froM the Bursar

Let me try to give you a sense of the rather bewildering variety of life to be found in this strange ‘ but compelling role.’

Allan Dodd

so, what exactly does a bursar do? is the question I am often asked by friends who discover that this long-serving management consultant has metamorphosed into the Bursar of Mansfield College. A year ago, when I first contributed to this magazine, I could reasonably plead more or less total ignorance. But now I have no excuse. So, let me try to give you a sense of the rather bewildering variety of life to be found in this strange but compelling role.

Of course there is all the regular stuff – managing the College’s finances, the constant stream of problems arising from the backlog of buildings maintenance, student accommodation, catering, IT, a procession of day-to-day staffing issues, and so on. But there is also the out of the ordinary, the strange and the unexpected. For example…

Many of you will have seen the Antony Gormley sculpture, which now rises from the middle of the Quad. You may like it, you may not (and not many people are completely indifferent), but you probably haven’t ever considered what is required to install a sculpture of this kind: the loan agreement with the sculptor; the structural engineers who specify the dimensions and loading of the plinth on which it stands (it weighs over 1.5 tons); the specialist installation company, which transports it to site and erects it; the specialist insurance policy; the security arrangements; the construction of the mound around the plinth (to very precise specifications); the landscaping. I never expected to undertake such a task, and if I had, I might have thought it would be a couple of hours’ work one Monday morning. Wrong!

You will also be aware that we are building new kitchens adjoining the East Range and the Chapel, and completely refurbishing the lower East Range to create a new refectory, bar and terrace. We started work in February, and as I write (in July) we are around 30% complete – and on change-request 103. Just how many things can you find in a project of this kind that you didn’t expect when you started? Well, when you knock down walls that are 125 years old, and dig holes in the ground where holes haven’t been dug for 125 years, ‘a lot’ is the answer. In fact, 103, and counting. I now know things about Japanese knotweed (near impossible to kill and capable of stopping a construction project in its tracks), asbestos (don’t ever, ever mess with it), the powers of Oxford City Council’s Planning Department (cannot be overstated), the impact of a 10cm change in insulation material depth (see Oxford City Planning), and a host of other things that I will doubtless forget as soon as the next issue emerges. But we are on course, on budget, and it is going to be great. Come and see the results from around May 2014 onwards, and in the meantime follow the progress at webcam. mansfield.ox.ac.uk. And if you blink and find that the film appears to be going backwards at one point, you are not imagining things – cf. the impact of a 10cm change in (wrongly installed) insulation material.

To give a feel for other things that I have found to be my job, here’s a random selection from over the past 12 months, some highly important, others just slightly quixotic: working with a team from McKinsey to develop a business plan for the Human Rights Institute; assessing whether the patch of waste land that we own in Birmingham (a carry-over from the Spring Hill College days) has any value; penetrating the endless complexities of the ways in which funding is allocated between the University and colleges (just who designed this University, I wonder?); supervising the dismantling of the Micklem Organ in preparation for its transportation to a new home in London; selecting and installing the temporary kitchens that now sit opposite the Porters’ Lodge and must serve us until the new kitchens are built; picking up the wonderful Sister Helen Prejean from Heathrow Airport very early one Saturday morning (something for which I volunteered, and for which I was rewarded with an absolutely fascinating journey back to Oxford).

I try not to bang on about all of this when I am asked what a bursar does – but I do try to give a flavour of it, which I hope I have achieved here. And I am usually asked one other question: ‘Do you enjoy it?’ Yes.

PS You are wondering, perhaps, about the current state of the College’s finances? They’re not in intensive care, but very dependent on the life-support that your generosity offers – thank you.