Faculty discord disrupts pioneering Japanese research institution

Infighting has broken out at a pioneering Japanese research institution as it navigates a delicate stage of its development, with some employees complaining that poor leadership is jeopardising its future.

When Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) was established on a remote island in 2011, it was envisioned by the Tokyo government as a unique graduate university that would lead Japanese research and attract eminent international faculty – with generous public funding to match.

It now employs more than 1,000 staff, including, as of March 2024, 79 faculty members. Of these, 64 per cent are from overseas, and the quality of OIST’s research output matches that of many leading global universities.

However, OIST’s heavy reliance on government funding has proved to be a potential weakness, and the institution has been forced to heavily scale back its expansion plans. Former president Peter Gruss stepped down early at the end of 2022, citing “challenges in terms of financing the university’s envisioned size and strategic plan”.

Now some staff have questioned whether his replacement, Karin Markides, can turn around the institution. Managers claimed that a “small and disaffected group” were to blame for the complaints, but the ongoing row has led to heightened tensions at the institution as it seeks further government support.

“OIST is facing an existential crisis as a result of the current leadership,” said one employee, who, like most interviewed for this article, wished to remain anonymous. 

“There’s no vision, there’s no excitement. We’re on a trajectory for obscurity.”

Markides, who spent nine years as president of Sweden’s Chalmers University of Technology, joined OIST in June 2023 after four years leading the American University of Armenia.

On her appointment, Markides was tasked with devising a new institutional strategy, but the document was criticised by some staff, with a letter sent to the board and president in April 2024 on behalf of faculty saying: “The strategy, as it stands, is lacking a clear vision, as well as specific, measurable objectives.”

The letter, sent by Christine Luscombe, chair of the faculty council, claimed that the “lack of a shared vision” had made the “recruitment of new faculty particularly challenging”.

A statement subsequently shared with Times Higher Education on behalf of the faculty council said that points made in the letter “were properly addressed some time ago and are not relevant today” and that the 10-month-old letter gave “the misleading impression that OIST is suffering from division and internal issues”.

Emails seen by THE suggest that the statement was drafted by an OIST communications adviser on behalf of the council, and that one elected member, Izumi Fukunaga, has resigned from the council since the statement was released.

One ex-employee, who confirmed they left OIST on good terms, spoke of a “breakdown in relations” between a small group of faculty and the president, but added that “most in the OIST community are working together constructively”.

“There are things that…could have been done better, but these are things we should work through internally. Some of the actions by the more aggressive people in this [institution] have not helped,” they said.

However, employee engagement surveys commissioned by OIST suggest concerns about leadership have been widespread at the institution. In a report shared by Markides in April 2024, questions about management received an overwhelmingly negative response. 

Scores for the statement, “The leaders of OIST really know what they are doing”, were in the eighth percentile when compared with similar organisations – with one the lowest possible score out of 100 – as were scores for “The actions of our executives support OIST’s mission and values”. The question, “I have a clear understanding of OIST’s strategic goals”, received a score in the third percentile. 

The institution defended these results, saying OIST’s leadership initiated the survey “very soon” after Markides joined the institution and that some “challenges reflect an extended period of transition and change”.

“The president is now overseeing, with senior colleagues, a key element of the approved ‘One OIST’ strategy, which responds comprehensively to issues highlighted in this as well as an old survey predating the president’s arrival,” it said. “The leadership is absolutely committed to ensuring that challenges revealed by feedback receive full and transparent attention.”

The ex-employee said that such results had been common throughout OIST’s history. “I’m not saying it’s not a problem, but it was not something that just happened because of the new president. That was a longstanding thing,” they said.

Other OIST staff who spoke to THE went on to complain that only a small number of top-level executives were being consulted on major decisions.

Additional upheaval has come from the departure of several senior staff members over the past year, albeit some of them for personal reasons. Departures include Evan Economo, dean of faculty affairs; Tetsuya Kawai, vice-president of information technology; Scott Rudisel, vice-president for buildings and facilities management; and, most recently, Heather Young, vice-president for communication and public relations. Nicholas Luscombe, the former dean of research, is no longer on the senior management team, but remains professor of genomics and gene regulation at the institution.

Some interviewees claimed that the working environment at the university had become toxic. “I feel sick in the morning before I go to work,” one employee told THE. “It’s such a shame, because people arrive with huge excitement and hope. It’s not just me.” 

In an internal email seen by THE, one departing senior leader said that they were resigning to prioritise their “well-being”, having been “feeling increasingly strained”.

In a joint statement, Markides and OIST’s governors and administration said reasons for senior staff departures included “promotion, family and schooling choices, reaching the age of retirement, an individual decision to resign, and removal from role following loss of trust”. 

“More than half of current university officers and senior executives have held their position for more than three years,” it added. 

The internal conflict comes at a time when the institution faces questions about high levels of public funding and is under pressure to increase support from external sources.

OIST is unique in Japan in guaranteeing academic staff five years of funding before they must pass peer review, allowing them to devote their time to pursuing research rather than chasing grants. But the institution’s challenges could prompt other leaders to lobby ministers “so that OIST doesn’t keep these [funding] privileges”, one employee said.

OIST denied it was lacking support from government, pointing to last month’s Tokyo budget allocation of ¥22.2 billion (£114 million) to the institution, which Markides and colleagues described as “the highest amount dedicated to OIST since its establishment”.

However, the ¥25 million year-on-year increase is equivalent to a 0.1 per cent rise, well below Japan’s 2 per cent inflation rate last year.

Having previously aimed to create 100 research units by 2023, with an eventual 300 planned, OIST previously said that it was “adjusting its goal” and hoped to have 100 by the end of 2026. It is now seeking to recruit six new principal investigators a year.

Employees who spoke to THE also criticised OIST’s board, which consists of four Nobel prizewinners as well as Japanese and international businesspeople.

“They’re too remote, they’re inattentive,” one source said. “They get flown first-class to Japan so it’s a cushy number and, in the meantime, the place is deteriorating, and people are really quite miserable.”

The board’s former chair, Cherry Murray, an emerita professor of physics at Harvard University, stepped down from the board at the end of last month due to health issues. Earlier this week OIST announced that VijayRaghavan Krishnaswamy, the Indian government’s former principal scientific adviser, had been elected as the new board chair.

“I think OIST values are important,” one source said. “I think we could be…very beneficial to Okinawa and Japan. I see the current leadership jeopardising this.”

The university denied claims that the board was often absent, describing members as “highly active and meeting significantly more frequently in 2024 over and above the normal cadence of board and committee meetings”. 

Referring to all the claims made in this article, Markides and the board described OIST as “a very young university which has managed to achieve a well-respected position within the academic world within a very short time”, which was “undergoing some necessary changes as it grows”. The “dominant position” among faculty was “one of support for both [the] board and president”, they claimed.

“Within or outside our campus people are free to express the views they hold. In this case a very small number of individuals do unjustified disservice to the institution,” they said.

helen.packer@timeshighereducation.com