ALEA award gets an upgrade

In 2017, the ALEA award (short for Art of Leadership award) made its big debut at ETH Zurich. The Academic Association of Scientific Staff at ETH Zurich (AVETH) launched it as the successor to the Golden Tricycle award. Since then, the ALEA has been awarded annually as part of a major in-house ETH event – either the Christmas reception or the togETHer staff party – to leadership personnel nominated by their colleagues for their exemplary leadership style.

AVETH and VPPL join forces to promote good leadership

Meanwhile, awareness of leadership culture has evolved significantly at ETH Zurich. The creation of the new Vice Presidency for Personnel and Leadership (VPPL) Executive Board domain gave new impetus and weight to the topics of personnel development and leadership. This is reflected in the ALEA award’s new configuration: from now on, AVETH and VPPL will present the award together.

For AVETH president Charles Ledoux, this makes sense: “Good leadership skills concern not only the scientific staff, but all employees at our university. That’s why it was important to us to present the award together with VPPL.” Julia Dannath, VPPL Vice President, regards the collaboration as an opportunity: “For good leadership to take full effect, it must be based on a collective understanding and must be practised by as many people at ETH Zurich as possible. With the ALEA award, we demonstrate that we’ve joined forces with AVETH in this important matter.

ALEA nominations to commence in January

The collaboration between AVETH and VPPL has already had an impact on the nomination process for ALEA, which will commence in January. What is new is that nominations are no longer restricted to people with official personnel responsibilities; those in leadership roles in their discipline can now also be nominated. That includes senior scientists as well as project and workshop leaders. The jury still consists of AVETH members and representatives of the Diversity and Cooperation department, the ETH Zurich ombuds office, the HR Consulting department and the PeKo.

That the award ceremony will from now on be held as an independent event separate from the Christmas reception and togETHer also reflects the ALEA award’s new status.  The first such ceremony will take place in the Main Building on 17 March 2023, including exchange forums on leadership topics. ETH Zurich employees will receive an invitation to this event in February.