UvA seeks new president of the Board, with crisis-management skills
Sooner than expected, the UvA has been able to place an advertisement to replace UvA Chair Edith Hooge, who resigned last month. Apart from a few details, the job description is the same as the one Hooge applied for. “The president attaches great importance to social safety and non-violence.”
Much sooner than expected, the UvA is looking for a new president of the Board following the sudden departure of Edith Hooge last month. The search for a new Chair is usually a time-consuming process, if only because all kinds of people from the Board and employee participation bodies have a say in the job advertisement. In this case, that was not so difficult, because the text is more or less the same as the one Hooge applied for in 2024, although the circumstances and context in which a new chair will have to operate have changed.
Crisis organisation
“The Chair attaches great importance to social safety and non-violence, guards against abuse of power inequality and has a clear vision of the role of, and demonstrable affinity with, employee participation,” according to the previous and current vacancy text. For this round of applications, it has been added that the candidate is “responsible for the UvA’s central crisis organisation”. This has always been the case, but now it is explicitly stated. Perhaps not an unnecessary phrase for an organisation that has gone from crisis to crisis over the past year and a half, as a result of which, according to some, the UvA’s reputation is under pressure.
Agile leadership
The vacancy also includes a revised text on what the UvA understands by “leadership”. The UvA refers to “agile leadership”, meaning a flexible team player who not only manages, but can also “navigate within different areas of tension”, because the UvA is – certainly in recent times – a complex and dynamic environment, “in which various internal and external challenges find their way into the workplace on a daily basis”. In other words, polarisation is also rampant at the UvA, and the new president must be able and willing to deal with it.
Headhunter
The Hague-based headhunter Chasse, which was also involved in the search that resulted in Edith Hooge being appointed, has been engaged to find the new Chair (text in Dutch only). In recent years, the UvA has increasingly used this company to search for top executives. Previously, Holtrop Ravesloot in Amstelveen and Egon Zehnder in the Zuidas were also used. The latter agency conducted the search that resulted in the appointment of former Board president Geert ten Dam (and Louise Gunning before her).
These types of search firms conduct their work with the utmost discretion (top jobs are at stake!), so it was quite an disaster when the entire procedure at Egon Zehnder ended up on the front page of the Dutch daily NRC, including the names of the candidates Ten Dam was up against. The then Chair of the UvA Supervisory Board, the late Atzo Niciolaï (VVD), was furious.
Elections
How Chasse will fare – applications are submitted via this agency, which conducts intake interviews and submits a list of candidates to the UvA’s selection committee – remains to be seen. The company has been hired by the UvA for this job, although there are plenty of UvA staff and students who would like to see a completely different procedure. For example, by means of internal elections, as is the case in Belgium, where elections are held for a rector. UvA rector Karen Maex (2016-2022) took part in Leuven, but lost to Flemish scientist and television personality Rik Torfs. She promptly left for the Netherlands.
For the time being, university Board members in the Netherlands are appointed, often with the help of a headhunter. This usually comes at a hefty price: a headhunter typically charges 20 to 35 per cent of the selected candidate’s gross annual salary, a percentage that can vary depending on the complexity of the search, the specific level of the position and the desired salary level.
Confidential
The idea behind this is that a successful candidate will be found and appointed: if it turns out that the candidate is not up to the job and is soon dismissed or fired, it is customary for the headhunter to conduct a new selection procedure free of charge. This is not the case with Hooge, according to university secretary Leon van de Zande. “It was her own choice to leave after a year; you can’t blame the company for that.” The university secretary does not disclose the fee that the UvA is paying Chasse for the search for a new president, presumably for reasons of confidentiality.
Because the previous recruitment of a president was not so long ago (January 2024), it may well be that the same people will apply for the vacancy as they did then. Anyone interested can apply until 19 October.
The aim is for the UvA to have a new Chair by 1 March 2026 at the latest. Until then, Peter-Paul Verbeek will take over the reins, in consultation with vice-President Richard Goldstein.
