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Prof Peter Rosseel delivers guest lecture during UFS visit

13 August 2024 | Story Anthony Mthembu | Photo Sibahle Dayimani and Amandla Kulu

The Business School at the University of the Free State (UFS) hosted Prof Peter Rosseel, Managing Director of Management Consulting and Research – a spin-off of the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium – for a guest lecture during his visit to the UFS Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences (EMS).

The guest lecture took place on 19 July 2024 in the Business School Auditorium and was attended by academics from the UFS.

Reflecting on the lecture

The lecture presented by Prof Rosseel focused on how combining strategy, strategy implementation, culture transformation, leadership, and learning successfully leads to sustainable growth, creates engagement, and delivers tangible results. Throughout the lecture, Prof Rosseel spoke about how experts tend to make bad leaders and therefore stop change from happening within an organisation. In fact, he highlighted that, “Experts stop change from happening within the workplace because experts, by definition, look through the eyes of their expertise, but you cannot reduce the world to different forms of expertise, as it is holistic.” As such, he argued that to change an organisation, one must see things from the point of view of others.

Furthermore, Prof Rosseel delved deeper into the hierarchical operating model within organisations. He indicated that the above model should be one community within organisations; however, unfortunately it is not. This is because organisations are made up of several departments such as finance and human resources. As such, he regards these departments to be silos that could prove to be detrimental to organisations, as each silo can create its own culture as opposed to an organisational culture. These are some of the points he discussed throughout the lecture.

After the lecture concluded, the audience had the opportunity to engage with Prof Rosseel on his viewpoints. In fact, Lyle Markham, Academic Head of Department and Lecturer in Industrial Psychology at the UFS, was one of the audience members and described the lecture as insightful.

News Archive

UFS receives record number of applications

2011-12-31

The University of the Free State (UFS) is looking forward to the start of the new academic year in January 2012, when thousands of new students will be joining the Kovsie family.

The UFS received almost 13 000 applications for studies in 2012. This is an increase of about 80% compared to the total number of applications received in 2010 for studies in 2011.

This increase is partly attributed to the university’s new method in approaching prospective students and the marketing initiatives followed during 2011. These included visits to various schools in the country by the Vice-Chancellor and Rector, Prof. Jonathan Jansen.

“This shows that the UFS is becoming a preferred place of study. Unfortunately, we can only take in about 4 000 first-years from these applications. We will, of course, choose the best and most diverse class of students,” says Prof. Jansen.

The university’s marketing initiatives will be intensified next year where students will take part as ambassadors in the university’s student recruitment campaigns for 2013.

Mr.Rudi Buys, The Dean of Student Affairs at the UFS, says Prof. Jansen’s visit to various schools in the country was very successful. This will be continued in 2012 and student leaders from residences, associations as well as the Student Representative Council will accompany him on these visits during the course of the year.

“These learners, just like our students, are part of a new generation of new democratic South Africans. Our students are excellent examples of youth leadership in the country and we are very excited about all our initiatives,” Mr Buys said.

The UFS is aware of the fact that learners will only receive their final Grade 12 results in January 2012. Final admission will therefore only be granted upon the submission of a certified copy of the matriculation results. Fax these results to 086 586 8947 or e-mail to applications@ufs.ac.za as soon as it is available.

Important dates for Bloemfontein students

Friday and Saturday 13 & 14 January 2012: Welcoming of new first-years
Sunday 15 January: Gateway College life programme (Bloemfontein edition) begins)
Monday 16 January 2012: Registration starts

Important dates for Qwaqwa students

Thursday 12 January 2012: Arrival of first-years
Friday 13 January 2012: Gateway College Life programme (Qwaqwa edition) begins.
Monday 16 January 2012: Registration starts

For more information, Bloemfontein students can contact Student Affairs at 051 401 9102 or send an e-mail to Cornelia Faasen at faasenc@ufs.ac.za . Qwaqwa students can contact Dulcie Malimabe at 058 718 5018 or send an e-mail to malimabedp@qwa.ufs.ac.za

Media Release
Issued by: Lacea Loader
Director: Strategic Communication
Telephone: +27 (0) 51 401 2584
+27 (0) 83 645 2454
E-mail: news@ufs.ac.za
Fax: +27 (0) 51 444 6393
Web: www.ufs.ac.za

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