Why do you need an effective workload management strategy?
It’s no secret that setting up effective workload management is not a simple task. But when it comes to implementing a management solution within a university, that said task becomes even more complicated.
The big deal with universities is that they are institutions that gather many different entities: faculty, staff and students, which represent a very large number of people to manage, especially when it is not done so effectively. In such a large structure, the challenge is to correlate all these different cogs and sources of people, so that they can interact with one another in the most effective and clear way possible.
Most of the time, managing academics’ workload allocations is done through complex spreadsheets and over complicated documents which many of us would disregard as too complex or simply spam.
However, now we will discuss the successful functionality of Academ’s web-based Workload Allocations Management System (WAMS), defined as a system that allows the allocation of academic workload in a simpler and more cognitive way.
Below we follow this more closely:
Why Successful Academic Workload Management Is So Important
Most of the time, a bad management is the result of an unbalanced workload between faculty and staff. It can have an impact on employees’ productivity and create significant consequences such as an increase of absenteeism or a creation of conflicts.
On the other hand, the installation of an effective workload management system ensures equity, accountability, transparency and flexibility. It is also a fast and easy way to analyse whether faculty members are spending time on activities that are actually part of their ultimate mission/vision.
We can talk about the main benefits of a well-articulated Workload Allocations Management System by dividing them into two different hierarchy scales:
For staff members, WAMS allows individual workload allocations to align with departmental goals and so on allows each employee to contribute to to the overall department’s goals. Because WAMS ensures flexibility, all factors are accommodated upon the development of the work plan. Moreover, it allows the understanding of individual staff members, and an appropriate allocation of their responsibilities. Finally, with WAMS, employees are related to their supervisors in determining and managing their workload
For the university, a good workload management allows better transparency and communication/understanding between the different departments. When all the actors of the faculty are aligned, it promotes cohesion within an academic staff group and it spurs a healthier and better work environment.
How Can WAMS Help You Improve Your Staff Workload Management And Productivity?
Academ’s Academic WAMS is a fast efficient way to create balanced workloads amongst staff members, as well as raise productivity levels substantially. The WAMS system allows staff to review the total workload for courses, as well as set workload targets based on hours and assigned teaching roles.
Because we know that each university has its own requirements in terms of workload management, we ensure that our application is thoroughly in tune with the needs of academic managers and that it follows the fundamental principles for an effective Academic Workload Allocation Model. That is why we provide the following facilities :
- A web-based database. By removing unreadable spreadsheets, our WAMS will allow you to replace error-prone spreadsheets
- A delivery of quality and student success
- A “Keep it simple, stupid” engineering principle (KISS) that provides simplicity in design and an ease of use of WAMS. Our application is intuitively useful and easily comprehensible
- Completely customisable and flexible reports with graphs and charts to support decision making and manage faculty and staff effectively
- An enhancement of the management of casual contracts
- An flexible application which was designed specifically to support a wide variety of workload models
For you, it will give you the opportunity to :
- Have access to resources, documentation, trainings, updates and new features to help you deal with productivity issues with tight budgets
- Have a better balanced workload between staff and faculty to align the interests of the institution
- Analyse whether faculty members are spending time on activities that are part of their ultimate mission/vision
- Take strategic directions for faculty, staff, courses and the institution
- Significantly improve your resource management
So, What’s The Next Step?
To conclude, the two words that would best describe the WAMS are undoubtedly “ease” and “productivity”. With our academic management system, you have access to many features that will save your time and increase your productivity. Everything becomes simpler with WAMS. This smart model has been designed to be both flexible and generic to fit your organisation and give you access to the best features.
So, if you are still unsure of all the benefits that this application can bring to your business, or if you simply have a question or love to know more, contact ACADEM now and get a free 1-hour product demonstration of WAMS at absolutely no cost! We would love to hear from you today.