Cambridge University Reporter


REPORTS

Report of the General Board on the establishment of a Professorship of Management Studies

The GENERAL BOARD beg leave to report to the University as follows:

1. The Faculty Board of Business and Management have advised the Board of the need to recruit a new Director of the Judge Institute of Management. The present Director, Professor Dame Sandra Dawson, was elected to the KPMG Professorship of Management Studies and appointed Director of the Judge Institute in 1995. She has signalled her intention to relinquish the office of Director with effect from 30 September 2006.

2. During Professor Dawson's tenure, the Institute has grown substantially. In their Report on the establishment of a Faculty of Business and Management, (Reporter, 2003-04, p. 988) the Board noted that the Institute had '43 academic staff and 75 other staff, and … responsibility for some 500 students in 7 degree programmes … the Institute has become an internationally recognized business school'.

3. The Director's role is particularly challenging. As well as the statutory duties of a Head of Department, in terms of providing academic leadership and managing research and teaching programmes, the Director is responsible for managing a large, external trading organization in a fiercely competitive business market. The trading organization comprises vocational programmes, for the M.B.A. Degree and for Executive Education, with an annual turnover of around £4m. The leading institutions in these markets are assessed and ranked every year by the world's business and financial press. Performance is highly visible and reflects on the University at large.

4. Central to the role of Director is leading efforts to raise external funds to underpin the facilities and staffing which are expected of a modern business school. In its short life, the Institute has attracted some tens of millions of pounds, thanks particularly to the leadership of the present Director. However, the Institute's principal international competitors enjoy endowments of hundreds of millions of pounds. A major further fund-raising campaign is being planned, and will be led by the new Director.

5. These externally facing activities have to be conducted alongside rigorous programmes of research and teaching which meet the University's high expectations in the Research Assessment Exercise, QAA review, etc. It is essential that, as well as the managerial and diplomatic skills required for trading and fund-raising activities, the Director should have the academic credentials and experience necessary to lead a major research effort, foster undergraduate and postgraduate teaching, and develop the Institute's strong research and teaching links with other Faculties and Departments in the University. The Faculty Board consider it essential that, in order to secure the necessary combination of academic standing, together with the experience, skills, and qualities required, the Directorship should be held concurrently with a Professorship. The Faculty Board propose that the Professorship should be open to candidates in any discipline within Management Studies. The Professor would be appointed to the Directorship for an initial term of six years, renewable for a further period of four years.

6. A benefactor has undertaken to provide the full costs of the Directorship and Professorship for five years. Should further external funding not be forthcoming, the cost of the office would thereafter be met by the Institute, either from new revenues or by compensating savings in recurrent expenditure. Suitable accommodation and administrative and secretarial support are available in the Institute's building. The Council of the School of Technology lend their full support to this proposal.

7. The General Board consider that, in view of the strategic nature of the appointment, it would be appropriate for them to make the appointment, on the advice of an appropriately constituted Advisory Committee, who would be supported by an Executive Search Company. At the conclusion of the process the Board would report again to the University recommending the establishment of a Professorship for a named person, who would also be required by regulation to hold the Directorship for an initial period of six years in the first instance.

8. The General Board recommend:

That approval be given to the procedure set out in this Report for the establishment of a Professorship of Management Studies in the Judge Institute of Management, to be held concurrently with the Directorship of the Institute.

13 April 2005ALISON RICHARD, Vice-ChancellorM. J. DAUNTONMELVEENA MCKENDRICK
 JOHN BELLRICHARD HUNTERROGER PARKER
 TOM BLUNDELLDREW LIVINGSTONKEITH PETERS
 WILLIAM BROWND. W. B. MACDONALDI. H. WHITE