The health and wellbeing of our students, members and staff is of paramount concern in these unprecedented and challenging times. We are working hard to continue to educate, enable and empower our members and students and are making changes to how we deliver lectures, workshops, assessments, examinations and events where needed to ensure continuity of service. See the answers to frequently asked questions we have received and some useful links below. Keep safe and well.
For more information on relevant supports available to students, please see our student supports area.
To view the recent COVID 19 update letter from our Chief Executive, Mary O'Dea, please click here.
Read the message to students from our Dean, Dr Margaret Fitzsimons, below;
Dear Student,
I hope you are keeping well in these difficult and challenging times. The health and well-being of our employees, students and members is our top priority during these times of great uncertainty. IOB has successfully implemented our remote working business continuity plan. Although our physical offices are closed, we are fully operational, and we are delighted we can continue to provide our services to you.
All our staff are available to support you. Programmes Directors and Programme Managers are available by email and by phone and can attend meetings (via Microsoft Teams and Skype). Queries are also being answered through the chat function on our website. All our employees are working normal hours and are enabled to work remotely with access to our systems and this can be sustained for a prolonged period. See more details below.
Our primary objective is to continue to deliver our core education and continuing professional development (CPD) services with limited disruption. Insofar as possible, all scheduled classes are being delivered either as live lectures or recorded webinars.
We continue to keep in contact with UCD and the University’s approach to certain education matters is informing our contingency actions. A key matter we are working on is the end of term examinations, my colleague Elena Day, Registrar in IOB will inform students as soon as possible on the specific details for your programme. We will keep you updated on everything by email, on the MyInstitute portal and our website.
We continue to keep in contact with our corporate members to advise employers of what we are doing. We know that your working arrangements have also changed and that trying to manage your study at this time is difficult. We want to support you to achieve your goals and if there is anything else that might assist you please let us know. Looking after yourself, keeping a routine and planning in study times will help you achieve this. Also please see our website at https://iob.ie/info for helpful information.
We are closely reviewing events as they unfold, adapting our decisions as required. We will continue to communicate with you as appropriate and to consider ways that we can further support you.
In the meantime, I hope that you and your families are safe and well over the coming weeks.
Dr Margaret Fitzsimons Dean
Useful work, lifestyle and industry links related to COVID 19
On 8 April, we invited Scott McInnes of Delivering Change to host a webinar where he gave really practical hints, tips and advice on leading and communicating from afar. The recorded webinar is available below in two part. Please note that if you are a Professional Banker or Chartered Banker the below will be available as eCPD module shortly and you will be able to view it in your My Institute in order to claim CPD hours if you were not in position to attend the live webinar.
Work and lifestyle;
Coping with Life in Lockdown, by Manfred F. R. Kets de Vries, INSEAD Distinguished Clinical Professor of Leadership Development and Organisational Change
‘Lagging wifi, internet freezes, distractions’: Students on the reality of online classes, The Irish Times
14 Lessons From Your School Days That Apply To Your Professional Life, Forbes Expert Coaches Council
Coronavirus: Five ways to work well from home, by Eleanor Lawrie & Sara Parry, Business reporters, BBC News
Financial Services sector commentary;
Maintaining Banking System Safety amid the COVID-19 Crisis, by Tobias Adrian and Aditya Narain, The IMFBlog
How to contact us:
In accordance with the guidance from Government and the Health Services Executive on the Coronavirus Covid-19 pandemic, our offices are closed at this time and we are working remotely.
We can be contacted by email which will be monitored and responded to as normal. Our general email address is [email protected]
For specific queries you can email [email protected] or [email protected]
Telephone lines are being monitored as normal and our telephone customer service is being maintained as normal from 9am to 5.00pm on weekdays. Our general office telephone number is: +353 1 6116500
Our website live Chat is being monitored as normal between the hours of 9am and 5.00pm on weekdays.
As our employees are working remotely, we regret that we are unable to deal with post to our office. We therefore suggest that members scan and email documents to us that may ordinarily have been posted. Most smartphones have a scanning capability in the event you do not have a scanner at home.
Keep safe and well.