More news coverage (in 'ResearchProfessional News') for our paper examining what academic staff in Australia are experiencing as the key dimensions and drivers of administrative burden (to access the paper see the pinned post in my profile): www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-aust...

The administrative burden in Australian universities is most keenly felt by teaching and research staff, according to...[the] study from the University of Melbourne’s faculty of education'. 2/2 Link to underpinning research: academic.oup.com/spp/advance-...

Today's edition of Future Campus includes a piece discussing our recently published research article (available open access) on how academic staff experience administrative burden in Australian universities: futurecampus.com.au/2025/08/08/c...

The Times Higher Education (THE) covers our just published research article (open access - see pinned post) on how academic staff experience administrative burden in Australian universities. The THE piece can be accessed here (requires a subscription): www.timeshighereducation.com/news/automat...

Our article examining what academic staff are experiencing as the key dimensions and drivers of administrative burden in Australian universities is now published online. It draws on survey responses from 350 staff from 37 Australian unis. Available open access at: academic.oup.com/spp/advance-...

Gwilym Croucher and I wrote a short piece for 'Future Campus' that adds to discussions of supply of and demand for PhD graduates in Australia and makes some specific policy recommendations: futurecampus.com.au/2025/07/07/h...

📣 I am very excited about my new book "#University #Governance, #Management and the #Academic #Profession" is out! 🙌 Thank you so much to co-editors Prof. Monica Marquina and Prof. Glen Jones for great collaboration ! 📘 Check it out through Springer: 👉 link.springer.com/book/10.1007...

Our paper analysing academic staff experiences of administrative burden at Australian universities recently got accepted for publication. It should be available online soon. This is quite a chunky paper focusing on what these staff view as the key dimensions and drivers of admin burden at work.

Oh the joy when your university has just released a new and mandatory travel portal which obviously isn't yet ready for users to use...

Just published (open access): In our article, we explore the key institutional forces that have led to casual academic employment being regarded as legitimate and normal element of university activity in Australia: link.springer.com/article/10.1...

The THE just published a niece piece discussing our recent article examining professional staff perspectives on administrative burden at Australian universities (subscription-based): www.timeshighereducation.com/news/endless...

New publication (open access): Our article examines how professional staff at Australian universities see the administrative burdens they encounter at work, and what they regard as effective strategies to reduce such burdens (e.g., fewer restructures!): www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

This is a fantastic opportunity. I had a great and productive time at the College last year and can highly recommend this fellowship scheme.

Interested in how and why turning universities into strategically managed organisations may make them more bureaucratic also? If you are then you may want to check out our recent paper. Now published as part of an issue: link.springer.com/article/10.1...

This is really worth a read - provocative but spot on in many ways: blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsoci...

I just learnt that the first article arising from our 'admin burden survey' conducted across Australian universities will be published soon. This article will look at the perspectives of universities' professional staff and their recommendations how to reduce admin burdens. I'll post more soon.

What's going on with major publishers and their proofing processes? I just received the proofs of an article and the list of references has been totally mangled. Second time this happened in a row now (same publisher btw). It's really hard to see any value-add in all of this (to the contrary).

Out of interest, has anyone got the feeling that peer reviews have become more rushed/superficial lately? I had a few occasions lately where reports asked for addressing/adding things that were clearly discussed already in the submitted paper. Easy to point out in revisions, but still a bit funny.

Job alert ✨ Colleagues at Uni. Agder, Norway, are looking to appoint a #postdoc interested in, i.a. research policy, funding, evaluation, to work on a Horizon project on the impact of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) 3-year contract, full-time, starting in spring 2025 Deadline: Jan 15

Earlier today I completed a review for one of the major journals in my field. A couple of hours after submitting my review, the same journal asked me to review another paper. It feels a bit much. Or are journals really struggling that badly to find reviewers?

I am just doing my university's online compliance module on managing information. It's bit funny how it repeatedly states to lock one's office to keep information safe - when the majority of university staff are actually working in open place office spaces..

Important paper given the strong and entrenched focus on competition in research policy, including here in Australia:

I really wonder how much staff time and, ultimately, $$$ at Australian universities is spent on completing online compliance modules. And many of these modules really don't seem to be relevant/fit for purpose at a first glance. This really must be quite a substantial investment/cost.