{"id":966,"date":"2024-05-26T15:29:05","date_gmt":"2024-05-26T14:29:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/?p=966"},"modified":"2024-05-26T15:43:05","modified_gmt":"2024-05-26T14:43:05","slug":"vice-chancellor-vennells","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/?p=966","title":{"rendered":"Vice Chancellor Vennells"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-media-text is-stacked-on-mobile\" style=\"grid-template-columns:85% auto\"><figure class=\"wp-block-media-text__media\"><video controls src=\"https:\/\/21percent.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/twittervid.com_jude5456_9cdf2b.mp4\"><\/video><\/figure><div class=\"wp-block-media-text__content\">\n<p><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It has been a riveting watch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The three days of Paula Vennell&#8217;s testimony have demolished forever the idea that those at the top of institutions like the Post Office are hugely skilled people worth gigantic salaries. &#8220;I am not a legal expert&#8221;, Paula said. &#8220;I am not technically minded&#8221;. &#8220;I have no skills in software development&#8221;. &#8220;I relied on the expertise of others in my team&#8221;. For this, the Post Office paid her <strong>\u00a35.1 m <\/strong>during her time at the helm, peaking at&nbsp;<strong>\u00a3718,300<\/strong>&nbsp;in 2018. That year her base salary was <strong>\u00a3253,800<\/strong> and she earned <strong>\u00a3390,800<\/strong> in bonuses (plus pensions and other benefits).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Paula readily accepted that there were no bugs in Horizon. Anyone who has ever written code or worked with a large piece of complex software knows that some bugs always remain, perhaps rare and obscure. This should have been a massive red flag that what she was hearing from her IT Director was untrustworthy. But Paula had never written computer code and had no relevant insight or skills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When you have no expertise, then you have to rely on the judgements of others. You lack the knowledge and critical thinking skills to do otherwise. So, at the top of the hierarchy, we usually find an individual like Paula who never accepts any responsibility for the things that go wrong.  She has simply taken advice from the senior management team, the Legal Department, or Human Resources. However, if things go well, the \u2018Remuneration Committee\u2019 normally finds that this is all because of the outstanding leadership of the individual at the top.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>People just like Paula Vennells run our water companies, our energy, our public transport, our NHS and sit on the boards of all major companies. And of course they run our Universities. In fact, the huge salary, the readiness to accept uncritically the untruths of her senior management team and the unwillingness to accept personal responsibility all suggest that Paula has a fantastic career in higher education management ahead of her.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There are many similarities between Paula Vennells and some of our Vice Chancellors. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>First, Vice Chancellors are usually imported after a global search. Parachuted in from a different University sometimes from a different country, they have no option but to rely on the senior management team around them. Just like Vennells, they have to take the advice and rely on the judgements of others. Normally senior management control the flow of information to a new Vice Chancellor. If there are ongoing problems in the University, Vice Chancellors have little option but to follow the lead of those who have been there much longer than they have. So, they can evade responsibility with ease when the catastrophe strikes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Second, Vice Chancellors are well paid, yet not held to account. Two recent examples will suffice.  <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-53233402\" title=\"Vice Chancellor Ian Diamond \">Vice Chancellor Ian Diamond <\/a>told the University of Aberdeen that he was retiring in August 2017. However, his formal notice period was triggered only after he had actually left his post, nearly a year later. Incredibly, his formal notice period began only after his actual notice period had ended. This meant he continued to be paid long after he had left. The Scottish Funding Council reviewed the payment which was in the region of <strong>\u00a3280,000.<\/strong> Eventually, Prof Diamond was asked to repay<strong> \u00a3119,000<\/strong>,\u00a0but he did not respond. The University of Aberdeen elected not to pursue the matter in a court of law. Now, after his tenure, the University of Aberdeen is facing a \u00a315 million deficit and &#8212; amongst other cuts &#8212; its Modern Languages department may not survive intact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>David Richardson, Vice Chancellor of the University of East Anglia,&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.timeshighereducation.com\/news\/uea-vice-chancellor-david-richardson-quits-amid-financial-crisis\">stepped down with immediate effect <\/a> in 2023. This was after it emerged that the institution faced a \u00a330 million deficit for 2023-2024, rising to a \u00a345 million deficit in three years time.  After leadership so poor that he was effectively booted out, David Richardson still accepted a <strong>\u00a397,000<\/strong> pay-off equivalent to six months\u2019 salary in lieu of notice. This means he received a final pay package of <strong>\u00a3371,000<\/strong> for the seven months he served as Vice Chancellor last year. Here, the axe has fallen primarily on Arts and Humanities lecturers at UEA who are being made redundant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So Paula Vennells has all the necessary attributes for a Vice Chancellorship. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>She won&#8217;t be going to prison. She is too fragrant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>She is coming to a University near you. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It has been a riveting watch. The three days of Paula Vennell&#8217;s testimony have demolished forever the idea that those at the top of institutions like the Post Office are hugely skilled people worth gigantic salaries. &#8220;I am not a legal expert&#8221;, Paula said. &#8220;I am not technically minded&#8221;. &#8220;I [&hellip;]<\/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-966","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\/966","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=966"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/966\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":980,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/966\/revisions\/980"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=966"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=966"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=966"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}