Twenty-first International Conference on Knowledge, Culture, and Change in Organizations

Abstract

The management of public universities has, in recent years, sought greater agility and efficiency in the execution of its activities in order to better support teaching, research, and outreach activities. Seeking to face its bureaucratic dysfunctions, Unicamp launched the Desburocratize Program. This was structured in three stages. The first stage consisted of an open call for participants, seeking to engage university staff. The second stage was to raise awareness and determine problematic concerns. The third step was to analyze the concerns and prioritize themes that defined five working groups: 1. culture; 2. norms for teaching, research and outreach; 3. management standards; 4. processes and 5. innovation. The teams were trained in design thinking and initially divided their scopes into fifteen problems. Six months after the training, the result was that 80% of the problems were treated. Both Program participants and the university community realized that, with the engagement of their employees, an interdisciplinary approach and the adoption of a methodology that works from the end user, it is possible to advance in management excellence. As a result of the Program, Lab-GESTA was institutionalized. It is one of the first initiatives in Brazil in which a Public University creates and establishes an innovation laboratory for public management, seeking consonance with the construction of creative and collaborative knowledge to advance with excellence teaching, research, and extension, but also in management.