Irandoust: Leadership based on mutual respect, openness, and compromise
In his first presidential address to the AIT community, the newly-appointed AIT President, Prof. Said Irandoust (above left), conveyed that his leadership will be based on mutual respect, openness, and compromise. The address was held at the AIT Conference Center on 8 July 2005.
'My leadership will be based on collective understanding and competency for dealing with the organization's tasks and on strategic long-term planning. As someone once
said, 'People do not plan to fail, they simply fail to plan.' I will try my best to avoid being egocentric, or selfish, and will try hard to allow others to grow by giving colleagues and students responsibilities. I will try my best to work for increasing the happiness at AIT by acting for development of cultural and mutual respect and trust, communication, presence and encouraging participation. I am also in favor of flexible, simple and transparent structures and leadership. I am in favor of boundary-less, team-oriented, organizational structure, people-oriented and outcome-oriented structures. I will work for a system with a minimal administration of highest possible quality, in order to allocate as much as possible of our resources to core activities, being research, education, and outreach activities,' he stated.
Before giving his address, Professor Irandoust was formally greeted with welcome messages from Prof. Dennes T. Bergado (above, second from left), Faculty Representative, Mr. Anil Rajbhandari, Representative of the Employees Committee, and Mr. Mohammad Solim Ullah (above right), Student Union Representative.
About his role as President of AIT, Prof. Irandoust said, 'I think, we all should work for clear shared values, a strong feeling of belonging, a sense of community, caring and trust. I will always welcome dialogues, debates, conversations, and will work for openness for ideas. As a chemist, I have a desire for experimentation and risk-taking where mistakes can occur, but these are seen as feedback and input for development. I will work for increased capacity within AIT to continuously learn, adapt, and change. Developing new ideas for the best of our institute is the responsibility of everyone, including students'.
He further told the AIT community that he will work with them to raise standards of teaching and research so as to meet to global standards and will work to strengthen AIT's interaction with industries and the region in order to better and more rapidly identify emergent fields of knowledge of high relevance for Asia. 'AIT towards Excellence' will be the key words of the Institute.
Prof. Irandoust noted that studying and research about and for the world with mankind's needs at the center is among the most important goals in an academic life. 'Mankind's problems today are global and we must, therefore, have an international perspective in all university activities. For me, personally, research in higher education is not only about increasing competency within some knowledge fields. It is also about cultural differences as a source of a potential for creation, innovation, critical thinking and development. The university for me is a place where the diversity among us is not seen and is not treated as a source of danger and tension among people. It is a place where all kinds of problems are solved by debate, by communication, discussion and conversation. It is a place where our big, complex, diverse, and beautiful world is not simplified into pure black and white, good and bad, rich and poor, developing and developed countries, resident and non-resident countries, Muslims and non-Muslims, us and them. It is a place where we are trained to respect the fundamental human rights,' Prof. Irandoust said.
After his address, a question and answer session took place in which Prof. Irandoust answered questions involving various issues such as the balancing of centralized and decentralized administration and the support for each school's own strategic planning and priorities.
Asked only one question concerning his hobbies, Prof. Irandoust said he is very interested in people, loves meeting people and discussing with them, and taking stock of their backgrounds and experiences. It turns out he also loves playing soccer and has a passion for oriental rugs - deeply appreciating how they blend art, color, form, design, social meanings, culture, science, technology, and engineering.
At the end of the festive event, Prof. Irandoust concluded, 'I am here to serve you, the community of AIT, not the other way around. My duty is to serve our students, faculty, and staff. That will be my concept. The central administration, or the office of President, is here to serve the community of AIT, support our staff, faculty and students. In order to do that, I need feedback from you continuously. I need your active participation, openness, experiences, and your help'.
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