STU/68th Council/19/016
10 October 2019

Dear colleagues,

Please find here the results of our survey on the geographical mobility exercise that took place this year.

It transpires from these results that the majority of the 311 colleagues concerned who responded are not at all satisfied with it:

• They consider that this exercise was launched without serious preparation or real consultation and found that it was improvised, arbitrary, stressful and demotivating ;
• 90% of them believe that transfers were decided in the absence of any precise, clear and transparent criteria and denounce an unfair Administration and opaque decision-making ;
• They regret that staff movements ignored personal skills , in contradiction with the objectives of the strategic transformation to enhance operational efficiency and UNESCO’s presence in the world, resulting for 70% of them in an exercise non-beneficial for the Organization ;
• 68% of them do not believe that this exercise will be useful to career development , which is not , contrary to what the Administration seems to think, the same as a transfer at equal grade ;
• They feel that the process should be suspended and evaluated before being renewed ;
• Some colleagues decry an unfair treatment of their cases in the form of a violation of the rules of deferments for health, family or personal reasons, leading to rejection of their requests, that they judge to be arbitrary.

We now expect the Administration, before launching the next round, to take into account the opinion of the staff, to correct mistakes made during the mobility exercise this year and to suspend, reassess and readjust the staff mobility policy to suit the needs of programme implementation serving a functional and efficient Organization.

Best regards,

The STU Council.