Administrative Heads Group Meeting 2-2002

Meeting 2/2002 of the Administrative Heads Group was held at 8.30am on Thursday, 18 April, 2002 in the Council Room, 1^st Floor, University Offices Building 3a, Clayton campus.

Apologies were received from Professor Alan Lindsay, Mrs Pam Herman, Mr Anthony Pollock, Professor Merran Evans, Mr Ian Porter, Mr John White, Mr Peter Marshall, Mr Joe Curtis, Mr Robin Coventry and Mr Martin Doulton.

The Chair welcomed new members Ms Cathrine Harboe-Ree, University Librarian, and Mr Nick Thorburn, Manager, Compliance and Ms Meredith Jackson, Executive Director, Marketing and Public Affairs.

Professor Stephen Parker, Dean, Faculty of Law, and Mr Jonathon Sanders, Specialist Advisor, Strategy and Commercial, Office of the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Resources), were invited to attend the meeting. Mr Owen Slattery, General Manager, Monash International Pty Ltd, and Ms Sue Gleeson, Faculty Registrar, Information Technology, attended as observers.

The Minutes of Meeting 1/2002, held Thursday, 14 February 2002 (circulated previously), were confirmed.

The Chair advised about progress with matters raised at the previous meeting including a crisis management project to commence shortly at the Berwick campus (with relevant activities to be rolled out to other campuses during 2002); the initiation of the SAP upgrade the weekend following Anzac Day; and the increase in international student commencements as at March 2002 to 2614 students, as compared to 2012 students in March 2001.

Professor Stephen Parker, Chair of the Monash Institutional Self Review Team, informed members about progress and noted that the exposure draft report had been prepared for initial consideration.

Professor Parker advised that the review had been a positive and cooperative experience. Members noted an outline of the themes from the review and the groupings of areas evaluated, together with detail about the report recommendations that were grouped under the categories of Developing a Monash Approach to Quality, Enhancing Our Human Capacity, Communication at Monash and Governance at Monash. Professor Parker advised that the process followed had provided objective preparation for the AUQA audit and for shaping Monash’s quality goals and activities towards 2020. Members noted that the recommendations were framed in a positive context.

A query was raised about dealing with perceptions of corporatisation. Professor Parker advised that the ‘communication strategies’ would touch on the issue and noted that the focus of the report was appropriately on teaching and learning and research.

The Vice-Chancellor thanked Professor Parker and noted that the exposure draft would be presented to the Committee of Deans the following week, with discussion to occur at the Vice-Chancellor’s Group about strategies for addressing the recommendations.

Members noted that nominations were called for the Vice-Chancellor’s Awards for Exceptional Performance by General Staff, and would close Friday, 9 August 2002. Details were at:

http://www.adm.monash.edu.au/sss/sdu/awards/

The Vice-Chancellor noted the importance of celebrating positive achievements and urged members to look closely at nominations for relevant staff for this award.

Members noted advice from the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research and Development), Professor P Darvall, regarding the university’s recent research involvement and highlights.

Ms Alison Crook, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Resources), advised the Group about the recent Support Services Workshop. The workshop, which was a further development of the original Support Services Plan, had involved divisional directors, several faculty managers and areas such as Research, Monash Commercial, MONYX and Monash International.

A focus of the workshop was on structures that would support international activities and globalisation. Ms Crook provided detail regarding the key issues considered and about concrete strategies that were developed in the areas of sustainable global operations, student expectations of the customer experience, Monash staff, consistency of image and reputation and self-reliance. Members noted that information would be available on the web shortly.

Mr A Patterson, Faculty Manager, Law, and Mr P Yates, Director, Systems and Services, Student and Staff Services Division, commented on benefits of the workshop as a helpful positioning experience with directional outcomes, and on the further focus on the student (and staff) experience from the previous plan.

Members noted the advice provided about Support Services directions.

Mr Jonathan Sanders, Specialist Advisor, Strategy and Commercial, provided a Powerpoint presentation regarding the Monash STRIP on the western side of the Clayton campus. Mr Sanders detailed the aims of the project including cross-disciplinary research and commercial activities, services for seemless commercial development of research outcomes and provision of a cluster environment, involving equal space for faculties and ‘paying customers’. Members noted benefits of the development such as access to world class research, location of the STRIP in the centre of enterprise and provision of incubation and business support. Mr Sanders informed the Group about planned layout, costs and funding and presented an overview of the expected occupancy of the first building. Members noted that completion of this stage was anticipated from March 2003. Work regarding further buildings was underway.

Ms Crook advised that the inclusion of a senior high school was planned for a later building. Members noted Ms Crook’s advice that Ms Jessica Lightfoot, Director, Major Projects, was working with areas of the university involved with the commercial sector and with the development of policy in relation to commercialisation. Ms Cathrine Harboe-Ree, University Librarian, agreed to meet with Mr Sanders about the relationship between the Library and the STRIP.

The Vice-Chancellor thanked Mr Sanders for the presentation.

Meeting 3/2002 of the Administrative Heads Group will be held at 8.30am on Thursday, 4 July 2002 in the Council Room.

Any items for inclusion in the next agenda will be required by Friday, 21 June 2002.