A baseline measurement will be done to show how TU Delft staff is experiencing social safety. This is what TU Delft wrote in the update of the social safety plan of action as required by the Inspectorate of Education. The Inspectorate will start its progress assessment this Monday.
Dies 2025. (Photo: Sam Rentmeester)
Eight months were needed for the TU Delft to update the plan of action. On Friday, TU Delft submitted the latest version of the so-called ‘Plan for Change’ to the Inspectorate of Education along with the latest quarterly report. The first version in May 2024 was still called a ‘plan of change’ while this one is a ‘plan of execution’, said TU Delft. The Inspectorate calls it an ‘action plan’ and requested it after it determined mismanagement one year ago. The Inspectorate wants to read how TU Delft believes it will solve the problems around the lack of social safety.
The first Plan for Change of last spring was deemed inadequate by the Inspectorate of Education on 14 of its 19 criteria. In its view, the Plan contained few concrete actions and overly concentrated on ‘objectives and direction’, said the Inspectorate. It also lacked a thorough analysis and the Inspectorate had its doubts about the sincerity of the motivation and any ‘real deep reflection’ by the Executive Board.
At the time, TU Delft asserted that the Plan for Change was only an initial first step. Despite this, the Inspectorate ordered TU Delft to come up with an improved, concrete version. Entitled Plan for Change: the implementation, it seems as though those behind the project want to show that they are, at the very least in the title, taking the call for clearer measures seriously.
Three priorities
The newly issued second version of the action plan starts with an eight page analysis of the underlying culture and structure at TU Delft. It covers hierarchical relationships, relationships of dependence, workload, and a ‘lack of clarity and transparency’ related to following up on complaints procedures.
The analysis states ‘three clear priorities’: a ‘reference measurement’; a centralised point of contact; and, the selection of supervisors. The trade unions have been pushing for these three measures since the Inspectorate’s report was issued in March 2024. Thereafter, in November, Minister of Education Bruins wrote a letter to the CNV Education union that the three priorities were ‘understandable measures’ and that he assumed that he did not need to ‘force this’.
The reference baseline (the unions refer to a baseline measurement) must be done in the second and third quarters of 2025. It should map the current status, independently of the existing employee monitor whose next issue will appear in 2027.
Suitability of supervisors
The plan also refers to a new programme called ‘License to lead’. In the programme, the subject of social safety plays a greater role in the recruitment and selection procedure of new supervisors. The programme, also one of the trade unions’ demands, should start in the fourth quarter of 2025. Current supervisors must take a ‘Leadership & Social Safety’ module this year.
The reports also state that the point of contact that was previously mentioned must be launched by the end of March at the latest. The trade unions had previously demanded that this Central Complaints Desk should be independent. Discussions have been held with the project organisation on this issue over the last few months. The execution plan is not clear as to whether the point of contact really will be located outside TU Delft or not.
It is also not clear what the victims of the lack of social safety can expect from the point of contact. It does state the overriding goal of ‘doing right by those suffering and recovering their trust, where necessary, through transparent and careful recovery measures that take account of both the individual and the organisational interests’.
Understanding and space
Other concrete, partly future, actions from the plan were already known. These include a new code of conduct, a feedback programme, moral deliberation sessions, work conferences, the Share & Care sessions, a new HR vision, the drop-in service, and the, now completed, series of Mindlab presentations.
TU Delft is again asking the Inspectorate for ‘understanding and space’. ‘It involves tailor-made actions that are not easy to translate into a plan of action and requires a step-by-step turnaround from the organisation.’ Whether the Inspectorate will accept this will emerge from its assessment. It is as yet unknown when this will be. The Inspectorate responded after one and a half months to the first plan of action.
What will start soon – on Monday 3 February – is the Inspectorate’s recovery assessment, as announced in its devastating report (in Dutch) published 11 months ago. The Inspectorate will carry out the new investigation to assess whether TU Delft has succeeded in improving the care of its staff members. The Inspectorate’s spokesperson says that the findings will be known in autumn. He also said that the Inspectorate is not looking for people who have reported abuses of social safety. This was the case in the first investigation.
Quandaries
On Monday, an awareness campaign entitled ‘Acceptable? Or not?’ will start as well. Stickers with questions and QR codes will be stuck to mirrors around campus. The questions will be about quandaries related to social safety and the QR codes are connected to the subject’s web page. TU Delft is also launching a podcast about social safety.
So what were the Inspectorate’s findings again?
The Inspectorate of Education investigated transgressive behaviour at TU Delft from December 2022 to November 2023. In the resulting report, the investigators speak of intimidation, racism, sexism, bullying, exclusion, gossiping, social insecurity due to lack of leadership and a culture of fear, among other things. For instance, employees are said to be afraid to voice their opinions and hold each other accountable for behaviour.
The effects among TU Delft employees who have reported to the inspection are often long-lasting and hampering. The inspectorate speaks of psychological and physical health complaints, absence from work and a general feeling of insecurity. Stress, burnout, depression and PTSD, crying and tense home situations also occur, as do illness, vomiting at work, panic attacks and heart palpitations.
The inspectorate reports that TU Delft’s university administration has a lot of information regarding what is happening in terms of social safety, but that they ‘omit to add everything up so as to create a complete picture’. ‘The management’ also ‘does not adequately manage in terms of appropriate measures’. The Inspectorate believes that this is mismanagement.
Read the news and background articles on the Inspectorate’s report in our dossier.

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