The winners of the 2nd edition of the ADN Awards - Acting Different at NOVA are now known

The second Gala of the ADN Awards - Acting Differently at NOVA was held on Monday 22nd, culminating in the announcement of the winners of the award created to identify, encourage, disseminate and leverage the sharing of innovative good management practices at the institution. In its second edition, the ADN Awards had Santander, DIGITALIS and QUIDGEST as partners.

A total of 27 applications were submitted from all 11 of NOVA's constituent entities, 15 of which presented new approaches and 12 related to the creation of new services and solutions, covering a total of 15 different areas.

After thanking the Directors of the Organic Units, the members of the jury, the award partners, the Administrator of NOVA University Lisbon, the "innovation champions" and everyone present, the Rector of NOVA, João Sàágua, gave a special word of recognition "to all the technical and administrative staff, to the entire NOVA community, which is made up of those who give their best every day to make the University's services work in the best possible way". 

Reinforcing people as the University's "most valuable resource", as well as the Institution's intrinsic mission to "serve society through knowledge", João Sàágua said that in the "current context of great transformation and development, organizational innovation is not an option, it is an absolute necessity". 

Calling for unity rather than division, and collaboration rather than competition, the Rector highlighted those who "come to work every day, on time; they carry out their mission; they collaborate with their colleagues; if they are in reception, they welcome people; they convey an image of the University's 'human touch'. People who, even if they're not in positions where innovation is a necessity, are absolutely dedicated, who help us live day to day, bring well-being and a culture of excellence to the university." 

The jury for this year's ADN Prize was made up of the following members: President of INA, Luísa Neto; Administrator of the University of Aveiro, Mário Pelaio; Jorge Pereira, Director of Santander Universidades; João Paulo Carvalho, Senior Partner at Quidgest; Ricardo Oliveira, responsible for planning and quality at Digitalis; NOVA Administrator, Ana Rita Marante.

Given the large number of good practices identified at NOVA, 14 projects were highlighted in different areas of the competition, and the following three projects were awarded prizes sponsored by the initiative's partner organizations:

• "Museu dos Sentidos: Inclusão e Acessibilidade na Comunicação de Ciência e do Património de Saúde do IHMT", an IHMT project presented by Salima Rehemtula, Rita Francês, João Couto Duarte, Paula Sousa Saraiva, Filomena Pereira, Paulo Caldeira and José Dória. This application, in the category of new services and integrated into the area of sustainability, was awarded the Santander Prize.
• "NOVA FCT - DRH: Embracing People", a NOVA FCT project, which received the Digitalis Award. In the category of new approaches and in the area of human resources management, this application, presented by Mónica Neto, Cristina Brandão, Gracinda Caetano, Patrícia Nunes, Gabriela Lipscomb, Paula Doroteia and Ademário Tavares, portrays an initiative for the integration, development and empowerment of human capital.
• "D2D - Data2Decide@NMS", a project presented by NOVA Medical School, received the Quidgest Award. This project, developed by Catarina Valente, Liliana Varela, Paulo Penetra, Jéssica Vaz and Fábio André, depicts a new data-based decision support system implemented at NMS.

Two honorable mentions were also awarded to the following projects:

"Desafio Narrativas de Impacto na Investigação", an application submitted by Hélder Lopes, Mariana Duarte and Rita Rua Ferreira, from NOVA's Rectory, which consisted of an initiative aimed at encouraging NOVA teachers and researchers to communicate the impact of their scientific projects through a competition of narratives accessible to the public and raising awareness of the multiple benefits of science in society.

"CHAM Talks, um podcast para ouvir ciência", a project that aimed to contribute to the dissemination and discussion of different topics, bringing together teachers, researchers, science managers, students and staff from NOVA FCSH. This project was presented by a team made up of the following members: Isabel Araújo Branco, Teresa Lacerda, Isabel Gomes de Almeida, Paulo Antunes, Joana Rodrigues, Beatriz Freitas, Luís Reis, Henrique Duarte, José Alberto Catalão, Alina Baldé, Carla Veloso, and Maria Clara Leal.
 

According to Pedro Saraiva, NOVA's Vice-Rector, who leads the Organizational Innovation agenda, "it is very gratifying to see how this second edition consolidates the ADN Awards as a space for identifying, sharing and communicating innovative projects that take place daily at NOVA, as well as recognizing the corresponding winners in the different areas of the competition. NOVA is therefore to be congratulated, and here I leave a sincere thank you to the more than 100 employees who made up the various teams of the 27 projects that applied for this second edition of the ADN Awards, all of them winners of the daily and permanent conquest of the many good organizational innovations that take place at NOVA and which this Annual Organizational Innovation Gala celebrates and recognizes!".