{"id":2909,"date":"2025-11-12T08:36:25","date_gmt":"2025-11-12T08:36:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/?p=2909"},"modified":"2025-11-12T11:02:26","modified_gmt":"2025-11-12T11:02:26","slug":"an-extraordinary-announcement-from-cambridge-university","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/?p=2909","title":{"rendered":"An Extraordinary Announcement"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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The University of Cambridge astonished everyone yesterday with this posting here<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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We would like to provide an update on senior leadership positions in the University.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Following recent changes and ongoing transitions, the University has decided not to proceed with the appointment of a new Chief Financial Officer at this time. This decision reflects the need to maintain stability and continuity in our leadership team and is in no way a reflection on the successful candidate. As a result, and with considerable regret, we confirm that Rita Akushie will not now be joining the University as our new CFO. We and Rita had been looking forward to her joining us, and we are very grateful to Rita for her engagement in this process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We are pleased that Anthony Odgers has kindly agreed to continue in his role to help guide the University through this period of change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We recognise the significant change in leadership positions in the central University administration at present through absence, vacancy and recent arrival. Interim arrangements are now in place to cover for the Registrary\u2019s prolonged period away from the office. These roles are key to providing strategic and operational stability and leadership to the University, and we would like to assure you that organisational resilience will continue to be of the highest priority.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Despite the delicate wording, this has “expensive disaster<\/em>” written all over it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The new CFO appeared to have a golden deal \u2014 a job for life worth roughly \u00a3350,000 a year. Walking away from a contract like that can\u2019t have come cheap. It likely cost the University very serious money, perhaps six or seven figures. The only reason to take such an expensive step would be if continuing with the appointment posed an even greater risk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So what could have gone so wrong, so fast? And why does the University’s statement emphasise “the need to maintain stability and continuity in our leadership team”<\/em>? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Given things are going so badly, the view of the 21 Group is that a shake-up of the leadership team is urgently needed<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The new CFO was going to have the Finance Division report directly to her. But that setup doesn\u2019t align with current practice, which places the Finance Division under the authority of the Registrary. The Registrary has been on leave since Summer 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We believe the poster BreakerMorant has joined the dots correctly here<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The new reporting lines effectively sidelined the Registrary, it could even amount to a claim of constructive dismissal. That might explain why the University abruptly reversed course \u2014 better to pay off one contract than risk a much bigger legal and governance crisis<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

This also explains the emphasis on “stability and continuity of the leadership team”<\/em> in the University’s announcement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If so, it’s a great shame — because continuity is not what we need, real and effective change is.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The University of Cambridge astonished everyone yesterday with this posting here We would like to provide an update on senior leadership positions in the University. Following recent changes and ongoing transitions, the University has decided not to proceed with the appointment of a new Chief Financial Officer at this time. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2909","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2909"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2909\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2924,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2909\/revisions\/2924"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}