A second round of applications at the Department of Public Health also failed to find a new department head. A day-to-day management team will therefore be in place from 1 September, initially for a one-year period.

2016.08.22 | Kirsten Olesen

Klavs Madsen – acting department head at the Department of Public Health as of 1 September.

Associate Professor Klavs Madsen from the Section for Sport Science at the Department of Public Health will become the acting department head of the Department of Public Health as of 1 September. At the same time, Associate Professor Niels Trolle Andersen from Section for Biostatistics at the same department will become acting deputy department head.

In other words, the hunt for a new department head at the Department of Public Health to take over from Søren Kjærgaard, who left the position on 1 June, has still not been successful.

Two rounds – no appointment

The position of department head has been advertised on two occasions, most recently with application deadline in July, but without success:

"It is a great shame that the appointment committee did not manage to find a new department head in the second round. But on the other hand, it is very important that we find someone who is absolutely right for the job, and I am pleased to see that the committee’s decision was unanimous," says Dean Allan Flyvbjerg.

Need for stability – but also for progress

He states that the work of finding a permanent department head has now been placed on hold and that a new round of applications will not be initiated before 2017 at the earliest:

"At the moment, emphasis must be on the acting management team creating stability, commitment and progress in the day-to-day work. However, it is also important for the department as a whole to make progress in the strategic process," says Allan Flyvbjerg.

Klavs Madsen and Niels Trolle Andersen have been acting department heads since June 2016.

Klavs Madsen was also department head of the former Department of Sport before it was merged with the Department of Public Health in 2011.