The DTU Leadership Foundation

DTU has been striving to professionalize its management for a number of years. This is the background for the initiative to describe the distinguishing features of good leadership at DTU. Large parts of the DTU Leadership Foundation embody the principles of an orally transmitted leadership culture that has evolved through years of dedicated effort to make DTU a professionally managed university.

The key concepts emerging most clearly from the process of describing DTU’s Leadership Foundation are: respect, dialogue, involvement, interdisciplinary cooperation, curiosity, responsibility, and societal perspective.

In the work with DTU’s Leadership Foundation, the view of humanity has been specified. The reason for this is recognition that human resources constitute the university’s most valuable asset. This is why all staff have a mutually committing dialogue with their immediate supervisor. This personal approach reflects DTU’s belief in the potential of every individual. This potential will be realized, for example, with leadership as a decisive factor for ensuring all university staff are acknowledged and constructively challenged. In this meeting, management will help set the course.

DTU’s Leadership Foundation highlights a prerequisite for meaningful employee self-management: managers’ responsibility to align expectations regarding goals and frameworks. DTU’s Leadership Foundation also stresses the importance of managers’ awareness of their responsibility as role models of the DTU culture—not only at official meetings, but in any situation where managers are present.

Furthermore, all DTU managers expect employees actively to voice their opinions and provide constructive criticism. They can do this, for example, as part of daily dialogue, at official meetings, during seminars, or in connection with DTU’s job satisfaction surveys.

Click here to read the DTU Leadership Foundation in full

If you have any comments or questions about the DTU Leadership Foundation, please contact Nina Fog, nfo@adm.dtu.dk, or your HR Partner. If you would like a hard-copy version of the DTU Leadership Foundation, you can order one by emailing Tine: tiol@dtu.dk.