idw – Informationsdienst Wissenschaft
Nachrichten, Termine, Experten
Nachrichten, Termine, Experten
idw - Informationsdienst
Wissenschaft
As of March 1, 2026, Arina Zonner will join the Executive Board of the University of Technology Nuremberg (UTN) as its first Founding Vice President for Staff, Alumni and Equity. In this role, she will provide strategic leadership for these areas at the executive level, with a strong focus on fostering a modern personnel culture in academia.
“International excellence at universities requires reliable, forward-looking framework conditions and, above all, a culture in which everyone can develop sustainably and achieve top performance. The areas of employees, alumni and equal opportunities play an important role in this context. The role assumed by Arina Zonner is unique among Bavarian universities, is based on UTN’s founding concept, and is made possible by UTN’s distinct legal framework,” said Founding President Prof. Dr. Michael Huth.
He added: “We consider ourselves fortunate to have gained in Arina Zonner a proven expert in strategic human resource management as well as organizational and cultural development. With her experience, she will contribute higher education policy expertise on sustainable personnel structures at universities and will actively help shape the development of UTN.”
Bavaria’s Minister of Science, Markus Blume, also extended his congratulations: “Congratulations to UTN on its new Founding Vice President – and congratulations to Arina Zonner on this excellent responsibility! Arina Zonner is living proof that our youngest state university is breaking new ground and is not hesitant to do so at the leadership level. She brings extensive experience and expertise from the private sector and has a strong profile in the areas of human resources, process management and talent development. I look forward to our collaboration and to many innovative impulses – all the best and every success!”
Extensive Leadership Experience in HR and Organizational Development
Arina Zonner is a native of Nuremberg and closely connected to the region. After completing her training as a bank clerk, she pursued further professional qualifications alongside her career. Today, as a business psychologist (M.Sc.) and business lawyer (LL.B.), she brings more than 22 years of professional experience in the banking and consulting sectors. For over ten years, she has held senior HR leadership roles, most recently serving as Head of Human Resources and authorized signatory (Prokuristin). In addition to her leadership responsibilities, she is active as a specialist author, keynote speaker and podcaster.
In her new position, Arina Zonner will assume strategic responsibility in particular for recruitment and staff development, as well as for equity and alumni affairs. She views UTN as a distinctive actor within the German higher education landscape: “UTN stands for the interdisciplinary integration of IT, engineering and the humanities – a unique and forward-looking approach within our university landscape,” said Zonner. “At the center are the people, including those who work or study at UTN. Drawing on my many years of experience in strategic HR management, transformation, and organizational and cultural development, I aim to actively shape this process of growth.”
She further emphasized: “Over the past five years, UTN’s employees and students have already achieved extraordinary things. The development of UTN is a pioneering project with significant impact for my hometown of Nuremberg, with supra-regional and international visibility. I am very much looking forward to joining the Executive Board and the entire team as Founding Vice President for Staff, Alumni and Equity in UTN’s anniversary year.”
https://www.utn.de/en/2026/02/12/arina-zonner-to-become-the-first-founding-vice-...
from left to right: Vice President for Administration Dr. Michael Fraas, Arina Zonner, Founding Pres ...
Source: Petra Zimmerer
Copyright: UTN
Criteria of this press release:
Journalists
interdisciplinary
transregional, national
Personnel announcements
English
You can combine search terms with and, or and/or not, e.g. Philo not logy.
You can use brackets to separate combinations from each other, e.g. (Philo not logy) or (Psycho and logy).
Coherent groups of words will be located as complete phrases if you put them into quotation marks, e.g. “Federal Republic of Germany”.
You can also use the advanced search without entering search terms. It will then follow the criteria you have selected (e.g. country or subject area).
If you have not selected any criteria in a given category, the entire category will be searched (e.g. all subject areas or all countries).
