Editorial
The productivity of academic work
In the summer, professors have the opportunity to focus on
three key tasks in their work: research, teaching and community
relations. This summer was no exception, even
though the news has been confusing in Finland.
The themes that were discussed during the summer included
a “social contract”. The concept is a loan from Jean-
Jacques Rousseau from the eighteenth century, but this summer it
was used to refer to something entirely different from its original
meaning. It was used to refer to an agreement between the government
and key labour market organisations that would improve the
competitive ability of Finland.
The idea was to measure changes in nominal unit costs in Finland
compared to other countries in the eurozone. Unit costs would be
calculated by dividing employee-specific salaries by the productivity
of the work.
Unit costs can be affected by lowering salaries in relation to other
countries. However, unit costs are also dependent on the productivity
of work, meaning that the unit cost will not necessarily decrease
if the productivity of the work decreases at the same time.
All this must somehow be applied to the framework of universities.
Salaries at universities have already effectively decreased, as recent
raises have been lower than the rate of inflation. This means that
the unit costs should already be on the decline. Longer working hours have also been brought up as a way to reduce
costs.
Teaching and research staff at universities
mainly work full-time, which means a total of
1,600 hours per year. Longer working time would
mean an increase in the total number of hours. According
to a time-management study carried out
by Statistics Finland some ten years ago, professors
actually put in 2,250 hours per year. With regard to
other teaching and research staff, the total number
of hours actually put in is hundreds of hours higher
than what is stated in the general collective agreement.
For this reason, an increase in the official
working time would hardly have any effect on the
actual number of hours worked.
The competitiveness of universities and research
institutes must be improved in other ways
– by improving the productivity of the work. This
is possible when the conditions are favourable for
sufficient input into and proper concentration on
key tasks: research and teaching. Possible means to
increase productivity include investment in technological
development, training and innovation. In
expert work, increasing productivity means leaping
forward instead of sticking to old patterns with
reduced resources.
My workplace community at the University of Helsinki
has been quite shocked about the government’s
actions and budget plans. Other universities must be
equally worried. According to the budget proposal
published by the Ministry of Finance in August 2015,
funding for universities will be cut by around EUR
100 million in 2016.
The figure is not entirely accurate, as the figures
presented by the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry
of Education and Culture are different. In addition,
the university index will be frozen, which
further reduces the funding. These are tough figures,
and the reductions will be implemented over an unreasonably
short period of time. Investment in new,
high-quality operations will be practically nonexistent,
and the plan to improve productivity may
well never materialise.
Kaarle Hämeri
Chair, The Finnish Union of University Professors
- Painetussa lehdessä sivu 38
|