Closure of OpporTUnity pilot program for professional staff

'Making a real difference to the university together'

December 15, 2023

[VIDEO] Evaluation of the OpporTUnity program pilot for professional staff will follow in the spring.

One of the groups participating in the OpporTUnity program. From left to right: Kevin Caris, Charlynn IJsselmuiden, Nathalie Janssen, Liesbeth Castelijns, Noortje Bax, Rens Hoenen, Marta Comellas Aragones. Joeri Faasen isn't on the picture. Photo: Linda Scheel

Some seventy staff from different service units and departments challenged themselves for a year in an intensive pilot program: the OpporTUnity program. In interdisciplinary groups, they worked on themselves, and on a better TU/e. “Your TU/e network gets bigger, the lines get shorter and you become one TU/e together,” enthuses Linda Scheel of the project team from HRM.

It was an intensive year for the seventy or so TU/e employees who started the OpporTUnity pilot program for support staff in November 2022. Coaching sessions, expert sessions, hackathons and an organization-wide challenge that they got to sink their teeth into as a group. All in addition to their regular jobs.

Investing

The participants, who work as professional staff at service units and departments, were nominated by their managers. “They are all people committed to the cause, who really want to go for TU/e,” says Linda Scheel, Learning Development specialist at HRM and one of the initiators of the OpporTUnity pilot program. “In turn, we are very happy to invest in our ambitious employees through this program.”

Linda Scheel. Photo: still uit video

Challenging painpoint cases

“In the program, we challenge them to develop themselves not only personally but also as a group,” Scheel says. The participants worked in interdisciplinary groups on a university ‘painpoint’ or ‘challenges’, such as more intensive cooperation between the various management units, onboarding of new employees, career development at TU/e, involving staff in developments at TU/e, etc.

Uncertainty about what the outcome should be and how to get there with their interdisciplinary group is the biggest learning curve.

Linda Scheel, HRM-project team OpporTUnity program

The setup of the challenges is similar to those presented to students in Challenge-Based Learning. “Uncertainty about what the outcome should be and how to get there with their interdisciplinary group is the biggest learning curve in this,” Scheel says. “Learning to collaborate across the boundaries of our own service unit or department makes them feel more connected, more one TU/e.”

Watch the video about the OpporTUnity programma by clicking on the photo.

Excitement and euphoria

On November 30, the groups presented their findings and learning in the Evoluon. For colleagues, managers and The Executive Board. “They were stiff with excitement beforehand, but the euphoria afterwards was all the greater. It was so nice to see them so proud,” Scheel says.

Finish line

Not everyone crossed the finish line of the program as a result, for various reasons by the way. “We’ll take that into account in the evaluation,” Scheel says. The pilot will be evaluated in early 2024. “It would be great to be able to offer this annually to our employees, to continue to invest in them this way.”

More info about the OpporTUnity program (this is an intranet link)

From our strategy: about talent

Talent is what our university is all about, at all levels. We are talking about students, of course, but also professors, lecturers, researchers and support staff. We see it as our task to help them further develop their talents in order to work together on major societal challenges. These are exactly the two components that were central to the OpporTUnity program.