Organisational and Staff Development - Building Effective Partnerships

UCL's Human Resources Strategy supports efficient, fair, consistent and sustainable people management and development enabling UCL to compete with the best universities in the world. The Organisational and Staff Development (OSD) service exists in order to enable UCL to build the organisational capability it needs to achieve its academic mission and navigate change successfully. We also provide the leadership to exploit fully the combined expertise and resources of all UCL’s in-house training providers, by developing a community of practice with shared aspirations and consistent service standards. As well as a centralised provision for researchers and other staff, we wanted to be able to get under the skin' of the different UCL Schools, Faculties and Departments to ensure that we give them bespoke and focused support for their agenda to complement our centralised provision. This means working closely with the senior management teams in those areas across the whole learning, development and change agenda and with all staff groupings. The Head of OSD has also facilitated some 'partnership' sessions with other key people who work to support researchers to agree ways of working together collaboratively. These include HR Consultants, other UCL Training Providers, Research Facilitators, UCL Advances, UCL Business, Careers Service etc. . We have discovered some duplication and overlap, but also some synergies and complementary activity that will benefit from this new approach. And there are great benefits to be had from a regular dialogue in terms of developing our provision and ensuring continuity and sustainability of the support given. Working in partnership with the Senior Management Team, UCL's Faculties, Corporate Support Services and HR Consultancy colleagues, we aim to: - enhance the quality of leadership and management at all levels in UCL; - ensure organisational change is aligned and delivers its anticipated benefits, and transitions are smooth and effectively supported; - develop a learning curriculum that reflects UCL’s strategic challenges, focuses on agreed learning priorities, is of the highest quality, represents value for money and delivers measurable organisational impact; - develop the personal and professional capability of individuals and teams across UCL to support the achievement of Faculty and UCL strategic objectives; enable research staff to access transferable skills for personal and career development purposes - to fully embed the Roberts' Agenda and the Concordat into the normal processes in the research and training enviornment; - develop and maintain effective information systems for administering and recording training, learning and development activity; - expand our use of modern learning technologies where appropriate and cost-effective, to enable accessible and remote learning solutions for all staff, irrespective of working hours or location; - develop a range of internal and external partnerships for delivery; - provide the leadership to bring together and leverage the combined expertise of all UCL's in-house training providers working in a community of practice to consistent service standards; - develop a basket of performance metrics to assess the impact of learning interventions on UCL's performance.

better placed to carry out learning needs analysis to identify gaps in provision and ensure that institutional as well as local needs are met; - reduce duplication and overlapping so reduce costs and improve on procurment; improve quality of provision; - maintain best practice; - ensure sustainability; - target resources and capability and capacity appropriately; early indications suggest stakeholders value the enhanced ‘connectedness’ and relevance of the service provision

What is the rationale for doing this?

How does it fit with institutional strategy?

What are the main features of the provision?

What are the aims and expected outcomes?

UCL's Human Resources Strategy supports efficient, fair, consistent and sustainable people management and development enabling UCL to compete with the best universities in the world.

The Organisational and Staff Development (OSD) service exists in order to enable UCL to build the organisational capability it needs to achieve its academic mission and navigate change successfully. We also provide the leadership to exploit fully the combined expertise and resources of all UCL’s in-house training providers, by developing a community of practice with shared aspirations and consistent service standards.
As well as a centralised provision for researchers and other staff, we wanted to be able to get under the skin' of the different UCL Schools, Faculties and Departments to ensure that we give them bespoke and focused support for their agenda to complement our centralised provision.  This means working closely with the senior management teams in those areas across the whole learning, development and change agenda and with all staff groupings.   The Head of OSD has also facilitated some 'partnership' sessions with other key people who work to support researchers to agree ways of working together collaboratively.  These include HR Consultants, other UCL Training Providers, Research Facilitators, UCL Advances, UCL Business, Careers Service etc. .

We have discovered some duplication and overlap, but also some synergies and complementary activity that will benefit from this new approach.  And there are great benefits to be had from a regular dialogue in terms of developing our provision and ensuring continuity and sustainability of the support given.

Working in partnership with the Senior Management Team, UCL's Faculties, Corporate Support Services and HR Consultancy colleagues, we aim to: 

• enhance the quality of leadership and management at all levels in UCL;
• ensure organisational change is aligned and delivers its anticipated benefits, and transitions are smooth and effectively supported;
• develop a learning curriculum that reflects UCL’s strategic challenges, focuses on agreed learning priorities, is of the highest quality, represents value for money and delivers measurable organisational impact;
• develop the personal and professional capability of individuals and teams across UCL to support the achievement of Faculty and UCL strategic objectives;
• enable research staff to access transferable skills for personal and career development purposes - to fully embed the Roberts' Agenda and the Concordat into the normal processes in the research and training enviornment;
• develop and maintain effective information systems for administering and recording training, learning and development activity;
• expand our use of modern learning technologies where appropriate and cost-effective, to enable accessible and remote learning solutions for all staff, irrespective of working hours or location;
• develop a range of internal and external partnerships for delivery;
• provide the leadership to bring together and leverage the combined expertise of all UCL's in-house training providers working in a community of practice to consistent service standards;
• develop a basket of performance metrics to assess the impact of learning interventions on UCL's performance. 

Are there any pre-requisites for engagement, e.g. levels of skill, years of experience, essential pre-activities?

How many participate in each 'activity'?

How do you monitor effectiveness?

Who do you seek feedback from?

Do you have benchmarks?

• better placed to carry out learning needs analysis to identify gaps in provision and ensure that institutional as well as local needs are met;
• reduce duplication and overlapping so reduce costs and improve on procurment;
• improve quality of provision;
• maintain best practice;
• ensure sustainability;
• target resources and capability and capacity appropriately;
• early indications suggest stakeholders value the enhanced ‘connectedness’ and relevance of the service provision

As always when introducing new ways of working, it is about demonstrating that there is now something better on offer; to be able to do that, we have to be invited in in the first place and demonstrate our credibility.  Some parts of UCL are more open than others, but we are finding that, having made an impact in some Faculties, there is an increasing 'pull' for our services.

OSD Consultants will focus on supporting individuals, teams and the organisation as a whole in a more aligned, yet locally relevant way.  Part of this will be about coaching and mentoring people to become more self-sufficient as individuals and teams, so that they can carry forward the researcher development agenda with less external intervention in the future.