KEY POINTS:
Manukau Institute of Technology (MIT) is set to slash around 90 positions in an efficiency and cost-cutting drive.
The jobs will be disappearing from the polytechnic's campus in Otara, South Auckland.
MIT chief executive Dr Peter Brothers announced the impending changes to staff at a meeting last Friday afternoon.
Letters outlining the situation for affected staff will be sent out to them on December 20. The institute is closed at that time and will not re-open until after the festive season.
Around 220 positions will disappear, or significantly change, and in turn around 130 positions will be created under the new planned structure - leaving a shortfall of around 90 jobs. That's around 7 per cent of the current workforce.
The top tier of management undergoes little or no change. The current Executive Team becomes the Senior Leadership Team, with its numbers in fact increased by one member to 9.
"We have structured a budget that allows for investment in the future." explained Dr Brothers today.
"If anything, (the cuts) might be lower than that (90 positions), for two reasons:
(1) for some months we hired people on fixed term contracts;
(2) in some targeted areas we'll be offering voluntary severance schemes."
"The real driver is to restructure to allow for future investment in new programs and teaching," he said.
"(The budget) could have gone into break-even but it would have removed the ability to invest in the future. It's a hard decision. MIT is going well now. If you're not investing in the future, you're dead," said Dr Brothers today.
He said he expected "a number" of staff would accept the offer of the voluntary severance package.
Applications for the newly-created positions will close on January 28, following which time interviews will take place and appointments announced by February 28.
Documents obtained by nzherald.co.nz outline the planned changes and the rationale behind them.
Dr Brothers explained to staff in the documents that present levels of expenditure were not sustainable in the budget planning exercise for 2008.
He said the institute had become "as mean and lean" as was possible through recent savings initiatives, but the time had been reached where "simple cost-cutting will now not suffice".
He said MIT had brought in consultants from PriceWaterhouse Coopers to assist them in redesigning processes, which "started from a blank page".
The main change in the proposed academic structure is the change from the existing 13 departments into 3 faculties and 5 departments - in other words, 13 becomes 8.
Most of the rationalisation is targeted at administration (non-academic)roles.
The proposals are now out for a period of consultation, until December 14. By December 19, the CEO indicated he will have made his decision on what form the final structure will take.
Dr Brothers emphasised that the proposals in the written report, entitled "Tomorrow's MIT", are draft and not final until the consultation process has been completed.
An institution on the Manukau landscape since its inception in 1970, MIT has built an enviable reputation for its role as a tertiary educator, at the forefront of creating educational opportunities for Maori and Pacific Island students in particular, utilising its location in the largest Polynesian city in the world.
The institute is a leader in short courses and customised training for business and industry, with over 1000 scheduled courses and 250 training contracts annually.
It has a unique niche in the teaching of subjects in the visual arts, hospitality, maritime, nursing and other trades; and in recent years has strengthened its reputation to be taken as a serious contender in business and IT qualifications.
MIT has also been at the forefront of so-called "foundation" and second-chance education, from which older students go on to professional and diploma-level education.
ACADEMIC STRUCTURE: THE OLD AND THE NEW?
Current (13 departments)
Further Education
Business Services
Nursing & Health
Technology
School of Visual Arts
Computing & Information Technology
Electrical & Computer Engineering
Te Tari (Maori Education)
Maritime
Consumer Services
Social Sciences
School of Business
Applied Studies
Proposed (3 faculties, 5 departments)
Faculty of Business
Faculty of Technology
Faculty of Social Sciences
Department of Nursing & Health
Department of Maritime & Logistics
Department of Visual Arts
Department of Hospitality
Te Tari (Maori Education)
- NZHERALD STAFF
