‘One PS’ – developing a vision to align our Professional Services

The Chief Operating Officer (Fiona Ryland) is proud to present ‘One PS’ for discussion and engagement across UCL.

‘I’m delighted to be able to present to colleagues ‘One PS’, a vision for aligning UCL Professional Services. I sincerely believe that the quality of our Professional Services can provide us with a competitive advantage in the future, making UCL the obvious choice for students, staff and the community, not just because of its academic strength but its sector leading services.’

‘One PS’ is a vision for Professional Services (PS) colleagues across UCL, encouraging them to work together to tackle challenges, solve problems and continue to make UCL a great place to work, study and learn.

UCL Library Services is part of the Office of the Vice-Provost (Research). It reports to him and is accountable to the whole UCL community via UCL Library Committee, chaired by the Vice-Provost (Education and Student Affairs). You can find more information on the place of Library Services within UCL structures on LibNet. The Library makes a strong contribution to the work of professional services across UCL and, as such, I am a member of the Professional Services Leadership Team along with the Directors of Operations from Faculties and with central Professional Services leaders.

‘One PS’ objectives:

Professional Services (PS) are distributed across UCL, and although significant effort has been put into building cohesion there is still more work to do. There is currently no common purpose and vision, and it is suggested that by creating one there are significant advantages to be had. The objectives for ‘One PS’:

1. Build alignment amongst key members of UCL’s professional services leadership community
2. Understand shared values and ways of working required to achieve vision
3. Create a common purpose and vision
4. Define priority themes and goals
5. Develop a specific action plan of next steps

Key themes from our discussions:

Since December discussions have been taking place across UCL to understand how we turn the ‘One PS’ objectives into action. Four clear themes became apparent from those discussions.
1. One approach will add value
2. Simplicity and clarity are key
3. We must work together on a few critical things
4. Our work must lead to action, and be supported by clear roles and responsibilities

The discussions also led us to the following draft vision:

‘To make UCL a great place to work and study, where what I do enables our people to do amazing things, everyday.’

Next steps for ‘One PS’:
The work now needs your feedback. Managers are encouraged to talk to their teams about ‘One PS’ and to share common themes and ideas with the ‘One PS’ team. It is essential that in creating this, all staff (from the centre, faculties and VP Offices) have an opportunity to say what they think. Hopefully feedback will have been generated by the PS Conference (June 24).

‘One PS’ Engagement Pack – Presentation

If you think what we are doing is great, or not, we want to hear from you. Please email onePS@ucl.ac.uk.

If you want to get involved in shaping what our future vision looks like please email me (benjamin.meunier@ucl.ac.uk) or Ian Dancy (I.Dancy@ucl.ac.uk), who is a member of the ‘One PS’ team.