Livio Mapelli as the new Department head will have two deputies, Ignatios Antoniadis who continues as head of the Theory Unit, and Roger Forty who will focus on the experimental programme. Catherine Decosse will be the new Departmental Planning Officer of the PH department taking over from Jose Salicio Diez during this year. Cecile Granier, who has acted for a long time as the HR advisor for the PH department is joining the new management team as the new Human Resources officer for the PH Department. Let's get to know the new members...

Roger Forty, Deputy Head of the Physics Department

Roger Forty is British, and studied physics at Oxford University and then Imperial College London.  His thesis was on a fixed-target experiment, studying the production of charmed particles with one of the first silicon micro-strip detectors.   He came to CERN as a Fellow in 1990 to work on ALEPH at LEP, and then stayed on as a research staff member.  He joined LHCb right at the birth of the collaboration and has served as deputy spokesperson twice, once in the design phase and over the last few years during its very successful first run.  His research career has focused on flavour physics, with measurements of the lifetimes and particle-antiparticle oscillations of beauty hadrons, and also instrumentation:  he optimised the design of the RICH detectors for LHCb, and has more recently been developing a novel concept for very fast time-of-flight measurement.    

He sees it as an interesting challenge to take the position of one of the deputy heads of the PH department, to take a broader view of the research being done at CERN, and to help facilitate the work of all the diverse groups in the department.  LHCb is running well and has recently had its upgrade approved, so it will still be there when the current two year mandate has been completed.  And Roger will try to keep an eye on the time-of-flight development, if time permits…  He had previously helped Philippe Bloch with the review of non-LHC preprints, and will now take over from him the formidable task of reviewing the LHC preprints too.  He sees his main role as working closely with Livio as department head, to support him in whatever way is needed, and to be available to stand in for him when required.  He will focus in particular on participation in the scientific committees, recruitment of research staff, and support of the smaller experiments.  

Catherine Decosse, Departmental Planning Officer

Catherine Decosse will be the new Departmental Planning Officer, continuing her long career at CERN. She has started working closely with Jose Salicio Diez and will gradually take over her new role during this year. In parallel, she will ensure for a few months a smooth transition with the new ALICE Resources Coordinator, Adriana Telesca.

Catherine Decosse, arrived at CERN in 1986 to work for an outsourcing company, which had a contract with the CERN Print-Shop. She joined CERN as a staff member in 1991, to work in the DG’s office of Prof. C. Rubbia, the then DG. By the end of 1994, she moved to the department for Electronics and Computing for Experiments Physics Division (ECP) and assisted M. Bénot in his functions as a DPO. After the re-structuration of the Research sector in 1998, Catherine joined the DPO’s office of IT for one year and, soon after, collaborated with F. Bourgeois in the Technology Transfer Office.

In 2000, she joined the Physics Department and the ALICE Experiment in order to assist Hans de Groot and, in 2009, she took the role of Resources Coordinator over from him. From 2006 until 2009, she was also ALICE Outreach Coordinator. In 2000, she decided to enrich her education while working and graduated in Economics and Political Science (BSc Honours) in 2005; later in 2009, she obtained a Master in Business Administration (MBA) by the UK Open University Business School.

Catherine has drawn valuable lessons from her previous experience as resource coordinator and has built a large network both within CERN as well as with many collaborating institutes. She understands the particular culture of the Physics department., as well as the importance of dealing effectively with requests from the experiments and the support groups as well as from the PH/TH group. She enjoys the diversity of requests, which requires great flexibility and creativity in order to get the required resources for different types of projects.

As DPO she will work closely with Livio Mapelli, Roger Forty and Ignatios Antoniadis. She will contribute to the management of the PH material budget resources and closely collaborate with Cécile Granier, the new HRO, who will deal with the personnel resources. She emphasizes how important it is to collaborate with colleagues and to establish long-standing relationships based on mutual trust, that are key to success.

Cecile Granier, Human Resources Officer

Cecile Granier is the new Human Resources Officer for the PH Department. She assists the Head of the Department in personnel management and facilitates his decisions in HR issues. Her responsibilities include recruitment, performance management, internal mobility etc. Lore Tailleu is the new HR Advisor for the PH Department and they collaborate closely.

Cecile, having acquired a Diplôme d’Etudes Supérieures (equivalent to a Master's Degree) in International Relations in 1993, spent one year as HR administrator at Institut Laue Langevin at Grenoble, before arriving at CERN in 1995. She began working as Personnel Coordinator in the Fellows, Associates and Students (FAS) service. In 2000, she became HR administrator in the Social and Statutory Conditions Group and served as Group leader from 2005 to 2006, managing individual cases (legal analysis and proposal of solutions) and conducting specific studies for the management. Then, she became HR Advisor and worked for various Departments as such. She finally joined PH in 2014 as an HRO.

The PH Department is one of the biggest departments at CERN, with almost 1000 staff members, fellows, students and associates and more than 10000 users. The number and the diversity of the personnel makes her new mission even more challenging. In her previous position, Cécile was advising the management and staff members of the PH Department with an “HR hat”, as she says. Now she advises the PH Department Head as member of the management team. Her long experience has helped her to acquire a broad understanding of HR processes as well as a comprehensive knowledge of the Organization. Cecile's adaptability and good sense of human relationships will help her rise to her new role as part of the management team.