Incoming chairman aims to end short-termism at Vitae

The careers body Vitae needs a strategic plan to make up for several years of short-term thinking and overlooked programmes, according to Indi Seehra, the incoming chairman of the board of trustees for Vitae’s parent organisation, the Careers Research and Advisory Centre.

“We’ve been a bit year-to-year because of funding issues of late,” Seehra told Research Fortnight. “What we need is for the board to think of a 3-to-5-year strategy,” he says, adding that he hopes one will be put in place in the new year.

Vitae’s future has been uncertain since Research Councils UK cut funding for careers and diversity—the pot from which the majority of Vitae’s funding came—by 73 per cent. In 2012, David Willetts, then universities and science minister, announced that RCUK and the Higher Education Funding Council for England would provide transitional funding until 2014-15, in which time the organisation would try to become self-sustaining.