New positions at K2

Despite the tight financial situation at the institute, we must steadily work with future recruitment of staff.  Good recruitment is extremely important for the long-term development of the institute.  This spring, K2 will start working on the framework for future recruitment.

It will be important to single out and weigh the criteria to be used in the recruitment process. Key words are teaching needs and skills, research, cooperation abilities, and leadership.

Unanswered questions are whether or not new positions should be allocated the academic sections or if we should follow the model: “We don’t care what you do as long as you are a leader in your field”.  What weight should the university clinics’ wish for specialized skills be given?  Likewise, we must discuss what positions are most suitable given the tasks we have – should we aim for more 50 and 100 % positions at the expense of 20 % positions?  Should the division of principal positions into multiple 20% positions as has been the case in recent years be reversed? Should we now hire more people to technical positions at the expense of scientific personnel?

We will begin by collecting background information about the present employment situation, expected budget resources for new positions, teaching needs (undervisningsregnskap) and scientific production (Cristin). Next we will ask for input from you regarding the principles for prioritization, as well as well-founded requests for new positions.  I hope many of you will engage actively in this.

Welcome to an important and a most certainly, demanding process. A detailed plan for the recruitment process will be published in K2’s weekly newsletter during April.

Eystein Husebye

This year, as in previous years, the Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry has announced prizes for the publication of the year, the research group of the year, the PhD-work of the year, as well as a prize for outstanding research dissemination.  Each institute may suggest up to two candidates within each category.

So far one suggestion for the publication of the year has been submitted.  Thus there is plenty of room for more suggestions and there is definitely not a lack of strong candidates at K2.  For each suggestion a brief justification report should be attached.  More information about the criteria for each prize category can be found here (in Norwegian only).

There you will also find an overview of previous winners.This is a great opportunity also for younger colleagues to make a mark; in addition there is a cash award.  I encourage all research groups to consider if they have candidates relevant for the various prizes.  Suggestions should be sent to Irene by March 24

Per