HR Award

In June 2020, the Faculty of Arts was awarded the prestigious HR Excellence in Research Award by the European Commission. The Faculty is thus committed to following the principles of the European Charter for Researchers and the Code of Conduct for the Recruitment of Researchers (“Charter” and “Code of Conduct”) in the following years.

The European Commission grants the HR Award for excellent management of human resources in the area of science and research. The awarded institutions guarantee an open and transparent employee recruitment and selection process, as well as a continuous assurance of the working environment quality. The HR Award:

• makes the Faculty of Arts more attractive to both Czech and foreign researchers
• encourages quality assurance processes in the area of science and research, and a continuous improvement of working environment for Czech and foreign workers
• enables to Faculty to publish job offers in the European EURAXESS portal and be more accessible within the international environment
• improves the Faculty’s chances of winning research projects and grants
• gives the Faculty an advantage when using overhead expenses in projects

The award itself was preceded by an extensive GAP analysis and a subsequent Action plan of improvements. The GAP analysis identifies weak spots of the current human resources management. The Action plan then sets specific and measurable steps to continually improve these weaknesses. After winning the award, the Faculty has two years to implement the Action plan. After two years, the progress is evaluated and if the results are successful, the Faculty’s award can be prolonged to three years.

The Faculty of Arts considers the following to be the key areas of improvement:

• postgraduate studies; i.e. the specification of the students’ rights and obligations, and of the rules governing the Faculty postgraduate studies
• communication; i.e. the creation of a communication strategy to strengthen ties with partner subjects and to popularise the results of science and research
• gender politics; i.e. a continuous enforcement of gender sensitivity within the processes of human resources management
• the integration of the Charter and the Code of Conduct principles into the Faculty’s long-term strategy and the related legislative documents

The GAP analysis and the Action plan are based on the results of a faculty-wide questionnaire survey and two focus groups. Complete documentation relating to the HR Award process is published below in English.

The Faculty of Arts is currently in the implementation stage and seeks to meet all goals set in the Action plan. An evaluation (Interim Assessment) will follow, which will assess the execution of the Action plan and set new goals for the next period. This is a key step to successfully implement the HRS4R process and retain the HR Award for another, three-year period.

The HR Award application filed on: December 10th, 2019

The HR Award gained on: June 22th, 2020

The date of Interim Assessment: June 22th, 2022

Contact: hraward@ff.zcu.cz