Important Internal Information: Emergency Measures at CEITEC MU in Respect of the Current Public Health Situation

To all employees at CEITEC MU


Dear colleagues,


In consequence of public health emergency measures decided by the Czech government and in line with decisions and recommendations of the Rector of Masaryk University, the following measures will be applied at CEITEC MU effective from tomorrow, 11 March 2020:


Presence at the workplace

1.1. Home office will be more broadly made available, beyond the extent of existing home office agreements, to employees who are not indispensable needed physically to ensure continuing operations at the institute, both at scientific workplaces (research groups, core facilities) or in administration. Due regard will be made with respect to needs of employees to ensure childcare in the view of the government´s  decision to close schools from tomorrow on.

1.2. Line managers (group leaders, core facility heads, heads of administrative departments) will make arrangements with their subordinate colleagues accordingly and will, at the same time, decide upon employees needed to remain physically present at the workplace and upon contact hours of the workplace (in the administration).

1.3. Lists of employees who are authorized for home office and of those expected to be physically present at the workplace will be submitted to the HR department by Friday, 13 March, noon, for scientific workplaces, and by tomorrow, 11 March, noon, for administrative departments. In the case of administrative departments, these lists are subject for final approval by Deputy Director for Administration. 



(International and domestic) business travel
1.1. It is recommended not to undertake any international or domestic business travel until end of April. 
1.2. Line managers (group leaders, core facility heads, heads of administrative departments) will decide upon cancelation of already planned trips scheduled to happen until the end of April. In deciding upon this, they will follow general directions issues by the university and the institute earlier and will consider all risks. The management will make provision to cover costs incurred by this step from central resources of the institute.
1.3. Whenever possible, use teleconferences or other tools instead of travel to a meeting.


Events
3.1. Already planned public or internal events that are not banned by decision of the government (i.e. bellow 100 attandees) will take place unless otherwise decided in individual cases.
3.2. No new events will be planned and scheduled until further notice. 

3.3. Internal events that are already planned will be considered on individual basis, having regard to their need and to the fact that teaching at the university has been suspended for now until further notice.

3.4. In consequence, most events will not take place in the nearest future. A comprehensive updated list of public and internal events that remain to take place after cancellations will be released by the Events Team. Please contact events@ceitec.muni.cz for discussion of a possible cancelation of any event you are responsible for organizing.



In case of any queries, a contact for this emergency situation will be availble at emergency@ceitec.muni.cz from tomorrow, to advice line managers and/or staff on issues relative to this situation. Please also follow website https://www.muni.cz/en/coronavirus that is updated on an ongoing basis by the university.


The overal situation will have an impact on CEITEC in many possible ways. Already we know that some supplies of new equipment may be delayed due to disruption of supply channels in the global economy. This may distort our ability to meet some deadlines and milestones in various projects. This is being monitored by the Grants Administration Department. Please be in touch with them, where relevant, so that the management can get ready for further discussion of the problem with university leadership and funding providers. 

Thank you very much for all your cooperation, keep calm and protect your health. 


Jiří Nantl

Director