One Professional Services

I recently opened two events, April’s PS Leadership Group (PSLG) and the annual PS Conference, talking to nearly one thousand colleagues about my own personal leadership journey and excitement about working at one of the world’s leading universities. Having grown up in Tower Hamlets I am thrilled to be in a position where I work at London’s Global University.

My career to date has not been a traditional one, with stops at ASDA, Comet and Compass Group. My early career was formative and shaped my core belief about the value of great service. It also taught me about the importance of consistency (in leadership) and creating an environment where colleagues can thrive at work. I recently revamped the regular PS Leadership Team (PSLT) to provide colleagues with an opportunity to share how they are leading a ‘great place to work’ across UCL. 

With colleagues from both PSLT and PSLG, I have created One Professional Services (One PS), which is a commitment to align all UCL’s professional services behind a shared vision and approach. At Monday’s PS Conference I was delighted to be able to launch the One PS webpages which bring together the work online, hopefully making it easier for you to get involved and tell us what you think. I strongly believe that if we can work more closely together, we will tackle challenges quicker and be an even better place to work. 

There is a lot going on, with lots of different strands, and I believe One PS is the vision linking everything we do, whether it be Transforming Our Professional Services (TOPS), Agile working or the new staff intranet. The team have setup OnePS@ucl.ac.uk so you can feedback directly about everything we are doing. One PS instigated several short- and medium-term priorities, including the Improvements Board, which was also launched at the PS Conference. The Improvement Board has ‘set itself a challenge of making a real difference at UCL, by making it easier for you to do your job and add value’. The Improvement Board is looking for potential ‘blocks’ and will work with colleagues from acrossUCL to try and solve them. 

Please tell the Improvement Board about your ‘blocks’. 

My journey to UCL has made me realise, over several different roles and sectors, that the way to solve problems is to recognise what they are, talk about them and work together until we find a solution. I hope in my first 6 months that I have made this easier for you, I now need your help - get involved, tell us what you think, and most importantly work together.