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10. July 2024
CEITEC Masaryk University (MUNI) is a young scientific institute focusing on structural and plant biology, molecular medicine and neuroscience. It provides top-class facilities for nearly thirty research teams and employs almost 400 people from 29 countries. CEITEC builds its success on recruiting and supporting excellent scientists who have access not only to modern infrastructure and instrumentation, but also to professional services, including those in HR.
The promotion of diversity and flexibility is inherent in the scientific world, and CEITEC is celebrating success with its policy of equal opportunities and the promotion of flexible working conditions. Let's take a look at this area through the lens of the institution's management, HR, senior management and a particular CEITEC employee.
CEITEC offers the following flexible forms of work as standard:
- Part-time option (offered for most administrative positions)
- Possibility to increase the hours after agreement with the manager
- Working from home under transparent rules
- Flexible working hours (core hours 9 AM-3 PM)
From the perspective of a director: Pavel Plevka, Structural Virologist, Head of the Research Group, Director of CEITEC MUNI and father of two children
Promoting equal opportunities and diversity are values that we have embedded directly into our strategy. Our long-term goal is to build an environment that enables employees to develop their talents and deliver quality performance without being constrained by, for example, caring responsibilities or being different. Diversity encourages innovative thinking, which is essential to science. Science needs people who bring diverse experience, perspectives and viewpoints, whether to a scientific problem or to the delivery of technical or administrative services.
From the HR perspective: Andrea Dvořáková, Head of HR Department, who joined CEITEC in 2017 from the commercial sector with the task of building a modern human resources management and development system
Looking at the advertisements attracting candidates for (mainly administrative) positions at CEITEC MUNI, it is evident that you offer the possibility of part-time work as a standard - what made you to do this and how much does it increase the interest of applicants?
Our HR policy is based on flexibility and friendliness towards carers, and this is our advantage. This allows CEITEC to add a larger number of interesting candidates to the pool of candidates who are interested in part-time work. We can offer any amount of working hours, of course with regard to the agenda.
What do you perceive as the greatest benefit of offering flexible working hours for you as an employer, and what do you perceive as the greatest challenge or disadvantage of such a system?
The advantage is definitely higher employee satisfaction, better work-life balance and their higher loyalty. The disadvantages are certainly the higher demands on managers (more part-timers means more subordinates to attend to) and the demand on office space. We have not yet moved to shared posts, but it is possible that the situation will lead us to do so.
Do you have to force individual managers to agree to flexible working arrangements for their subordinates, or are they proactive and interested in offering them (e.g. allowing home working or part-time working)?
It is very individual and also depends on the type of work. Not all positions can be done from home or on a part-time basis. But in general, I would say we have very enlightened managers and one of the roles of HR is also to motivate managers to work part-time or inform them about the possibility and benefits.
Are men also interested in flexible working?
As for part-time work, the uptake is lower for men than for women. We still have more women part-timers, but we do have a few first pioneers among men. As for working from home, the use of this opportunity depends more on the position than on gender.
Do people working in scientific or administrative positions use flexible forms of work differently? (if so, what is the difference?)
It depends a lot on the type of position, but they are used by both parts, the scientific and administrative or managerial.
From the perspective of a manager: Alice Valterová, Head of Grant Administration Department with 20+ employees, a young team with a relatively high rate of maternity and parental leave, as well as returns from it
Your department has a relatively high percentage of part-timers, what challenges does this pose for you as a team leader?
More than 60% of our team is part-time, which means that compared to the number of FTEs (full time equivalents), I have almost double the number of people to manage. This entails high demands on time and coordination. If I want to reflect the needs of all team members and have enough space for them, it is really time-consuming. As a team we have had to learn to work differently and be more in sync, for example all team meetings are already hybrid by default and the use of online tools for sharing documents and information is an absolute must. Although it took us a while to tame the technology, it now works without any problems. On the contrary, I see a big advantage primarily in being able to enable a faster return of people from parental leave, and therefore the return of trained, experienced and highly effective people. At the same time, I perceive that the supply of part-time jobs on the labour market is still quite limited and often this is what can make a quality candidate decide to accept a job offer at CEITEC.
What motivates you as a manager to offer part-time or home-office jobs to your employees?
Personally, I used a form of part-time and extended home-office during my parenting time and it seems obvious and fair to me to offer this to my people. Personally, I valued this flexibility very much (while knowing that I wouldn't get this option everywhere), so I tried and still try to approach these flexible forms as responsibly as possible. I perceive that people in the team take the same approach - they see it as a great benefit to their work-life balance and would not like to compromise it in any way. On the contrary - sometimes it can be more of a problem not to exceed the set hours or working hours [laughs].
Do you yourself use (or have you ever used) flexible forms of employment yourself?
I took advantage of this opportunity during both of my parental leaves. In fact, I think I was one of the first pioneers of this model within the administration in a similar position and I believe I convinced my colleagues, supervisors and subordinates that there was no need to be afraid of this model.
Working from home is increasingly popular, but there is still a lingering concern among some managers about whether people actually work when they are at home. How do you work with the element of trust (or control) in relation to working from home with your team? And have you ever regretted letting someone work from home?
The basis for working from home should be some rules that are clearly stated and sufficiently transparent across the team. In general, I guess several things help me to trust my team - I myself have never felt the need to abuse this form of work in any way, and therefore I probably wouldn't a priori assume this for others. At the same time, I choose my team members myself based on not only work but also personality characteristics, which makes it easier to build trust. And last but not least, communication is an important topic - telling each other what works and what doesn't work and being able to give honest feedback when something doesn't fit the bill.
From the perspective of an employee: Ester Jarour, Head of Strategic Partnerships, formerly Spokesperson, Science Support Manager and Marketing Manager
Promoting flexibility as a reason for accepting the offer
I joined CEITEC as marketing manager in October 2017 after 19 years abroad. I was looking for a job in an international environment where I could use my good English skills. At the same time, it was important for me to do something meaningful and I was looking for an employer offering flexible working conditions as I was looking after my three children aged 2, 4 and 6. CEITEC offered everything that was important to me at the time, which is why I accepted the offer, even though I had two other very interesting job offers. For the first two years I worked 0.8 hours, six hours a day.
Promoting flexibility: the freedom not only to reduce hours but also to increase them
After two years, I got divorced and was forced to raise my working time to a full-time job for financial reasons, even though I still had to pick up my children from school and kindergarten at 4:30 PM at the latest. My manager at the time was very accommodating and offered me to work 6 hours from the office and 2 hours from home each day. There was already a trust built between us, so she knew she could rely on me and I would always do my job faithfully. I really appreciated this solution at the time and I think it was a win-win solution for both parties. CEITEC did not lose an employee in whom it had previously invested, and I was able to overcome a challenging life situation and continue doing work that I found fulfilling.
Promoting flexibility, investment in relationships and loyalty
My children are older now, but it is still important to me that I can and regularly do work from home, whether it is for focused work or because my children are sick. What I like about CEITEC is that, even as a single mother, I can have an interesting career path and continuously develop while taking care of my three children. Unfortunately, this is not yet commonplace in all organisations.
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