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Lack of ambition I call it. People have become too comfortable. Europe had become rich enough that throwing away such opportunities wouldn't affect them. Now it

Lack of ambition I call it. People have become too comfortable. Europe had become rich enough that throwing away such opportunities wouldn't affect them. Now it does, but they are too entrenched to see it. The number of times I've seen a position go empty just because people couldn't resolve their internal conflcits is too high. Also, there's apparently no punishment for letting positions go empty.

mnky9800n 1y ago
I don't think that is it. I think the employment law is written outside the context of how academic research is funded. Unlike companies, academic researchers cannot do something good and then have it generate revenue. You can not build an app and then support it and then use the profits to continue developing new ideas. You can only continue to apply for money to fund ideas. In companies that generate revenue, many countries require permanent positions and just cause for firings with the assumption that as long as there is revenue and profit, the company can't simply lay off people to generate more profit. However, since there is no revenue generation at a university, there is no way to continue to support people who work there beyond the grants that fund their positions. And there is no way to acquire those funds internally except by layoffs which are not allowed because universities will not layoff permanent people to save on money since those permanent people decide the layoffs anyways (who lays off themselves?). This is compounded that many countries have different retirement laws for older professors and they can often times take up departmental resources through emeritus positions that would otherwise go to fund young people seeking permanent positions. I think that the solution is that university leadership should come from academic staff (e.g., a democratically elected faculty senate plus a rektor team as leader) and they decide layoffs so that administration can be laid off as well as academic teams. Second I think that there should be a reorganization of the university academic staff with responsibilities redistributed. Older professors should teach more and assume advisory positions instead of leadership ones in research projects, younger professors should not teach much at all and focus on driving research forward as research leaders, and there should be more focus on recruiting permanent technical staff to build larger teams at the expense of fewer PhD positions. And funding should change to have fewer grant funds and more long term funds that go towards institutions to build national lab like organizations across europe like there is in the USA, Germany with Helmholtz, etc. Of course this will all cost a lot of money and no one will do this. but i think without a reorg there will simply be more of the same and european innovation will continue to stagnate.

mnky9800n 1y ago

I don't think that is it. I think the employment law is written outside the context of how academic research is funded. Unlike companies, academic researchers cannot do something good and then have it generate revenue. You can not build an app and then support it and then use the profits to continue developing new ideas. You can only continue to apply for money to fund ideas. In companies that generate revenue, many countries require permanent positions and just cause for firings with the assumption that as long as there is revenue and profit, the company can't simply lay off people to generate more profit. However, since there is no revenue generation at a university, there is no way to continue to support people who work there beyond the grants that fund their positions. And there is no way to acquire those funds internally except by layoffs which are not allowed because universities will not layoff permanent people to save on money since those permanent people decide the layoffs anyways (who lays off themselves?). This is compounded that many countries have different retirement laws for older professors and they can often times take up departmental resources through emeritus positions that would otherwise go to fund young people seeking permanent positions. I think that the solution is that university leadership should come from academic staff (e.g., a democratically elected faculty senate plus a rektor team as leader) and they decide layoffs so that administration can be laid off as well as academic teams. Second I think that there should be a reorganization of the university academic staff with responsibilities redistributed. Older professors should teach more and assume advisory positions instead of leadership ones in research projects, younger professors should not teach much at all and focus on driving research forward as research leaders, and there should be more focus on recruiting permanent technical staff to build larger teams at the expense of fewer PhD positions. And funding should change to have fewer grant funds and more long term funds that go towards institutions to build national lab like organizations across europe like there is in the USA, Germany with Helmholtz, etc. Of course this will all cost a lot of money and no one will do this. but i think without a reorg there will simply be more of the same and european innovation will continue to stagnate.