You received forty reports from staff and five from students during the past academic year. What do those figures tell you?
‘At the very least, it is not a break with previous trends. The numbers fit the pattern of roughly forty to fifty cases I receive each year. There were slightly fewer reports than last year, perhaps due to the reorganisation at the Faculty of TNW at that time. This year, by contrast, there was an increase in reports from the Faculty of ITC, which can also be explained by a reorganisation.’
You write that five of the nine reports from the Faculty of ITC were related to the reorganisation. As an ombuds officer, what do you observe during such a process?
‘You see that situations like these create unrest, often extending far beyond individual cases. It always takes time before things return to normal. When people are reassigned or transferred, while everyone has preferences that cannot always be accommodated, you quickly create fertile ground for conflict.’
How should UT anticipate that?
‘I think it would be wise to make social safety one of the criteria when reassigning staff. That is one of the recommendations in my annual report. At present, the primary consideration is someone’s expertise when finding a suitable position. That is understandable, of course, but if you take social safety seriously as a university, then it should also be part of the equation. If you require people to work together while knowing they cannot get along, you are asking for trouble. As an employer, you are effectively lighting the fuse yourself.’
As in every annual report, you draw a lesson from the reports you receive. This year, you focused on how conflicts spiral out of control…
‘That’s right. I do see a pattern in how conflicts develop. One misstep during that process can be enough to send a conflict off the rails.’
As in the case of the Faculty of EEMCS, given the recent issue?
‘I cannot comment on any specific case. What I can say is that an important first step is to listen without prejudice to what the actual problem is, especially if you are part of the situation yourself. It is important to approach a situation in a professional manner, while also showing empathy. In other words, you need to look at a conflict objectively while also being able to put yourself in someone else’s position.’
What does that look like in practice?
‘What often happens is that people take a highly normative view of a conflict. When a manager has to resolve a problem, they may conclude that someone is not responding rationally or ‘normally’. But by that stage, the person involved may have been under pressure for a long time because they have been caught up in the conflict, and may indeed react irrationally or lose their temper. The risk then is that the discussion shifts towards that person’s behaviour, rather than the substantive conflict that started it all. That is precisely why both a professional and an empathetic perspective are so important: they help you keep the situation in focus and assess it fairly.’
How do you view this in light of the recent warnings issued by the Dutch Labour Inspectorate to UT?
‘Leaving aside the fact that virtually every university received similar warnings, one particularly interesting aspect of the Inspectorate’s advice is an institution’s capacity to learn. We produce all kinds of annual reports within the support structure. You want the organisation to learn from them, because otherwise there is little point in writing them. So the question is: what does the university do with these findings, and how are they translated into policy? After seven years here, I have a fairly good sense of what is working well at UT and what could be improved. But I also want to see action taken. In that respect, I certainly share the Inspectorate’s view.’
Do you get the impression that something is actually being done with the recommendations you have made over the years?
‘In some cases, certainly. Take the discussion about the position of Human Resources, for example. There has been extensive debate on that topic. There is also greater awareness of the vulnerable position of PhD candidates. So in that sense I am satisfied, particularly when I look at UT’s current intention to strengthen its own capacity to learn.’
Now that there is a national evaluation report on university ombuds officers, how do you view your own role within the system?
‘I think my role is well embedded within the support structure. Even so, when I look at that report, I think we need to continue explaining clearly what my role and responsibilities are. In The Hague, there appears to be a perception that university ombuds officers deal exclusively with cases involving sexual misconduct. In reality, the vast majority of my cases concern workplace conflicts and damaged working relationships.’
Even so, you do not have a formal mandate to intervene, for example. Wouldn’t you like more ‘power’?
‘It is true that I have to rely on persuasion. Generally speaking, I am quite satisfied with the way people respond to my interventions, but I am not an administrator and I do not want to become one. During a recent meeting within the support structure, we discussed the wish that sometimes exists to establish the facts independently, essentially to determine the truth in conflicts. That is certainly important, but I believe it falls outside my role. As an ombuds officer, my focus is not so much on who is right, or on assigning blame. My main aim is to understand the underlying conflict and help de-escalate it wherever possible, so that both the reporting party and UT can ultimately move forward.’
