The CEO of the CNRS, Antoine Petit, is alienating the organization's employees, laboratory directors and even its university partners. On December 12, at the convention of unit directors, representing more than 800 laboratories, he surprised the audience by announcing the creation of a new label, the « CNRS Key Labs ».
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This status, granted to approximately 25% of units (i.e. 46% of CNRS personnel), aims to “focus a particular effort on a smaller number of units, those which can legitimately claim to be qualified as “world-class””. At the CNRS board of directors meeting on December 20, a document on the strategy until 2028 specifies that it is “to help the very good to become even better”. The CEO also explained that “this priority does not mean exclusivity”that is to say that the CNRS will not abandon the 75% of unlabeled units.
-The precision was not reassuring. As of December 20, France Universités, the main partner of the CNRS in these units, described as “mixed” because they are jointly supervised between the organization and the universities, expressed its “disagreement with the unilateral announcements made by the CNRS”. “Total disagreement” reiterated in a press release on January 17, despite a meeting with Antoine Petit. A motion of no confidence calling for“immediate stop” of Key Labs and the resignation of the CEO collected more than 5,200 signatures. According to a survey carried out by the Association of Laboratory Directors (ADL), nearly 80% of the 428 respondents are against the measure. The main union, the National Union of Scientific Research (SNCS-FSU), also denounced, on December 18, this “destructive politics”.
“Behind the backs of the staff”
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