A good practice design for a large decentralised research organisation (Abstract)

Background:
The Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft in Germany is the world's largest organisation for applied research. More than 30,000 staff members work in 76 institutes and research facilities throughout Germany. Typically for many STEM-oriented organisations, the proportion of women researchers is low. By 2020, the proportion of women researchers increased by four percentage points to 24% compared to 2016. As the size and decentralised organisational structure result oftentimes in complex and lengthy change processes, Fraunhofer created the “Support Programme Equal Opportunities” (May 2021 to March 2022) to promote gender equality. The programme’s goal is threefold: 1) accompany the Fraunhofer institutes to implement equal opportunities through a strategic approach and new measures as well as methods on the ground; 2) promote the achievement of the equality policy objectives agreed with the Federal state; 3) foster a comprehensive culture change through the dissemination of the centrally organised development programme on gender equality in the Fraunhofer Institutes.
Methods:
The programme serves as an innovative approach recognised as good practice by the new edition of the EIGE GEAR tool. Coordinated by the central Diversity Management, the programme has the following characteristics. 1) The coordinating department collaborates with various departments, such as personnel marketing, recruiting or executive search. External experts support the activities, e.g. workshop design and moderation. The coordinating department organises a workshop series for a community of appointed institute representatives to enable participants to develop local strategy plans for the promotion and implementation of equal opportunities at their institutes. The transfer of knowledge on strategic equal opportunities management and existing funding and networking opportunities within Fraunhofer is established. 2) The institute representatives create local steering committees, consisting of decision-makers, personnel and equal opportunities managers from their institute, to develop and implement institute-specific local strategic plans. 3) The implementation is regularly and periodically evaluated during workshops and peer groups. A summative evaluation is carried out by the end of the implementation phase.
The "Support Programme Equal Opportunities" is based on the Community of Practice concept, tailoring all measures to the contextual conditions of a large, decentralised research organisation. It follows a community-based approach as participation is voluntary and anchored in peer-to-peer assessment. Even though the process is coordinated centrally, top-down, it is supported exclusively by the bottom-up commitment of the institutes, thus establishing a multi-level approach, resulting in an otherwise unattainable area effect.
Results:
38 of 76 institutes participated in the workshops of the support programme. In a final survey (n = 29), half of the respondents could see progress in small steps and 20% confirmed an overall good development, compared to one tenth, seeing no progress at all; three quarters set up a team to implement equal opportunity actions; three out of five institutes are in the process of planning or implementing measures.
Conclusions:
The initial results suggest that a process of change has been initiated in many institutes. The support programme will be continued to strengthen these positive developments in the future.