Ramere 4 Hakihea 2020

Kia ora koutou katoa

What an outstanding event the Unitec Excellence Awards was! Congratulations to all the winners. 

The dress-up was so much fun and the creativity was amazing. I’d like to thank everyone involved in making this event happen, in particular the Communications and Event team, and Facilities Management crew. I know it was a big team effort and you did us all proud. Not to mention the Kūmara and Chicken pies – outstanding!

We captured some great photos, you can view them all here.

This was of course my first Excellence Awards and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It’s been a heck of a year, but to celebrate those people who went above and beyond was something special. Having said that, I am proud of the contribution each and everyone of you has made.

A special moment at the Awards...
 

As promised last week, below is a link to some slides I wanted to share with you regarding our proposed Strategic Roadmap for Tāmaki Makaurau. Next year we will set-up workshops and give everyone the opportunity to input into this draft strategy. Our Board has approved this subject to consultation. It will form the basis of how we will engage with students, employers and our communities, and will be the plan for Unitec and MIT to start implementing. Please don’t share these slides outside of our institute as they are confidential and we certainly wouldn’t want our competitors seeing them. At the workshops next year we will share the full pack so you can provide your feedback and get a good understanding of the wider context both for Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland and nationally.

I’ve been working on integrating the two Executive Leadership Teams (ELT) at MIT and Unitec. Once this process is completed, this tier of management will sit across both Unitec and MIT.  

Having the two organisations working closer together will help embed a common goal and understanding across the institutes, as well as providing a seamless vocational education and training solution for the region’s learners, employers and communities.  

While MIT and Unitec will remain two separate entities, achieving an integrated leadership team will drive efficiencies through collaboration, enabling the collective strengths each provider brings, improving quality and delivery.    

My plan is to have the Executive Team structure confirmed by the end of the year (subject to consultation with the two ELT teams). 

I appreciate there may be questions around this and I am open to sharing as much as I can once the consultation on the proposed changes is concluded. 

You will appreciate this is a challenging time for the two executive teams and I want to thank them for their patience while we work through this.  

Enjoy the weekend and hopefully plenty of sunshine.

Ngā mihi

Gus