Page 72 - DUT Annual Report 2023

COUNCI ON TRA
L STATEMENT NSFORMATION
Delivery of our ENVISION2030 strategy continued to transform our teaching and learning, research, and operations, across all target areas. Some highlights from the year in review are presented in this report on transformation.
Lived Values and Institutional
Culture
Nurturing a people-centred culture that embodies our values and principles gained much traction in 2023, via the four-day LVF launch, which rallied DUT students, staff, and stakeholders to perpetuate values- and principles- based behaviours in everyday practices. Additionally, the introduction of the Staff Bravo Awards, a digital application-based employee recognition programme, incentivised the manifestation of our values and principles. The activation of the LVF also yielded positive outcomes in our student constituency, as evidenced by a reduction in violent student protests, contrasting with the experiences of several peer higher education institutions. Our ‘Lived Values’ is an antecedent to the ‘Institutional Culture’ we seek so, in addition to values- and principles- based behaviour and decisions, we also undertook several activities to nurture a culture of shared responsibility and accountability.
The annual Council and Institutional Forum Workshops continued to deepen a shared understanding of roles and responsibilities as contemplated in the Higher Education Act and DUT Statute. This initiative shaped the frugality of the quarterly management reports to the Council and paved the way for approval of the university’s Delegation of Authority document, resulting in the unblurring of governance-management lines. The inaugural Vice- Chancellor’s Cup, which included a curtain-raising match between management and organised labour teams, resulted in the improvement of the everelusive stakeholder relations. The Council-approved revised SRC Constitution provides for an extended term of two years to ensure continuity and stability within student governance.
Moreover, student-led conversations were initiated with the goal of promoting a socially cohesive and inclusive culture at DUT.
Digital Transformation
Our ‘Digital Environment’ strategic objective mandates transformative change by the adoption of integrated digital systems and processes that enable our people to deliver optimally. The implementation of the Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system, powered by Systems, Applications, and Products (SAP) in Data Processing, marks a milestone shift in providing an integrated digital system and the generation of unified and consolidated human capital services, finance, and procurement datasets.
Curriculum transformation
Following the Senate approval of our ENVISION2030 aligned philosophy of the education statement ‘Our creativity and innovation shapes adaptive graduates who transform the world’, curriculum transformation was engendered and pedagogical approaches were adopted in our endeavour to position our students as ‘Adaptive Graduates’. The Senate report will expatiate on several key activities undertaken to provide curricula that stimulate creativity and innovation to generate new knowledge and solutions.
Procurement
Further to the procurement digitalisation mentioned, our procurement processes were guided by an approved institutional procurement plan. This plan served as the cornerstone for instilling discipline and ensuring the systematic procurement of goods and services in accordance with established guidelines. A key initiative that
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DUT ANNUAL REPORT 2023