CA/88/19 Orig.: en Munich, 26.09.2019 SUBJECT: President's activities report SUBMITTED BY: President of the European Patent Office ADDRESSEES: Administrative Council (for information) CA/88/19 e 2019-7203 - I - TABLE OF CONTENTS Subject Page I. INTRODUCTION 1 II. GOAL 1: BUILD AN ENGAGED, KNOWLEDGEABLE AND COLLABORATIVE ORGANISATION 1 III. GOAL 2: SIMPLIFY AND MODERNISE EPO IT SYSTEMS 6 IV. GOAL 3: DELIVER HIGH-QUALITY PRODUCTS AND SERVICES EFFICIENTLY 10 V. GOAL 4: BUILD A EUROPEAN PATENT SYSTEM AND NETWORK WITH A GLOBAL IMPACT 21 VI. GOAL 5: SECURE LONG-TERM SUSTAINABILITY 37 VII. RECOMMENDATION FOR PUBLICATION 42 CA/88/19 e 2019-7203 I. INTRODUCTION Transparency of the Office's activities is ensured through regular reporting to the Council. The present report outlines the major developments and most relevant endeavours characterising 2019 so far. In June the Council unanimously approved the Strategic Plan 2023 (SP2023) that encompasses the five strategic goals the Office will pursue to evolve into a sustainable office that delivers excellence. Until now the reporting had a configuration linked to the various business areas and to the relevant departmental subdivisions, focusing more upon the operations of the Office. This report seeks to gradually move towards a report that more closely reflects SP2023, following its structure and describing the achievements in the various goals and key initiatives. This report therefore needs to be understood as a transitional one that will improve alongside the implementation of the programmes and projects of the SP. The Office also intends to propose a better aligned and more comprehensive reporting process. An annual report on the implementation of SP2023 will be submitted to every June meeting of the Administrative Council, together with the other annual reports in annex, such as the Social, Environmental, and Quality reports. In this way a consolidated report on the management of the Office will coincide with the submission of the Opinion of the Board of Auditors on the yearly accounts of the Office. II. GOAL 1: BUILD AN ENGAGED, KNOWLEDGEABLE AND COLLABORATIVE ORGANISATION In SP2023, the EPO has placed a focus on the development of its staff and their performance. After all, the achievements of the EPO's staff have supported the Office's overall success throughout its history. Among the goals of SP2023, the EPO has therefore committed to ensuring it is capable of attracting some of the brightest talents from across Europe and to supporting their ongoing professional development. The successful fulfilment of those goals are closely linked to staff engagement, which underpins not just Goal 1, but also the ability to achieve many of the EPO's other strategic goals. CA/88/19 e 1/42 2019-7203 Like other pivotal projects, such as a reorganised BIT, some initiatives were started before June 2019, to help the EPO address issues that were felt to be particularly pressing. Making immediate progress on staff engagement was seen to be one of those pivotal projects. A Strategic Staff Survey, which sought to accurately measure staff engagement, was therefore carried out in the first half of 2019. Its findings have revealed a number of clearly identifiable action points which will in time either be translated into projects and programmes of SP2023 or carried out as accompanying measures in other projects. The Office-wide staff survey has helped the EPO to focus on the promotion of direct communication to the staff and reinforcement of managerial communication, talent development, and social dialogue. • ATTRACT AND DEVELOP TALENTS As previously reported to the Council, the office has adopted a prudent approach to recruitment taking into account the progress of the Early Certainty programme. As the Office makes progress in absorbing its backlogs, it continuously seeks to improve rebalancing of its staff, in particular examiners and formalities officers. In the frame of the rebalancing exercise, several internal DG 1 job fairs were organised, involving 59 teams across sectors. Examiners interested in a move to another technical field will receive the appropriate support and the possibility to have a test phase before transferring to other team. Any move will be accompanied by reskilling programmes to make sure that the needs of both the staff concerned and the Office are met. These actions were completed by the usual external recruitment process: since the beginning of the year, 81 external candidates were recruited as examiners, 40 have already started in different fields of technology, while 41 other suitable candidates should start in the near future. As part of the initiatives to foster diversity, the Office has launched the mentoring programme, "Women in the Lead" to support talented women in developing their career perspectives and personal development opportunities through structured exchanges with experienced senior managers and directors. The programme started in April 2019 with a pilot for 51 mentees and 26 mentors and will last six months. The full mentoring programme will be rolled-out in the coming months. CA/88/19 e 2/42 2019-7203 Building upon the success of the part-time working scheme, and as part of the Office's efforts to support flexible working arrangements and a work-life balance, the ad hoc teleworking pilot was launched in April this year. Up until this point, 44% of eligible employees have signed the agreement and 111 employees have already teleworked and so far 400 days of telework were requested. A qualitative analysis to measure the satisfaction of both employer and employees is on-going in order to adjust the scheme before its extension to all staff. • PRAKTIKA EXTERN PROGRAM The Praktika Extern Program has been an excellent learning opportunity for examiners, IP attorneys and Industry in developing an enhanced understanding of their respective needs. The successful implementation of the Praktika Extern program enabled 86 examiners to work directly within a user organisation for a period of up to three weeks. 393 examiners participated in the programme between 2010 and 2018. Evaluation and feedback received also helps the EPO to focus on continual improvement of procedures and workflows. In 2019 the program has been expanded to include 30 formalities officers. 200 Praktika Extern examiner participation (incl. 2019 applications) 150 150 100 86 55 50 46 39 41 42 36 34 14 0 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 CA/88/19 e 3/42 2019-7203 • MAKING OUR PREMISES MORE FUNCTIONAL The bike parking facility at the Isar building is now operational. In line with the EPO's health policy, it will encourage staff to use an environmentally-friendly form of transport. Construction work on the PH7 data centre for disaster recovery has been finalised. It fully complies with the established data centre standards (EN 50600 class 3). In February 2019, the BFC approved the request to increase the facility capacity for the BoA located in Haar. The extra meeting space and additional, fully- refurbished offices were handed over to the BoA in two stages in April and October 2019. As of the beginning of September, staff members can also use their access badge for the canteen, cafeteria and coffee purchases at all sites, and for printing documents. New recharge machines have also been installed outside the canteens, for crediting access badges. The asbestos removal in Old Main in The Hague is progressing as planned and constructive demolition is scheduled to start in January 2020. Regular onsite checks confirm that the removal and demolition preparation activities fully take into account staff health and safety. The new Corporate Contract Process (CCP) was implemented successfully in 2019 for several major contracts across sites. This new methodology, focusing on quality control throughout the entire process, gives the EPO a suitable level of control over activities, and also when outsourced. • DIRECT AND TRANSPARENT COMMUNICATION WITH THE STAFF AND FOLLOW-UP OF THE STAFF SURVEY A wide-range of initiatives are ongoing to improve direct communications with staff. These include more systematic communications via videos, in addition to communiqués, dedicated intranet pages on important topics and events, such as SP2023, follow-up of the staff survey, quality, social dialogue, and financial study. Specific efforts are also focused on managerial communication. CA/88/19 e 4/42 2019-7203 Through new discovery sessions, team managers and directors are able to interact directly on strategic and operational issues directly with the President and Vice-Presidents. Since June 2019, around 200 managers have participated in the discovery sessions. This programme will continue throughout the implementation of the Strategic Plan. Following the publication to all staff of the staff survey results, the results were debated at each managerial level, from units to DG. These discussions allowed the Office to build a comprehensive action addressing areas of improvement, such as managerial communication, working effectiveness, quality and external reputation, and talent development. • DIALOGUE WITH SOCIAL PARTNERS A wide-range of topics are currently under discussion in several meetings of working groups at the technical level, covering the performance management system, the resources and communication means for Staff Representatives, the actuarial funding valuation and remuneration and social security, healthcare and guide to cover. These meetings have paved the way for the Office to submit written proposals to Staff Representatives on these issues before the end of year. In addition, discussions have been held on the next salary adjustment. The analysis of the impact of the current formula and proposals for the future have been addressed, with a view to making concrete proposals to the June 2020 Administrative Council. In the framework of the "Diversity and Inclusion" programme, a working group involving staff representatives has been established. New rounds of discussions with the unions have been held. In the frame of these discussions, the Office has made an offer to integrate SUEPO offices into the EPO's premises.