all those who have worked with Project Transform so far. I’m looking forward to working with many more colleagues across the University as the project progresses.

Karen Cox
Deputy Vice-Chancellor and Project Transform sponsor

Support and advice are available from various places during the organisation design process. For more info visit the Project Transform FAQ pages.

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