Routines for appointment to teaching and research posts are established in the following statutes, regulations and guidelines:
• The Universities and University Colleges Act § 6-3
• The Regulations concerning appointment and promotion to teaching and research posts
• The Regulations concerning terms and conditions of employment for post-doctoral research fellow, research fellow and research assistant
• Rules concerning appointment to teaching and research positions and management positons at Nord University.
• Guidelines relating to expert appraisal at Nord University.
NORMAL CASE PROCESSING
1. Registration of the case.
2. Appointment of an expert committee, tasked with completing an academic/professional assessment of the application.
3. Submission of the committee's report, which ranks the applicants who are qualified for the position, and which concludes the committee's work.
4. Evaluation of the suitability of the applicants. Ranked applicants are invited to attend an interview, which is followed by a trial lecture and reference check.
5. Recommendations submitted to the Board of Appointments for Academic and Research Positions.
6. The Appointments Board processes the recommendations and adopts a decision regarding appointment.
7. Offer of employment sent to Applicant. If Nord and Applicant 1 do not come to an agreement regarding the terms of appointment, or Applicant 1 refuses the offer, the offer may be sent to Applicant.
8. All applicants are advised that the appointment process has been concluded.
INFORMATION DURING THE APPOINTMENT PROCESS
1. Applicants receive an automatically generated confirmation that their applicant has been received.
2. Following the application deadline, applicants are provided with the public applicant list.
3. Applicants are provided with information about the appointment of an expert committee.
4. Applicants are sent the report of the expert committee, and have the opportunity to submit remarks relating to the same.
5. Applicants are informed that the appointment has been filled, and the process is concluded.
EXPERT COMMITTEE AND LOCAL RECOMMENDATIONS COMMITTEE
All appointments to teaching and research positions at Nord occur on the basis of an expert assessment. The Dean appoints the expert committee.
The expert committee assesses the academic/professional qualifications of the applicants and prepares an evaluation of the candidates' expertise.
This evaluation, which usually ranks the three best applicants, is forwarded to the local recommendations committee (a professionally/academically representative group comprised of 3-5 people). The local recommendations committee conducts interviews, trial lectures and reference checks. There are no trial lectures for appointments of doctoral research fellows and post-doctoral research fellows.
On the basis of their assessment, the recommendations committee may change the ranking of the candidates. Subsequently, a recommendation for appointment is presented to the Appointments Board, who adopts a decision regarding appointment.
INTERVIEWS, REFERENCES AND TRIAL LECTURES
Nord routinely utilizes interviews and reference checks during the hiring process. These are conducted by the recommendations committee.
For appointment to permanent research and teaching positions, the highest ranked candidates will be invited to give a trial lecture, which forms part of the basis for assessment of the applicants.
PROCESS DURATION
The assessment of the expert committee is usually available within three months of the committee's appointment. However, the entire process often takes longer than this. Applicants can expect the process, from application deadline to appointment, to take between five to 12 months. Nord works actively to reduce the length of the hiring process.
Internal preparatory work/classification of applicants
In some cases, Nord may conduct an internal selection process prior to forwarding applications and documents to the expert committee. In such cases, the position announcement will contain details of the selection process and applicants will be asked to send only an application and their CV in the first round.
Following the application deadline, a local recommendations committee appointed by the Dean will review the applications. Their assessment is then forwarded to the expert committee for approval. All applicants will be informed about the assessment conducted by the local recommendations committee. Suitable applicants will be asked to submit publications and other documentation relevant for assessment by the expert committee. The process will then proceed as described under the heading "Expert committee and local recommendations committee".