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Detailed description regarding the entrepreneurial university from concept to action.
THE ENTREPRENEURIAL UNIVERSITY:
FROM CONCEPT TO ACTION
December 2013
The Natonal Centre for Entrepreneurship in Educaton (NCEE) drives insttutonal change throughout
the further and higher educaton sectors in the UK. It works in partnership to create beter conditons for
long-term sustainable entrepreneurship. It plays a central role in the Entrepreneurial University Leaders
Programme (EULP) which was launched in 2010. Past partcipants to the EULP are key contributors to this
publicaton.
ABOUT THE ENTREPRENEURIAL UNIVERSITY LEADERS PROGRAMME
Programme Objectves, Partners and Partcipants
The Entrepreneurial University Leadership Programme (EULP) is a pioneering development
programme for senior university leaders. It explores the changing roles of universites and
the benefts of enterprise, entrepreneurship and innovaton within the university context. It
facilitates learning from worldwide experience and focuses upon acton for entrepreneurial
development within partcipant universites.
The programme is delivered annually through a partnership between the Natonal Centre
for Entrepreneurship in Educaton (NCEE) and Universites UK (UUK). Three modules take
place each year: the frst at the Saïd Business School, University of Oxford; the second at
the recipient insttuton of The Times Higher Educaton Entrepreneurial University of the
Year Award and the third at UUK’s head ofce at Woburn House, London. The partcipants
represent a mix of Vice Chancellors, Deputy and Pro-Vice Chancellors and Academic and
Professional Heads of university departments. Up to 30 partcipants are accepted for each
programme, and there is an actve alumni network for contnuing learning and experience
exchange. To date, partcipants from ten countries have taken part.
Programme Design
The entrepreneurial concept provides the framework for the programme. It explores the
nature of the imperatve to respond to increasing uncertainty and complexity. The concept is
not used solely in the narrow sense of new venturing and the commercializaton of knowledge
but importantly, covers key areas of wider entrepreneurial university development. These
include: mission, governance and strategy; organisaton design and development;
inter-departmental co-operaton and transdisciplinarity; fnancial leverage; public value and
internatonal, natonal, regional and local stakeholder engagement; knowledge
confguraton, exchange, transfer and support; curriculum development, enterprise,
entrepreneurship educaton and employability; alumni relatons and engagement; and
internatonalisaton.
The programme works from concept to acton in three modules. It examines practce in Asia,
Europe and the USA. It explores future economic, social, technological and environmental
trends and their impact on universites. It discusses the leadership skills and atributes
required to make change happen. The modules are interspersed with an acton agenda
focused upon partcipant implementaton of entrepreneurial change initatves. These are
facilitated by an experienced tutor team of past partcipants on the programme.
The three modules are:
1. The Entrepreneurial University: Concept & Visioning;
2. The Entrepreneurial University: Applying the Concept and Exploring Good Practce;
3. The Entrepreneurial University: The Way Ahead - Actons for Change.
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THE ENTREPRENEURIAL UNIVERSITY: FROM CONCEPT TO ACTION
October 2013
Editors:
Paul Coyle
Co-Director, Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme, Natonal Centre for Entrepreneurship in
Educaton (NCEE)
[email protected]
Allan Gibb
Professor Emeritus, University of Durham, UK
[email protected]
Gay Haskins
Co-Director, Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme, NCEE & Associate Fellow, Sa?d Business
School, University of Oxford, UK
[email protected]
Contributors:
Chris Baker, Director, Economic and Social Engagement, University of Brighton
Paul Coyle, Co-Director, Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme, NCEE
Professor Lesley Dobree, Deputy Vice Chancellor, Anglia Ruskin University
Professor Pete Downes, Principal and Vice Chancellor, University of Dundee
Ian Dunn, Deputy Vice-Chancellor for Student Experience, Coventry University
Professor Allan Gibb, Professor Emeritus, University of Durham
Professor Paul Gough, Deputy Vice Chancellor, University of the West of England
Professor John Gratan, Pro Vice Chancellor, Aberystwyth University
Professor Stephen Hagen, Professor Emeritus, University of South Wales
Professor Andrew Hamilton, Vice Chancellor, University of Oxford
Professor Mike Thomas, Pro Vice Chancellor (Academic), University of Chester
Mikkel Trym, Director, Copenhagen Innovaton & Entrepreneurship Lab (CIEL)
Professor Anthony Wheton, Vice Dean, Faculty of Medical and Human Sciences,
University of Manchester
Laura Woods, Director of Academic Enterprise, Teesside University
The Editorial Team would also like to thank Professor Paul Hannon, Director, Insttute for Entrepreneurial
Leadership, Swansea University (former Chief Executve Ofcer, NCEE) for his support in the early stages of
this publicaton and Lisa Hunt, Programme Coordinator, NCEE for her assistance in its fnalisaton.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
About the Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme 2
Introducton - About this Publicaton 6
Preface by Keith Burnley, Chief Executve, NCEE and Nicola
Dandridge, Chief Executve, Universites UK 7
Foreword: Oxford’s Commitment to Acton by Andrew Hamilton,
Vice Chancellor, University of Oxford 8
Part I: The Entrepreneurial University Concept - 20 Key Questons
by Allan Gibb, Professor Emeritus, University of Durham 10
1. What is the entrepreneurial concept that challenges universites? 10
2. What is the link between enterprise, entrepreneurship and innovaton in universites? 10
3. Is there really a need for universites to become more entrepreneurial? 10
4. What are the major challenges to traditonal university models? 11
5. In general, how are these challenges shaping the sector? 11
6. Is the essental ‘idea’ and autonomy of a university under threat? 11
7. What are the external pressures shaping the entrepreneurial future of universites? 12
8. How are universites responding to these pressures? 12
9. Are these responses leading to an even more diferentated higher educaton sector? 13
10. What will be the future private sector role? 13
11. Is diferentaton leading to change in the ways that knowledge is organized and delivered? 13
12. Does the debate about new sources of learning mean acceptance of the ‘Triple Helix’ model? 14
13. In the light of all these changes how is the public value of a university to be judged? 14
14. How can the entrepreneurial potental of a university be explored and developed? 14
15. How can a review of entrepreneurial potental contribute to achievement of university
objectves? 15
16. What does this mean for the overall balance of university/stakeholder relatonships? 15
17. What are the implicatons for individual university departments? 16
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18. Overall, what does the entrepreneurial concept mean for the design of the university? 16
19. What are the implicatons for leadership? 16
20. In summary, what might be the shape of the future entrepreneurial university? 16
Part II The Entrepreneurial University in Acton: 11 Examples 18
Theme A: Entrepreneurial Strategy
1. A Strategy to Foster Enterprise by Lesley Dobree, Deputy Vice Chancellor, Anglia Ruskin
University 20
2. Towards an Internatonal Strategy by John Gratan, Pro Vice Chancellor, Aberystwyth
University 22
3. A Strategy for Developing an Entrepreneurial University by Stephen Hagen, Actng Vice
Chancellor, and Paul Coyle, Professor of Entrepreneurial Leadership at the former
University of Wales, Newport 25
4. A Strategy for Business Engagement – developing an Entrepreneurial Culture by Laura
Woods, Director of Academic Enterprise, University of Teesside 28
Theme B: Entrepreneurial Partnerships
5. Creatng Innovaton in Partnership with Local Communites by Chris Baker, Director,
Economic and Social Engagement, University of Brighton 31
6. Achieving Impact through Partnerships by Pete Downes, Principal and Vice Chancellor,
University of Dundee 34
7. The Role of Partnership in a Regional Innovaton Hub by Paul Gough, Deputy Vice Chancellor,
University of the West of England 38
8. Partnering for Entrepreneurial Actvity by Anthony Wheton, Vice Dean, Faculty of
Medical and Human Sciences, University of Manchester 41
Theme C: Entrepreneurial Curriculum and Pedagogy
9. A Risk Based Approach to Curriculum Design by Ian Dunn, Deputy Vice Chancellor for
Student Experience, Coventry University 44
10. Embedding Enterprise in the Curriculum by Mike Thomas, Pro Vice Chancellor (Academic),
University of Chester 47
11. Collaboraton between Students, Academics and Industry by Mikkel Trym, Director,
Copenhagen Innovaton & Entrepreneurship Lab (CIEL) 50
Appendices:
A. The University Entrepreneurial Scorecard: Exploring the Entrepreneurial Potental of
a University 54
B. Background Readings 58
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INTRODUCTION: ABOUT THIS PUBLICATION
This publicaton seeks to demonstrate concept, acton and impact associated with
development of the entrepreneurial university. It is writen to familiarise the reader with many
of the issues raised and discussed in the Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme and to
share the experiences of some of the past partcipants.
It begins with a foreword by the Vice Chancellor of the University of Oxford, outlining some of
the innovatons that Oxford has introduced in recent years.
Part one explores a number of key concepts and issues underpinning the programme. It does
so by addressing twenty major questons which have emerged both from the experience of
running the programme, refectons upon it, and research. There are no academic references,
but a short reading list is included from which many of the arguments are drawn. A further
appendix sets out a framework and scorecard for a review of a University’s ‘entrepreneurial
potental.’
The second part consists of eleven short vignetes writen by senior university personnel who
have atended the programme. These do not take the form of refectons on the programme,
nor are they designed to be part of an evaluaton. They are writen to enhance the reader’s
understanding of how diferent universites may approach the issue of university enterprise,
entrepreneurship and innovaton. As such they demonstrate a rich seam of experience and
motvaton.
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PREFACE
December, 2013
Following exceptonally positve feedback from alumni, and the commitment of its faculty and
founders, The Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme (EULP) is about to begin its fourth iteraton
with record demand for partcipaton.
The Entrepreneurial University: from Concept to Acton is the latest in a series of papers available on the
website of the Natonal Centre for Entrepreneurship in Educaton (NCEE) tracing the development of the
entrepreneurial university concept. These papers give the EULP a strong research underpinning and are
used to update its design on a regular basis.
This new publicaton highlights innovaton and change that has taken place within the universites
represented by the partcipants on the programme. NCEE aims to collect further examples of change
management on a regular basis. These will provide a valuable record of enterprise, innovaton and the
pursuit of entrepreneurial opportunity in the university sector.
We would like to thank all involved for their ongoing eforts and dedicaton to the success of the
programme and look forward to our contnuing partnership in its development.
Keith Burnley,
Chief Executve Ofcer,
Natonal Centre for Entrepreneurship in Educaton (NCEE)
Nicola Dandridge,
Chief Executve,
Universites UK
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FOREWORD: OXFORD’S COMMITMENT TO ACTION
Professor Andrew Hamilton, Vice Chancellor, University of Oxford
It is now almost four years since the Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme (EULP) began in 2010.
On each of the three iteratons to date, Oxford has been delighted to host the frst module and to welcome
senior partcipants from a wide range of universites to the City of Oxford.
Why is this so? Why should an 800 year-old university, steeped in traditon and renowned for its ancient
buildings and gleaming spires place a strong emphasis on entrepreneurship, innovaton, change and the
impact of our endeavours?
In the University of Oxford’s 2011/2012 Annual Review, I wrote that one of the defning characteristcs
of Oxford is its inexhaustble curiosity. We want to know and to explore the unknown. We want to know
and explore because with knowledge and exploraton come the possibility of change, of making a positve
impact and of meetng the many challenges of life in the 21st Century.
Let me share with you just three of the many initatves that illustrate the innovaton and enterprise within
the Oxford community:
• Vision and values in student enterprise: launched in February 2002, Oxford Entrepreneurs has
become the largest entrepreneurship society in Europe with over 7,000 members, undergraduates,
graduates, MBA students, alumni and external members. Its mission is to encourage and support
student entrepreneurship by providing inspiraton, educaton, networking and the chance to learn the
skills to become a leading entrepreneur.
Five years later, in 2007, the Oxford Hub was founded by a group of equally visionary students.
Their vision was of a network that would connect students working across diferent causes to share
insight and experience, create social change and assist coordinaton, thereby making all groups more
efectve.
Today, the Oxford Hub is an energetc network of 500 students involved in creatng positve social
change. It ofers contnuous opportunites to get involved, provides weekly training sessions and
speaker events, runs conferences throughout the year and places a host of student volunteers in the
local community. The immense success that Oxford Hub has enjoyed has led to the development of
a natonal network of student hubs. Today, Oxford University is proud to support the actvites of the
Oxford Hub, alongside Barclays, Ashoka, Man Charitable Trust and Deloite’s.
In additon, every year, I grant the Vice Chancellor’s Civic Awards. These are given to students who
show exceptonal achievement and commitment to creatng positve social or environmental change.
The awards have been presented for volunteering locally, natonally and internatonally, raising funds
for charity, campaigning and research on social and environmental issues.
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• Innovaton with impact: Isis Innovaton Limited (ISIS) was established by the University of
Oxford in 1988, as its wholly-owned technology transfer company. Its mission is to be the leading
internatonal technology transfer organisaton, to transfer technology and expertse from the
University of Oxford, to deliver value to all clients. ISIS works on projects from all areas of the
University’s research actvites: life sciences, physical sciences, social sciences and humanites.
Today ISIS has three main business actvites. ISIS Technology Transfer helps Oxford University
researchers to commercialise intellectual property arising from their research including:
patentng, promoton, licensing and spin-out teams and companies. Oxford University Consultng helps
Oxford University researchers to identfy and manage consultng opportunites and helps clients access
experts from Oxford’s world-class, interdisciplinary research base. ISIS Enterprise provides consultng
expertse and advice in technology transfer and innovaton management to clients across the public
and private sectors around the world.
ISIS is therefore a key interface between the university, industry, investors and government. In 2012,
ISIS generated a return to the University and its researchers of £5.3 million, and created shareholdings
for the University in fve new spin-out companies worth £3 million.
• Interdisciplinary research and teaching on global 21st Century issues: Oxford has a strong
commitment to research and teaching on topics related to global 21st century issues and opportunites.
Interdisciplinarity and co-operaton with faculty across the university and beyond are keys to our
success. For instance:
Oxford Martn School is an interdisciplinary research community of over 300 scholars working to
address the global challenges and opportunites of the 21st century. From the governance of
geo-engineering and the possibilites of quantum physics, to the future of food and the implicatons
of our ageing populaton, the Martn School supports over 30 individual research teams across the
university to consider some of the biggest questons of our future.
Tropical Medicine is a collecton of research groups focused on infectous diseases and is permanently
based in Africa and Asia. Our research in tropical medicine ranges from clinical studies to behavioural
sciences with the capacity to build and pursue collaboraton with colleagues around the world as a key
success requirement.
Oxford’s Blavatnik School of Government, launched in 2010, is pursuing a vision of beter government,
stronger societes and richer human opportunites across the world. Its research is challenge-focused
and practce-based, taking historical, comparatve, multdisciplinary and collaboratve approaches to
develop practcal strategies for dealing with challewnges facing policy makers. It welcomed its frst
class of future leaders in 2012 when it launched its Masters in Public Policy. This excitng programme
draws its curriculum from across the University’s four divisions: humanites; medical sciences; social
sciences; and mathematcal, physical and life sciences. It includes a component on how to use
medical and scientfc advice critcally; practcal skills in areas such as negotaton, fnance and project
management; and the use of Oxford philosophers to teach students how to reason through the ethical
dilemmas they will face in politcal leadership.
These are among a myriad of potental examples of Oxford’s commitment to making an impact. I hope
that they, together with the eleven examples from previous partcipants to the Entrepreneurial University
Leaders Programme, will provide inspiraton to many other universites to create the change required to
meet the many challenges we face.
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Part I : THE ENTREPRENEURIAL UNIVERSITY CONCEPT - 20 KEY QUESTIONS
Allan Gibb, Professor Emeritus, University of Durham
1. What is the entrepreneurial concept that challenges universites?
Central to the debate on the idea of the ‘entrepreneurial university’ is the queston of how the
‘entrepreneurship concept’, and the ofen associated meaning and use of the word ‘enterprise’, are
interpreted. Entrepreneurship is perceived by many academics to be associated solely with business and the
commercialisaton of university intellectual property (partcularly in the science and engineering felds) and
is therefore ted in with innovaton in the context of the work of technology transfer ofces, incubators and
science parks. This view is strengthened substantally by government and even internatonal (OECD)
perspectves that perceive universites as sources of technological innovaton and ‘engines of growth’.
The concepts of entrepreneurship and enterprise have, however, in the academic literature, been
substantally clarifed to embrace applicaton to a wide range of contexts. These concepts are adopted as
follows in the EULP.
The Enterprise Concept focuses upon the development of the ‘enterprising person and entrepreneurial
mindset’. The former consttutes a set of personal skills, atributes, behavioural and motvatonal capacites
(associated with those of the entrepreneur) but which can be used in any context (social, work, leisure etc).
Prominent among these are; intuitve decision making, capacity to make things happen autonomously,
networking, initatve taking, opportunity identfcaton, creatve problem solving, strategic thinking, and self
efcacy. The ‘Mindset’ concept focuses not just upon the noton of ‘being your own boss’ in a business context
but upon the ability of an individual to cope with an unpredictable external environment and the associated
entrepreneurial ways of doing, thinking, feeling, communicatng, organising and learning.
The Entrepreneurship Concept focuses upon the applicaton of these personal enterprising skills, atributes
and mindsets to the context of setng up a new venture or initatve of any kind, developing/growing an
existng venture or initatve and designing an entrepreneurial organisaton (one in which the capacity for
efectve use of enterprising skills will be enhanced). The context is therefore not confned to business but is
equally applicable to social enterprise, educaton, health, NGOs and mainstream public organisatons (e.g.
universites and governments).
2. What is the link between enterprise, entrepreneurship and innovaton in universites?
The Innovaton Concept in the university context broadens beyond technology with the above defnitons. In
general innovaton is defned as creatng, fnding and exploitng opportunites for new ways of doing things
resultng in beter products and services, systems and ways of leading/managing people and organisatons.
Innovaton in an entrepreneurial university development context may therefore be viewed in terms of: new
organisaton and leadership development initatves; experiments in pedagogy, knowledge organisaton and
programme development; internal and external stakeholder engagement; trans-disciplinary actvity; and new
research exploratons, methods and applicatons to practce.
The successful pursuit of innovaton is a functon of individual enterprising endeavour and entrepreneurial
organisaton capacity. Innovaton is impossible without these. They are both necessary conditons, sufcient
only when combined with an organisaton culture and broader environment that is conducive to, and
supportve of, such actvity.
3. Is there really a need for universites to become more entrepreneurial?
It is the levels of uncertainty and complexity in any environment and the associated threats and opportunites
that dictate the need for entrepreneurial response. It is also the case that entrepreneurial persons within
organisatons may themselves create uncertainty and complexity by their actons which may at tmes be
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deviant (challenging accepted norms). It will be argued below that organisatons can be designed to crush such
enterprise or encourage and channel it. A major goal of the EULP is to explore the dynamics of the environment
of universites, the relevance of the entrepreneurial concept to the design of response and the implicatons for
strategies, organisaton and leadership.
Universites are facing higher levels of uncertainty and complexity in their environment as well as greater
entrepreneurial pressures from within. Throughout the world there have been, for many years, mountng
challenges to the concept of the university as a ‘protected’ place for individual research and teaching in
pursuit of truth. In many countries the ‘protecton’ has come mainly through the public purse. The
‘massifcaton’ of Higher Educaton whereby a very large minority of the young populaton is given access,
together with an associated growth in the number of higher educaton insttutons, has made the costs of
this model unsustainable. Universites have had increasingly to look elsewhere for resource for research and
extensions of their scholarship. Pressures in this respect have increased with the global recession.
4. What are the major challenges to traditonal university models?
Over the past two decades UK governments have become ever more directve in their funding of the higher
educaton sector with more pressure for relevance in research and teaching ted into contributon to economic
growth, social mobility, technical innovaton and employability. This pressure operates against a backcloth of
increasing global competton as the higher educaton sector expands rapidly in many developing countries.
The sources of knowledge have also been opened up considerably via the global IT revoluton and universites
can no longer claim to the unique knowledge environment that they were once were. Some of the detail of
these pressures on universites and responses in the UK context is given below.
5. In general, how are these challenges shaping the sector?
The above pressures in the environment provide opportunites as well as threats leading to: pursuit of
internatonal partnerships in research and teaching; the building of wider networks of relatonships: actve
partnering to leverage resources; greater understanding of the wider contexts of knowledge sourcing and
applicaton; and actve pursuit of relevance. The pressure for accountability in terms of public value has also
grown considerably. Measures by which university excellence is now judged include: graduate employability,
employment and salary; impact of research; contributon to natonal, regional and local economic and social
development; teaching quality; and social mobility.
6. Is the essental ‘idea’ and autonomy of a university under threat?
There has been for some tme in the UK a body of academics opposed to the directon in which the
higher educaton sector is moving. The main thrust of their argument is that the model of the university as a
‘disinterested’ organisaton concerned with pursuit of truth and dependent upon individual eforts in this
respect, regardless of the utlity of the ‘discovery’ or relevance to the immediate needs of society, has been
undermined. The main culprit in this respect is seen as government with its pressure for relevance and impact,
its infuence upon the directon of research funding, its view of universites as ‘engines of growth’ and more
recently in England, via its creaton of a ‘market’ by the transfer of funds for teaching directly into the hands
of students (under a student loan scheme). It is argued that the combinaton of these pressures, with their
focus upon utlity, threatens the very idea of a university as derived from the traditonal Bologna and Humboldt
models. The development of numerous metrics to measure university performance is regarded as a substantal
intrusion upon a model of academic freedom where accountability was through peer review.
An alternatve view is that universites were not always focused upon discovery via the linking of
research and teaching. The infuental 19th century Newman model of the university was primarily that of a
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teaching insttuton. There is also a heritage of the original ‘old’ universites focusing upon the ‘professions’,
medicine, law and divinity, and therefore ‘useful’ knowledge (albeit underpinned by philosophy). In the
UK the growth in emphasis upon social and economic utlity, alongside local and regional engagement, to
some degree refects the culture and history of the post-92 wave of new universites. They are more strongly
focused upon creatng useful knowledge and are more likely to be refectve of government views and those of
wider social and economic pressure groups. There is also a strong competency, and in many cases vocatonal,
component in their approaches to learning. The Russell Group of UK universites arguably are more responsive
to traditonal academic power structures within and without the university and argue for the equatng of
excellence in research with excellence in teaching. Nevertheless they are also responding to the pressures
noted above and explored in more detail below.
7. What are the external pressures shaping the entrepreneurial future of universites?
Within the broad spectrum of the environment described above, there are many specifc uncertaintes and
complexites creatng both challenges and opportunites for universites. Paramount among these is the need
to maintain and increase student numbers. Notably, there are falls in part-tme and postgraduate student
applicatons, partcularly from overseas.
The fall-out from this and the changes in the English funding regime are at the root of the challenge to
harvest new resources and leverage and/or replace public monies. The ever broadening range of ‘ofcial’
accountability metrics noted earlier feeds a climate of competton, but also stmulates pursuit of cooperaton
and partnership. Adding to pressures from this scenario is a wide range of further concerns some of which
are more immediate than others. On the immediate horizon are issues such as the move to Open Access
publicaton and the additonal cost burden that this may place on universites, the challenge of developing
entrepreneurship educaton across the university following the 2012 natonal Quality Assurance Agency (QAA)
guidelines and the recommendatons of the UK Government Wilson report in this respect with its specifc focus
upon business engagement, subsequently reinforced by recommendatons of reports by Lord Heseltne and
Young and the Wity consultatons with universites (see bibliography).
More fundamental is the task of facing up to the detail of the growth of overseas competton partcularly from
South East Asia, India and China, the associated demand for a more global curriculum and the threat to what
has been labelled the ‘colonial’ model of a university with its emphasis upon knowledge for its own sake. An
additonal signifcant development is the emergence of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) ofering free
tuiton to tens of thousands of students world-wide. This initatve has been led by US elite universites but
is now also actvely engaging UK universites and the private sector although issues remain as to the
availability of accreditaton and credit accumulaton towards degree status. When added to the growth and use
of social media these initatves pose distnctve challenges to the pedagogy of teaching and learning and the
organisaton of knowledge. The opening up of opportunitesfor the private sector to increase its visibility in
higher educaton provides potental for collaboraton as well as competton. Private sector engagement is
not limited to teaching but is increasingly evident in the subcontractng out by universites of a wide range of
services.
Overall, there are also growing pressures to broaden student experiental learning partcularly with the small
and medium enterprise sector of the economy: also to engage with social entrepreneurship by partnering with
a wider range of local, regional, natonal and internatonal stakeholders.
8. How are universites responding to these pressures?
The main focus of response is upon the atracton of students with a wide range of incentves and
overtures including scholarships for those from less privileged background and innovatve relatonship-building
actvites with schools, teachers, parents, local authorites and potental future students themselves.
Beyond the conventonal taster days, school staf liaison days, fairs and student briefngs the newer initatves
include: development of satellite subject actvites in local schools; the designaton of university staf as schools
ambassadors; summer schools for potental students; direct support for school curriculum development and
linked ‘passport’ certfcaton; school sponsorship and wide use of dialogue through the social media.
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Addressing the new ‘accountability’ metrics provides also a key focus for response. ‘Employability’ is
being embedded contextually in the curriculum in many departments. Greater responsibility for employment
outcomes is also being delegated to individual departments. Wider opportunites for student experiental
learning experiences are being explored alongside entrepreneurial and enterprise skills development. Student
voluntarism is being more widely and formally supported ofen with a social enterprise orientaton. There is
greater emphasis upon student ownership of learning and engagement in assessment processes; and eforts
are also being made to engage employers and other stakeholders in the processes of curriculum design and
delivery. Such responses are not as yet uniformly widespread. Linked with the above is a growing emphasis
upon local/regional partnership in economic and social development with a number of universites building
strong community development initatves into their formal strategies.
In the feld of on-line learning, a growing number of UK universites are providing graduate and post-graduate
programmes substantally through this medium, while groups of UK universites are taking up the challenge
of the MOOCs in developing their own ‘free’ ofers. Somewhat forgoten amidst the present debate is that
individual UK universites have been ofering undergraduate and postgraduate programmes online for many
years building on the UK Open University’s pioneering eforts in this respect.
The IT and social media revoluton in general has highlighted the potental for internatonal partnerships
in research and teaching. Many universites heavily depend upon income from foreign students: to build
this outreach there has been a substantal growth in partnerships with overseas private and public
insttutons alongside initatves in the development of overseas campuses usually in partnership with
local universites.
9. Are these responses leading to an even more diferentated higher educaton sector?
In the UK this is clearly the case. While the sector as a whole has for many years been highly diferentated in
its commitment to wide stakeholder engagement, undoubtedly more higher educaton insttutons are buying
in to the concept of the ‘engaged’ university each startng from areas of existng strength. The former
polytechnics (post ’92 universites), as noted above, have a substantal history of wider community engagement.
The older self labelled ‘research based’ universites have focused upon their value in science and technology
development and related network building. The ‘impact’ agenda introduced into the ofcial UK Research
Assessment process is also infuencing the noton of engagement in all universites. In the feld of teaching and
learning there are fewer distnctve diferentatons. While there is much rhetoric, the link between excellence
in teaching and excellence in research is not always clear.
Given the ofcial emphasis upon accountability and engagement of universites, it is unsurprising that it is the
former polytechnic and newer universites that are leading the way in rebranding themselves in a distnctve
way to ft the new metrics, for example as universites for employability and/or employment, universites for
useful knowledge, universites for enterprise, universites for social enterprise and the ‘business engaged’
university.
10. What will be the future private sector role?
The private sector is actvely responding to many of the above challenges and is engaging substantally in
the online learning process, partcularly in the US while expanding more incrementally in the UK. There is a
growing number of established UK university partnerships with private companies. Private sector actvity has
partcular resonance in the professional and vocatonal felds: this opens up opportunites for public
universites to partner in recruitng from private enttes into their postgraduate programmes. Opportunites
for established universites to link up with vocatonal colleges are also being taken up with support from ofcial
programmes.
11. Is diferentaton leading to change in the ways that knowledge is organised and delivered?
There is a substantal ongoing debate as to how universites are managing the burgeoning internatonal fow
of informaton and knowledge or ‘Big Data’ as it is being labelled. The debate is not only stmulated by the
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global impact of the internet and social media but, more fundamentally, by recogniton that the university is
no longer the sole or, as some would argue, the dominant domain for discovery and learning. Much of the
discussion centres on the concept of a move from a Mode 1 form of learning, where the university is
confgured as an independent space for discovery and learning, to a Mode 2 typology of an organisaton with
high levels of engagement in learning and knowledge exchange with a wide range of stakeholders.
In the Mode 2 model, knowledge development and producton becomes more contextualised to diferent
situatons, more problem/issue centred and more refectve of use in practce. This, it is argued, will challenge
existng forms of knowledge organisaton, will demand more trans-disciplinary approaches and may lead to
the creaton of new interdisciplinary concepts and paradigms. It will lead to a strengthening of the university’s
capacity for knowledge exchange; will stmulate closer partnerships with external stakeholders, more learning
from practce and the discovery of new ways of distributng knowledge. In this conceptualisaton, the university
moves from being a niche organisaton to a more open and comprehensive learning organisaton. In extremis
this might lead to the abandonment of universites organised around conventonal disciplinary departments
with a focus more upon the creaton of strategic areas of learning and discovery, linked to distnctve areas of
present and future needs of society, cultural, economic, environmental, social and technological.
In this debate the concept of useful knowledge is not confned to a focus upon ‘know how‘ in the
technical sense but refers as much, if not more, to the need to link the development of student knowledge
to values and to broad areas of society need for development and the enrichment of culture. This marries up
withthe concept of ‘wisdom’ as being concerned with the individual’s capacity to embrace a combinaton of
experience/knowledge and deeper understanding of a life world of uncertainty and complexity. Overall, while
the academic debate is intensive, the practce, in the UK is limited.
12. Does the debate about new sources of learning mean acceptance of the ‘triple helix’ model?
The triple helix model of a university, presented in numerous conferences around the world, and
accompanied by equally numerous papers, is focused upon the noton of partnership between the university,
business and government. The original tripartte model has been broadened to accommodate the culture of
a society and the distnctve environment in which universites operate. The model, which has had a strong
impact upon practce, is in line with the Mode 2 concept described above. Its focus has been heavily centred
on the role of universites in support of technological innovaton. It will be argued below that the challenge to
universites of entrepreneurial engagement with society can be beter characterised in a diferent way.
13. In the light of all of these changes how is the public value of a university to be judged?
The pressure for accountability for public value from universites comes from a variety of sources. As noted
above, the ofcial focus upon ‘performance’ and the student- led demand conditons in England lead the way
in this respect. The emphasis is substantally upon ‘economic value’, determined on a cost beneft (value for
money) basis. It is this approach that the UK Commitee for Defence of the Universites is so much opposed to.
The public value concept can, however, be approached diferently.
As espoused by Mark Moore of Harvard University, and subsequently widely explored by governments,
the ‘public value’ concept focuses substantally upon the processes and organisaton of the creaton of
value. In this model excellence is pursued and judged by the achievement of ‘legitmacy’ with a range of key
stakeholders. The insttuton’s value is derived from the stakeholder perspectves which are then built
into operatonal capacity and refected back in pursuit of outcomes. This fts into the concept of a broader
stakeholder model of a university’s pursuit of value, wider yet more precise, than that of the triple helix model
and its derivatves.
14. How can the entrepreneurial potental of a university be explored and developed?
Even a superfcial review of most university actvity will provide evidence of a substantal degree of personal
enterprise and pockets of entrepreneurial organisatonal behaviour as defned above. These may not be
branded as ‘enterprising’ or ‘entrepreneurial’ by the university as long as these labels remain associated with
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business and commercialisaton of knowledge processes. The entrepreneurial potental of a university is
therefore best explored by an informal process without formal labelling. Such a review can be organised
through examinaton of actvity in fve key areas of:
• research, knowledge transfer and exchange;
• stakeholder relatonship and partnership development at the local, regional and natonal level;
• internatonalisaton processes;
• enterprise and entrepreneurship pedagogy and knowledge organisaton across the university; and
• governance, strategy, organisaton design and leadership at all levels.
This process will almost certainly uncover areas of interdependence and future development potental. For
example, exploraton of enterprise and entrepreneurial educaton actvity will reveal the potental for linking it
with: existng knowledge exchange programmes; incubator and technology park actvity; internatonal alumni
engagement; local and regional social enterprise partnership actvity; joint ventures with business associatons
and local authorites in enterprise development; formal teaching and learning strategies; staf development
programmes; and student led initatves. A university review, even startng from a single area as above, may
provide a platorm for wider exploraton of the university’s entrepreneurial potental.
15. How can a review of entrepreneurial potental contribute to achievement of key university
objectves?
The overall objectve of a review process is to identfy how enterprise and entrepreneurship can add value in
meetng a university’s key strategic objectves, for example:
• enhancing the student experience, employability and employment;
• achieving excellence in teaching and learning;
• innovaton in research approaches, achieving impact and fnding resource;
• broadening revenue fows;
• improving knowledge exchange processes;
• contributng to local and regional economic and social development;
• creatng an internatonal presence; and
• above all, enhancing the reputaton, compettveness and distnctveness of the university
16. What does this mean for the overall balance of university/stakeholder relatonships?
Universites have always needed to be responsive to the interests of a variety of external stakeholders. But
traditonally in the UK, the dominant infuental stakeholders have been those who directly infuence the fow
of resources for teaching and research namely the government, the ofcial funding agencies, other universites
who provide peer review of excellence and research funding bodies, public and private.
The changes in funding arrangements described above, together with the broad changes in the ‘task
environment’ of the university also described earlier, have created an imperatve for wider stakeholder
engagement and partnership. All of those who, for example, infuence student choice, have become more
important in stakeholder relatonship development.
The creaton of actve partnerships with other universites, natonal and internatonal, with local government
and development agencies, with NGOs in the feld of social enterprise and economic and social development
has also become much more important. Internally, working with student representatve bodies and
entrepreneurship societes and actve involvement with alumni groups have become imperatves.
Partnerships with businesses and their associatons have become of partcular signifcance. The university is
therefore emerging as a broader stakeholder relatonship organisaton witha natural imperatve to adopt a
Mode 2 focus of learning.
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17. What are the implicatons for individual university departments?
Universites are pluralistc organisatons embodying not only a variety of scholarly disciplines but also
diferent values, cultures and dominant modes of learning and approaches to research. Importantly, there
are also distnctve diferences in the nature and thrust of relatonships with the stakeholder environment.
The humanites are sometmes judged to be weak in stakeholder relatonship development although in
practce they are ofen strong. Within each disciplinary domain, however, the relevant key stakeholders will be
diferent. A music department will have very diferent external relatonship networks than a department of
divinity or arts, although there will be overlap and therefore scope for cross disciplinary boundary actvity. The
balance of university stakeholder relatonship and partnership potental can therefore only be fully explored on
a botom up basis.
18. Overall, what does the entrepreneurial concept mean for the design of the university?
Organisatons of all kinds need to be designed around the nature and dynamics of the task environment
they face (defned as the relevant stakeholders and the demands they place upon the organisaton). The
multple uncertaintes and complexites noted above challenge the university to develop its capacity to respond
fexibly to the demands of a widening stakeholder environment. The Mode 2 knowledge concept also demands
capacity to respond to learning and discovery challenges in new, innovatve, ways. It was noted above that the
capacity to innovate is a functon of individual enterprising behaviour and entrepreneurial organisaton design.
In general, organisatons can be designed to enhance or constrain personal enterprising behaviour.
Enterprising behaviour demands freedom for individuals to take ownership of initatves, see such initatves
through, enjoy and take personal ownership of external and internal relatonships, and make mistakes and
learn from them by ‘doing’.
Essentally entrepreneurial organisatons are designed to encourage and support botom-up initatve and
reward and empower such initatve. They facilitate informal relatonships and network building as a
necessary conditon for the promoton of innovaton via the building of individual and collectve social capital.
Such organisatons are held together more by shared values and culture than by formal control systems and
more by informal fexible strategic thinking and awareness than by highly formal planning systems.
19. What are the implicatons for leadership?
The key leadership challenges relate to championing of the organisaton design model described in the
response to queston 18 above, and the creaton of shared values and ratonale for ways of doing things in
pursuit of this model across the university.
The entrepreneurial leader is a role model for enterprising behaviour, is an opportunity seeker, paves the
way for others to fnd and realise opportunites, sets the climate for behaviour through example, coaches the
shared vision, empowers and supports botom-up innovaton and risk taking and shares the responsibility for
any associated failure. She/he is an enterprising person, valuing intuitve thinking and supportve of fexible
strategic orientaton (strategy and acton intertwined) tailored to operatng within a climate of uncertainty and
complexity. Importantly, she/he is able to communicate strongly the university vision, internally and externally,
through the building of personal trust-based relatonships combined with an intellectual capacity to confront
many of the issues referred to above. The style of this transformatonal leadership model will need to be
adjusted to the existng and traditonal cultures and values of the insttuton.
20. In summary, what might be the shape of the future entrepreneurial university?
If such an entty was to be designed from scratch it might classically described as a dynamic entrepreneurial
learning organisaton in a Mode 2 mould. As such it would be geared to engage and learn from all key
stakeholders internally and externally. It would judge its excellence through the eyes of these stakeholders and
be unafraid to give them a role, through partnership, in the design and developmentof its actvity. It would
therefore have a very strong community orientaton. It would combine excellence in research with a constant
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eye upon key areas of future needs of society, domestc and internatonal and would build fexible scenarios
accordingly. It would constantly explore and exploit the opportunites ofered by global IT networks and social
media. Its curriculum would be developed with a global audience in mind and would be shaped by actve
learning as to how other cultures see things.
Internally, it would be organised to empower individuals ‘botom up’ and would seek to reward innovatons
from this source, charging each department head to be accountable for these and share risk. Its overarching
reward and promoton systems would be transparently linked to ability to reward innovaton in the broadest
sense set out in this paper with clear promotonal tracks. It would recruit enterprising and entrepreneurial
staf and encourage them to share a common culture of trust and learning by and through acton. It would
encourage them to build strong personal trust-based external relatonship networks and therefore social
capital which would enhance the capacity of the university to truly engage. As such it would be constantly in
tune with the ‘community of practce’ and each department would need to be aligned in this way.
The entrepreneurial university would build into its stafng a body of externals as professors/fellows of practce
and be unafraid to engage even the smallest economic and social entrepreneurs. In the feld of teaching and
learning, entrepreneurial pedagogies would be embedded in each department across the university, students
and externals would be actvely engaged in curriculum design and assessment processes. There would be
multple opportunites to learn by doing and refect conceptually. Student entrepreneurial societes would
be strongly supported as would social enterprise hubs and given encouragement to lead entrepreneurial
venturing of all kinds. Overall, in research and teaching the entrepreneurial university will encourage the
crossing of disciplinary boundaries perhaps leading to new trans-disciplinary departments.
Such an entrepreneurial organisaton would not be alien to much of the traditonal culture and values
of a university with the emphasis upon autonomy and freedom for acton. The only constraint is that of
management of the interdependence upon a widening range of stakeholders. The opportunity and challenge
is to manage this in such a way that maximises autonomy, freedom of thought and the empowerment of
individuals.
The reality of the university world at present is somewhat removed from the above scenario. But it is clear that
individual examples of many of the characteristcs described above can be found. Individual universites and
university groupings are diferentatng themselves in diferent ways with selectve emphasis upon research
values, research relevance and development from research, innovatons in teaching and learning and wider
outcomes, some, but not all, ted in with ofcial policy. Many of these innovatons are in deliberate pursuit of
enterprise and entrepreneurial actvity as described above. It will become clear from the vignetes in Part II
that the concepts of enterprise and entrepreneurship can be used to enhance and contribute to the distnctve
philosophies and practce of very diferent universites.
“Such an entrepreneurial organisaton would not be alien to much of the traditonal
culture and values of a university with the emphasis upon autonomy and freedom
for acton. The only constraint is that of management of the interdependence upon
a widening range of stakeholders. The opportunity and challenge is to manage this
in such a way that maximises autonomy, freedom of thought and the empowerment
of individuals.”
Allan Gibb, Professor Emeritus, University of Durham
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PART II: THE ENTREPRENEURIAL UNIVERSITY IN ACTION - 11 EXAMPLES
Part II focuses on eleven short vignetes writen by senior university personnel who have atended the
Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme (EULP). These short case studies do not necessarily
relate directly to the experience of the programme. Rather they give a personal perspectve of the range
of challenges faced by universites in becoming more entrepreneurial and of some actons taken to
address them. The case studies are grouped and presented in three themes: Entrepreneurial Strategy,
Entrepreneurial Partnerships and Entrepreneurial Curriculum & Pedagogy.
A major goal of the EULP is to explore the dynamics of the environment of universites, the relevance of
the entrepreneurial concept, the design of response and the implicatons for strategies, organisaton and
leadership. These eleven examples have been writen to enhance the reader’s understanding and draw
atenton to the challenges of leadership involved in enabling universites to become more
entrepreneurial. As such, they demonstrate a rich seam of experience and illustrate how diferent
universites may approach the issue of enterprise and entrepreneurial development.
A. ENTREPRENEURIAL STRATEGY
Four case studies explore questons of strategy relatng to questons in Part I such as how universites
are responding to the local and internatonal environment, how individual universites and university
groupings are diferentatng themselves and ways in which universites are establishing the base of
enterprising and entrepreneurial behaviour that already exists and using that as the foundaton for future
development.
In “A Strategy to Foster Enterprise,” Professor Lesley Dobree ( Anglia Ruskin University) considers the
challenge of drawing together many and varied entrepreneurial actvites taking place across a university
and of getng the diferent parts of the organisaton talking, sharing and working together.
In “Towards an Internatonal Strategy,” John Gratan (Aberystwyth University) presents a review of the
university’s internatonal strategy to date with recommendatons for actons going forward.
In “A Strategy for Developing an Entrepreneurial University”, Stephen Hagen and Paul Coyle (formerly both
members of the Executve Commitee of the former University of Wales, Newport), describe the work
undertaken to develop and positon a university as an Entrepreneurial University, primarily through the
development of an ambitous and radical strategy, and also through support for graduate start-up business
and curriculum development.
In “A Strategy for Business Engagement – Developing an Entrepreneurial Culture,” Laura Woods
(Teesside University) provides an example of how a university can take an entrepreneurial approach to
developing enterprising staf with the capability to deliver innovaton in their teaching, research and
business collaboratons.
B. ENTREPRENEURIAL PARTNERSHIPS
Four case studies address some of the questons in Part I related to partnerships between universites and
external stakeholders, the creaton of public value, the contributons to economic and social development
and the ways in which partnership can support excellence in research.
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In “Creatng Innovaton in Partnership with Local Communites” Chris Baker (University of Brighton),
describes the challenge of innovaton that is driven by partnership to meet the needs of very diferent
local communites. The challenge for the university is to create an entrepreneurial organisaton that can
marry the drive of enterprising individuals, both staf and students, to the economic and social needs of
these communites.
“Achieving Impact through Partnership” by Professor Pete Downes (University of Dundee) focuses upon
the philosophy of a university built upon academic excellence and its eforts to embed, accelerate and
reward impact through interdisciplinarity and partnership, thereby enabling students to emerge with a
beter understanding of how they can use the skills they have acquired at university in the outside world.
In “The Role of Partnership in a Regional Innovaton Hub,” Professor Paul Gough (University of the West of
England) explains how relevant examples of enterprise and entrepreneurial thinking can inform a
university’s actvites in a Regional Innovaton Hub.
“Partnering for Entrepreneurial Actvity” by Professor Anthony Wheton (University of Manchester)
describes a developing partnership between the Natonal Health Service and a university, demonstratng
how common interests are served by the partnership, and the ways in which each partner can leverage
the other’s resources and increase investment in shared strategic objectves.
C. ENTREPRENEURIAL CURRICULUM AND PEDAGOGY
Three vignetes look at key questons about curriculum and pedagogy from part one above, including
the challenge of developing entrepreneurship educaton across a university and of encouraging and
supportng botom-up initatves.
In “A Risk Based Approach to Curriculum Design,” Ian Dunn (Coventry University) considers the creaton
of a risk-based organisatonal culture designed to support botom-up initatves for changes in curriculum
design and the development of student enterprise and entrepreneurship.
“Embedding Enterprise in the Curriculum” by Professor Mike Thomas (University of Chester) describes
the challenges of determining a defniton of enterprise that could be commonly accepted throughout a
university and of embedding enterprise in a university’s teaching & learning strategy.
In “Collaboraton between Students, Academics and Industry” Mikkel Trym (Copenhagen Innovaton and
Entrepreneurship Lab) describes how hundreds of researchers and students have become involved in
student-driven entrepreneurship initatves and describes the challenges of creatng a culture amongst
staf that will support a student entrepreneurship eco-system.
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THEME A: ENTREPRENEURIAL STRATEGY
1. A Strategy to Foster Enterprise
Professor Lesley Dobree, Deputy Vice Chancellor, Anglia Ruskin University
1.1 The entrepreneurial potental
With nearly 32,000 students, over 10,000 of whom are studying in a range of collaboratve and employer
partnerships, Anglia Ruskin University contnues to grow and is one of the largest universites in the East of
England. The two major campuses are situated in Cambridge and Chelmsford. We also have joint venture
partnerships with Peterborough Regional College and the College of West Anglia to form University
Centres in Peterborough and King’s Lynn. Along with our own smaller campus in Peterborough, we
therefore have a strong presence in three important cites in the East of England.
We have a large number of collaboratve partnerships both in the UK and internatonally with 9,000
students studying at these various locatons. Our distance learning portolio is growing: the Degrees at
Work project, including employers such as Harrods, Barclays, Timberland, the RAF and Willmot Dixon,
among others, achieves favourable publicity.
Our Cambridge Campus (the home of the Cambridge School of Art opened by John Ruskin 1819-1900)
has been engaging with the business community for many years ofering ‘enterprise for everyone, not
enterprise for the elite!’
Our Chelmsford Campus has a history of excellence in technical and vocatonal educaton. Our innovatve
and expanding Postgraduate Medical Insttute (PMI) at the heart of the Campus, houses a state-of-the-
art Biomedical Engineering Laboratory, an acute care Simulaton Unit complete with control room and
a 400 and a 200 seated lecture theatre linking live to hospital operatng theatres around the world. We
have also launched the new MedTech Campus in Essex, a partnership with local authorites, to promote
innovaton in medical technology and to create 12,500 jobs in the Essex area. We are also establishing
the Chelmsford Medical Business Incubaton Centre, to open in 2014, to atract student startups and
businesses in the early stages of their development.
1.2 The entrepreneurial challenge
The Anglia Ruskin Corporate Plan highlights the focus upon entrepreneurship. The strategy is to develop
this agenda further as the higher educaton landscape contnues to change and to gain wider recogniton
locally, natonally and globally as an entrepreneurial university. Some seriously challenging targets have
been set, focused upon entrepreneurial actvites, as part of a diversifcaton of the university’s income
and employer engagement strategy. Whilst we at Anglia Ruskin remain commited to achieving excellence
Total HE students: 21,605
including:
UK Postgraduates: 2,220
UK Undergraduates: 16,075
Internatonal: 3,305
This vignete considers the challenge of drawing together many and varied entrepreneurial
actvites taking place across a university and of getng the diferent parts of the organisaton
talking, sharing and working together.
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in teaching, learning and research and supportng the achievement of its diverse student populaton, we
also need to foster the enterprise concept in all staf and students.
One of the main challenges is drawing together and sharing the many and varied actvites taking place.
This requires getng the diferent parts of the organisaton talking, sharing and working together to
exploit synergistc potental. There is no doubt, that the whole is greater and likely to exert greater impact,
than the sum of the various parts or pockets of actvity.
1.3 Responding to the challenge
The holistc approach needed involves coordinaton of the many varied and successful entrepreneurial
actvites across the insttuton. With the aim of boostng confdence and reputaton, staf and students
are being encouraged to become more involved in a diverse range of enterprising actvites in pursuit
of innovaton. As an outcome of the learning on the EULP, I undertook a review of existng provision
relatng to enterprise and entrepreneurship; this included auditng knowledge transfer, exchange and
support, external stakeholder engagement, internatonalizaton and entrepreneurship educaton. This has
helped to create a narratve to share more widely.
Additonally, a cross-university group of those staf involved in those actvites, including representaton
from the students union, was brought together to share knowledge and actvites and exploit
opportunites. The group is commited, amongst other things, to making a submission for the UK Times
Higher Educaton Entrepreneurial University of the Year Award in 2014.
1.4 Problems and opportunites
Some of the opportunites arising from being a large, diverse, mult-sited growing organisaton also create
a challenge to developing a holistc approach. Facultes and support services are highly engaged with their
respectve actvites at a local level and are sometmes too occupied, and occasionally reluctant, to share
informaton. The University Lord Ashcrof Internatonal Business School is at the forefront of many of the
enterprising initatves but is not necessarily best able to disseminate the learning from these initatves
across the wider university.
My role of Deputy Vice Chancellor enables a “helicopter view” of the full range of our actvites and allows
synergistc links to be made’.
1.5 Transformatonal impact
Although there is stll much work to do, the creaton of the narratve and introducton of a cross-University
group, focused on developing enterprise and entrepreneurship has encouraged a diverse range of staf to
work more closely together. The intenton is to apply the enterprising skills and entrepreneurial
mindset that already exists to grow and develop existng actvites, set up new ventures and enhance
Anglia Ruskin’s ability and reputaton as an entrepreneurial insttuton.
“My role of Deputy Vice Chancellor enables a “helicopter view” of the full range of
our actvites and allows synergistc links to be made.”
Lesley Dobree, Deputy Vice Chancellor, Anglia Ruskin University
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2. Towards an Internatonal Strategy
Professor John Gratan, Pro Vice Chancellor, Aberystwyth University
2.1 About Aberystwyth University
Aberystwyth University was founded in 1872. Today, it is known for its excellence in research,
teaching and the quality of the student experience. It is a traditonal; campus based university that ofers
internatonal partners a friendly welcome, great student satsfacton and a high-quality university
environment. It delivers world class research and all degree programmes are internatonally recognised.
Aberystwyth’s strengths lie in the felds of food and water security, earth science and environmental
quality, computer science (partcularly artfcial intelligence and machine learning), internatonal politcs,
modern languages, the performing arts and health and exercise science.
2.2. Aberystwyth’s internatonal strategy to 2012
Any successful business in a compettve market must establish a number of complimentary factors: i) the
quality of its product; ii) its uniqueness; iii) its reputaton; iv) its products which match market demand;
v) a well-developed understanding of the market. However, with the excepton of markets such as
Malaysia, Aberystwyth’s approach has concentrated on a single actvity, atractng students to study in
Wales. Despite this, internatonal actvity, properly managed and scrupulously risk assured, represents a
signifcant potental source of revenue.
2.3 Local successes and failures
Aberystwyth has enjoyed some success in two internatonal markets, Malaysia and Norway. The lesson of
these is that Aberystwyth can succeed in the internatonal market if it invests in its actvites and develops
its relatonships. Characteristcs of both success stories are that the university and specifc departments
(psychology has developed strong relatonships in Norway) have invested in and developed mature
relatonships with agents and higher educaton partners in both countries.
2.4 Internatonal student demand beyond 2013
The internatonal market for students is huge and proftable with much growth potental.
Degree and foundaton pathways which are linked to high calibre intensive English language programmes
are rising in popularity. While internatonal post graduate training is under great compettve pressure,
the undergraduate market stll has great growth potental. Partcularly strong sources of undergraduate
enrolment are Malaysia, Indonesia, India, Turkey and Saudi Arabia.
A massive market, largely ignored by UK higher educaton (with some notable exceptons, such as the
Open University and the University of Derby) is the worldwide market in self-paced E-learning products.
E-learning is increasingly being seen as an important means for developing economies to educate their
populaton and the strategy is natonally mandated in countries such as Malaysia, Vietnam, China and
Nigeria.
No HE students: 11,705
including:
UK Postgraduates: 1,225
UK Undergraduates: 8,630
Internatonal: 1,850
This vignete presents a review of Aberystwyth University’s internatonal strategy to date with
recommendatons for actons going forward.
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All universites should be alert to natonal initatves. It is clear that the governments of many
developing economies wish to expand their domestc higher educaton sector and raise the quality of the
universites they currently have. Schemes such as Brazil’s Science without Borders, Vietnam’s Project
911, both of which will support up to 1000 fully funded overseas PhD scholarships each year, must be
vigorously engaged with.
2.5 Branch campuses/regional hubs
Research strongly suggests that internatonal branch campuses will succeed if the ofer is based around
insttutonal reputaton, quality of programmes, employability prospects and internatonal rankings.
Research has also modelled typical confguratons of internatonal actvity, and universites should pay
atenton to alternatve models when determining their own approach.
Acton 1: Aberystwyth should explore the establishment of branch campuses and determine the specifc
approach to take in this regard.
2.6 Validaton and franchising
In the process of revising collaboratve partnership processes, universites should take steps to establish
clear guidelines which will enable them to enter into the validaton and franchising market in a manner
which is scrupulously quality assured. The process is two-fold. Firstly, there must be approval of the
partner (a decision of senate) prior to validaton or franchising the provision. Secondly, insttutes must
design and validate framework programmes which can be easily ofered to overseas partners. These must
be of exceptonally high quality and supported by embedded learning resources.
Acton 2: Aberystwyth should seek overseas partners who can deliver a franchised and validated provision.
Acton 3: Aberystwyth should design and establish high quality programmes which can be quickly adapted
and delivered overseas.
2.7 Foundaton partners: foundaton colleges, partner schools, internatonal schools
These kinds of foundaton partners represent a large source of potental students. A mature internatonal
strategy will develop and nurture an extensive network of them. In additon, Aberystwyth should
consider the delivery of intensive English language training and foundaton programmes through these
kinds of partners, from which students may matriculate with a validated qualifcaton, matriculate to a
higher educaton partner, or artculate to the home campus or foundaton partner colleges and schools in
the UK.
Acton 4: Aberystwyth should design and pre-approve high quality foundaton programmes which may be
franchised to foundaton partners overseas.
Acton 5: Aberystwyth should consider the design and delivery of an intensive English language training
programme which can be delivered by overseas foundaton partners.
Acton 6: Aberystwyth should establish strategic alliances with UK school and further educaton partners
through which incoming students may be prepared for study at framework for higher educaton (FHEQ)
level 5 and above.
2.8 Internatonal higher educaton insttuton alliances
A strategy should be developed including: a range of partnerships with higher educaton insttutons
in target countries; relatonships based on profle-raising staf and student exchanges; alliances where
Aberystwyth works in partnership to jointly develop, deliver and validate distance learning programmes
in strategically important areas.
Acton 7: Each memorandum of understanding should actvely deliver regular staf and/or student
exchanges.
Acton 8: Aberystwyth should investgate the development of internatonal distance learning programmes
with major internatonal higher educaton insttutons.
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2.9 Mapping the exit points
Aberystwyth should make available and celebrate its full menu of qualifcatons, from foundaton and
undergraduate to taught post graduate and research degrees. By leveraging this full spectrum of awards,
considerable numbers of overseas students may be accessed who may not initally aspire to a full degree
but for whom an Aberystwyth qualifcaton will be a considerable career asset.
Acton 9: make available, map and market all the qualifcatons that Aberystwyth ofers in order to reach
the widest possible market.
2.10 E-distance learning & certfed professional development (CPD)
This is a potentally massive market. High quality E-distance learning provision is a means by which
Aberystwyth may access a large internatonal market, satsfying demand for high quality. The E-language
training market also ofers an opportunity. In additon, Aberystwyth’s adult learning CPD is currently aimed
at a local market and is extremely modestly priced. The University could develop an electronic version
of these courses, mirroring the University of Cape Town’s “Get Smarter” site, which reached over 20 000
students annually and generates a revenue in excess of £18 million.
Acton 10: Aberystwyth should aim to develop an E-Learning arm with a remit of reaching a wide internatonal
audience and challenging targets for revenue generaton.
2.11 Marketng
Aberystwyth should develop bespoke plans for entry into selected markets. The university should also
conduct its own market research by assembling data from the many high quality informaton sources
which are available.
Acton 11: Conduct thorough market research/analysis and develop bespoke plans market entry.
2.12 Conclusion
Research suggests that an internatonally actve UK university has as many students studying its
programmes overseas as it does domestcally.
Acton 12: Aberystwyth – and indeed all universites - should answer the queston ‘How ambitous do we
want to be internatonally?’ and ‘Are we prepared to invest to get there, and to what level of investment?’
“…all universites should answer the queston: “How ambitous do we want to be
internatonally?” and “Are we prepared to invest to get there, and to what level of
investment”.
John Gratan, Pro Vice Chancellor, Aberystwyth University
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3. A Strategy for Developing an Entrepreneurial University
Professor Stephen Hagen, Actng Vice-Chancellor, and Paul Coyle, Professor of Entrepreneurial Leadership,
at the former University of Wales, Newport
3.1 Introducton
From 2011-2013, the University of Wales, Newport undertook a range of actvites designed to enable it
to become more entrepreneurial and with a view to creatng, over the longer term, an ‘entrepreneurial
university’. In 2013, merger with University of Glamorgan to create the new University of South Wales
led to the dissoluton of the University of Wales, Newport. This vignete captures useful lessons from the
period prior to merger regarding the path to developing an ‘entrepreneurial university’.
3.2 A strategy for the whole organisaton
One of the frst and most important steps was the artculaton of a strategy that would defne what the
concept of the ‘entrepreneurial university’ would specifcally mean at the University of Wales, Newport.
The distnctve principle of the ‘entrepreneurial university’ for Newport was that it would empower staf,
students and external organisatons and communites to efect meaningful change in the world around
them.
Whilst the scope of such an entrepreneurial university’s actvites would include opportunites and
support for new business start-ups, it was thought that innovaton within the structure and culture of
the organizaton would lead to the development of new initatves and provide a clear directon and
purpose within the university itself. The emphasis of the ‘entrepreneurial university’ was also to be on the
curriculum: developing and translatng knowledge across diferent disciplines in line with a closer
applicaton to employment. The aim was to establish closer partnerships with external organisatons and
communites who were interested in engaging in the transformaton.
3.3 Support from the top
The adopton of the ‘entrepreneurial university’ as the primary strategy for Newport was approved by the
Board of Governors in autumn 2011. Support from the top was deemed crucial for the strategy to become
an ‘entrepreneurial university’ to be successful. Professor Stephen Hagen took on the lead role within
the Executve, frst as Deputy Vice Chancellor (Academic) and then as Actng Vice-Chancellor, giving the
opportunity for the implementaton of the strategy to be pursued across the entre organisaton.
The appointment of Paul Coyle, as Professor of Entrepreneurial Leadership and Executve Dean of the
Faculty of Arts & Business, brought additonal expertse to the organisaton to support the implementaton
of the strategy. At the Actng Vice-Chancellor’s request, Professor Coyle established and ran the
Entrepreneurial University Development Group, whose membership was drawn from experienced and
Total HE students: 9,990
including:
UK Postgraduates: 1,350
UK Undergraduates: 7,650
Internatonal: 985
In this vignete, Stephen Hagen and Paul Coyle, (both formerly members of the Executve of the
former University of Wales, Newport), describe work undertaken to develop an entrepreneurial
university, both through an ambitous and radical strategy, and through support for graduate start-up
business and curriculum development.
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enthusiastc champions of entrepreneurship in facultes and professional support departments. The group
worked to ensure that the university’s strategy to become an ‘entrepreneurial university’ was inclusive
of all staf, identfed staf development priorites, delivered developmental events, and recommended
ways of recognizing, incentvizing and rewarding staf. In additon, the group sought to devise working
defnitons of entrepreneurial atributes for staf and students.
3.4 A strategy embedded in the curriculum
A major principle of the strategy was to focus on developing the ‘citzen-entrepreneur’ whose skills would
be necessary not just to the individual, but to the regeneraton of the South Wales economy, leading to
curriculum development that would be mapped to the target sectors identfed for its regeneraton. It was
also recognised that the strategy would support public services in the region, assistng them to be at the
forefront of efectve innovaton in their felds. Newport was already a university with a powerful focus on
the development of its region – with 50% of its students being over 30 years old.
The impact of a strategic focus on entrepreneurship resulted in a much stronger emphasis on
entrepreneurial skills, employability and embedding of (social) enterprise in academic programmes. In
2011-12 this manifested itself in a greater emphasis on employability and the development of specifc
modules enttled ‘entrepreneurship’ or ‘enterprise’ at undergraduate level. The underlying cultural
impact was harder to measure but was arguably more signifcant in that small scale initatves were
undertaken across the university as a result of the increased profle of entrepreneurship.
The process of validaton and revalidaton of programmes was the key mechanism for embedding
entrepreneurship across the curriculum. There were two notable manifestatons of this: changes to
programme content and to the number of trans-disciplinary cross-school and faculty initatves that were
undertaken.
The reconfguraton of the university’s four academic schools in 2011-12 into two facultes with
cross-cutng responsibilites was designed to support cross- and trans-disciplinary innovatons. The
creaton of the Faculty of Arts and Business, and its locaton on the new city centre campus where staf
from a range of disciplines were co-located, countered the silo efect of previous academic confguratons.
Professor Paul Coyle was also appointed to lead the planned development of the new faculty and to
embed the ‘entrepreneurial university’ as a tangible, living cross-university process.
The largest scale new curriculum development was a suite of MA programmes that focussed on business
creaton. The core modules capitalised on the expertse of specialists in entrepreneurship and business
innovaton but used the experience of specialists in art and design to contextualise the delivery and
assessment and support individual students’ ideas. Students were provided with studio space to launch
creatve businesses and be linked in to the university’s business incubaton unit and ‘bright ideas’
(start-up) programme. Social enterprise was also included as a new form of supported business creaton
within this suite of programmes as a progression route for the wider undergraduate populaton.
The underpinning change of university ethos to one that is more entrepreneurial also impacted on
signifcant revisions made to programmes as they were being revalidated. The undergraduate business
programmes, for example, were given a compulsory module requiring work based learning or an
enterprise project. All full-tme students also studied a business collaboratons module, designed to aid
employability and include content such as professional networking and social capital.
History is perhaps a less obvious subject area to embed entrepreneurship but the teams’ success with
digital heritage projects and the interests of staf together with the strong insttutonal support for
innovaton led to a greater emphasis on heritage rather than History. The revalidaton of the MA in
Regional History saw the introducton of Heritage into its ttle and an emphasis on employability through
closer working with a range of heritage projects and local partners. This theme was also refected in a new
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foundaton degree in Heritage Management that embedded entrepreneurial and business skills.
3.5 Support for start-ups
Central to the university becoming an ‘entrepreneurial university’ was increasing the opportunity for
student start-ups. In November 2012, the Bright Ideas (‘Innovaton’) Centre opened alongside the
University’s Business Development Team adjacent to the Arts and Business Faculty and mentoring
sessions started for students and staf. In March 2013, a Graduate Incubaton Centre opened with ofces
for new graduate start-ups, an open plan incubator area for hot-desks, a training room and meetng room.
This space could be used by new businesses and for the Student Enterprise Club. These actvites built
on Newport’s track-record of success in business/community engagement, including a fow of student
start-ups and, broadly speaking, the existence of a vocatonal/professional curriculum.
3.6 Key messages
Some of the useful lessons learned from the period of tme spent on this project to create an
‘entrepreneurial university’ include:
• Defning what the concept of the ‘entrepreneurial university’ means to the specifc context of an
insttuton in terms of its history, culture and locaton;
• Obtaining the support of the governing body for the strategy to become an ‘entrepreneurial
university’;
• Allocatng lead responsibilites within an executve for the implementaton of the strategy;
• Establishing close links with the businesses and communites that will beneft from and can support
the strategy;
• Identfying staf development priorites, delivering developmental events, and recognizing,
incentvizing and rewarding staf;
• Creatng a strong emphasis on entrepreneurial skills, employability and embedding of (social)
enterprise in academic programmes;
• Using validaton and review events to embed change in curriculum content and learning strategies;
• Confguring academic structures to support collaboraton and interdisciplinarity;
• Providing support for student start-ups.
“A strategic focus on entrepreneurship resulted in a stronger emphasis on
entrepreneurial skills, employability and …. enterprise in academic programmes.”
Stephen Hagen, former Actng Vice Chancellor of the former University of Wales, Newport
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4. A Strategy for Business Engagement - Developing an Entrepreneurial Culture
Laura Woods, Director of Academic Enterprise, Teesside University
4.1 About Teesside University
Teesside University is the primary higher educaton provider in the Tees Valley in north east England. Its
six academic Schools (Business, Computng, Science & Engineering, Social Sciences & Law, Arts & Media
and Health & Social Care) cater for both full-tme undergraduates and a large non-traditonal student
market; while research of natonal and internatonal quality is delivered through its fve research insttutes.
The university has a strong reputaton for digital technologies, and a track record in supportng
graduate enterprise. It works closely with business and community partners and plays a key role in the Tees
Valley Unlimited Local Enterprise Partnership. It opened a new Darlington campus in 2011 to expand HE
provision in the west of the Tees Valley and to grow its professional and organizatonal development.
Teesside won the Times Higher Educaton University of the Year award in 2009, the frst post-1992
university to do so.
4.2 The complex environment
In common with much of the higher educaton sector, Teesside University is facing radical change.
Public funding for teaching is reducing, research funding is increasingly concentrated and new private
competton is being introduced. At the same tme, an increasing number of organisatons in the
immediate locality are looking to the university for support, partnership and stability, and the university
has a signifcant role to play in the delivery of the Local Enterprise Partnership’s economic development
strategy.
4.3 A focus upon business relatonships
A key response from the university to this changing external environment is a reafrmaton of its
commitment to working with business. Much more than a mission diferentator, this underpinning
approach is seen as critcal for ensuring that both teaching and research are business-relevant; atractng
students and producing employable and entrepreneurial graduates; supportng new business creaton in
its own right; embedding innovaton and skills in businesses with the capacity for growth; and sustaining
and increasing income.
The university’s objectve is to cement its reputaton for understanding, working with and responding
to business, in ways that deliver measurable added value not only for its partners, but critcally for its
students, staf, teaching and research.
The university embarked on a strategic change project some four years ago to inculcate a stronger
entrepreneurial culture in the insttuton. The project involved the appointment of senior academic
managers in schools with responsibility for business engagement; a programme of incentves and
Total HE students: 27,980
including:
UK Postgraduates: 2,465
UK Undergraduates: 23,435
Internatonal: 2,085
This vignete provides an example of how a university can take an entrepreneurial approach to
developing enterprising staf with the capability to deliver innovaton in their teaching, research and
business collaboratons.
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rewards; creaton of a university-wide team of business development managers, underpinning
infrastructure and systems, including a customer relatonship management system; an extensive staf
development and mentoring programme; and networks and events to develop a business-facing
community with real critcal mass in the university.
4.4 Organising for success
The above actvity was underpinned by a central department charged with supportng all aspects of
work with business, from knowledge transfer and consultancy, through enterprise and entrepreneurship,
to tailored workforce development for employers. Success was measured both quanttatvely, through
performance indicators such as new businesses created and supported, workforce development student
numbers and Higher Educaton Business and Community Interacton survey income; and qualitatvely
through internal and external percepton surveys.
4.5 Present and future development
The second stage of development now under way seeks to drive change, positvely and efectvely, through
the contributons, collaboraton and lastng engagement with the business agenda of a wider group of
colleagues. To be successful and sustained, this engagement needs to be characterised by entrepreneurial
behaviour, and to be efected in diferent, innovatve ways.
With an infrastructure in place, the key elements of this second stage are strongly people-focused. They
include:
• A new and diferent staf development programme, linking partcipants directly with business through
mentoring (for new staf), a cross-disciplinary team project with business, and a series of business
partnership challenges (for more experienced staf). Funding has been used to free up both staf and
business tme to facilitate partnership working.
• A stronger focus on internal communicaton, through mechanisms such as events, lunches and TeesBe,
an online platorm for the exchange of news, views and informaton and the creaton of an online staf
community.
• A social enterprise strategy, supported by a social entrepreneur in residence, support and funding for
new social entrepreneurs amongst staf and students, and a programme of high-profle speakers.
• entrepreneurs@tees, an initatve designed to stmulate entrepreneurial mindsets in students through
events, projects and partnerships with local entrepreneurs – as well as engaging academic colleagues
in new curriculum development
• Enterprise fellowships: a new career route for staf who develop strong relatonships with business.
• Buy-out of tme and access to fnance for new entrepreneurial teaching or business initatves through
a business investment fund.
• Commercial Spark – a major practcal initatve focused on the further development of business
development managers as a cohesive and infuental community of “boundary spanners” between
academe and the wider business and community world.
4.6 Problems and Opportunites
This focus on embedding an entrepreneurial approach more widely, brings with it familiar challenges
posed by structure (internal competton vs. internal collaboraton); resources and capacity (workloads
and headroom); competng priorites at school and university level; attudes; and communicaton. In
many ways, this last is the greatest challenge, and consultaton and discussion, the enlistng of
credible expertse, innovatve approaches, and building and using efectve networks within the insttuton
are all fundamentally important. The importance, too, of contnuity, reinforcement and an emphasis on
contnuous improvement cannot be overestmated.
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4.7 Targeted Outcomes
The impact of the change being sought is the development of a signifcant community of enterprising staf
with the capacity and capability to exploit opportunites and deliver innovaton in their teaching, research
and business work. As with all cultural change, this is a long game, and one which crucially is dependent
upon strategic commitment at the highest level.
The fact that this is led from the top, by the Vice Chancellor and his team, is the biggest critcal success
factor for Teesside.
“The impact of the change being sought is the development of a signifcant
community of enterprising staf with the capacity and capability to exploit
opportunites and deliver innovaton in their teaching, research and business work.”
Laura Woods, Director of Academic Enterprise, Teesside University
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THEME B: ENTREPRENEURIAL PARTNERSHIPS
5. Creatng Innovaton in Partnership with Local Communites
Chris Baker, Director of Economic and Social Engagement, University of Brighton
5.1 Introducton
The University of Brighton is a community of 22,000 students and 2,600 staf based on fve campuses
in Brighton, Eastbourne and Hastngs. Forty-fve per cent of all undergraduates are aged 21 or over on
entry. Ninety-four per cent of full-tme undergraduates have the opportunity to partcipate in work-based
or work-related learning as part of their course. The majority of courses are accredited by professional
and statutory bodies. Results from the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise confrmed that 79% of the
university’s research output is of internatonal standing. Brighton is also ranked as the leading modern
university in terms of the quality of its research by Research Fortnight. For these reasons it seeks to
describe itself as ‘a professional and applied university.’
5.2 The organisaton culture
The University of Brighton can be characterised as a pluralistc organisaton where decision making is
devolved to school level. Individuals enjoy a good deal of freedom and individual autonomy in the
absence of a performance management culture. This means that the way change is conceived, created and
managed will vary signifcantly at the level of the individual, discipline and school.
5.3 The entrepreneurial challenge of localisaton
Brighton embraces many of the ingredients of an innovatve insttuton; but these ingredients are
distributed geographically and buried deep within diferent academic disciplines. Therefore describing a
pan-insttutonal distnctve noton of an entrepreneurial organisaton is difcult. This should not imply
that leaders, staf and students themselves are not enterprising (many are). The values which underpin
the sense of enterprise are likely to be couched in the language and practce of partnership, collaboraton
and individual philosophy rather than in a broad insttutonal mission statement. The partnerships sought
are likely to be for mutual beneft with a desire to make a positve diference to the communites locally,
globally and professionally.
5.4 Pursuit of social engagement
It is hardly surprising in these circumstances that social engagement resonates strongly as a basis for
the university’s pursuit of innovaton. For example, Brighton’s Community University Partnerships
Programme, now in its tenth year, won the THES award for outstanding contributon to the local
Total HE students: 22,075
including:
UK Postgraduates: 3,385
UK Undergraduates: 15,775
Internatonal: 2,915
This vignete describes the challenge of innovaton driven by partnership to meet the needs of very
diferent local communites. The challenge for the university is to create an entrepreneurial
organisaton that can marry the drive of enterprising individuals, both staf and students, to the
economic and social needs of these communites.
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community as far back as 2008 and has gone on to collect further accolades. As a result the
commercial imperatve of exploitaton for university gain is not (and is unlikely to be) one that drives
strategy or acton in the immediate future. Strategies to move the insttuton forward can only succeed if
they acknowledge this as the basis for development. The current strategy (2012-2015) sees both
economic and social engagement not as simply ends in themselves but fowing from translatonal research
and teaching that have an impact on both the student experience and the experience of those living in our
communites.
5.5 Building innovatve communites - Brighton
The university, to support innovaton, has to do so within the specifc context of the way that knowledge
exchange is being supported and organised in the diferent stakeholder communites. Innovaton
strategies are determined locally in partnership with external stakeholders so that they refect specifc
challenges of a given area. The university’s innovaton support is based around four spatal areas that
relate to Brighton, Eastbourne, Hastngs and Crawley including the broader area known as the Gatwick
Diamond’.
The approach in Brighton, the home city of the university, is determined by the town’s reputaton as a
vibrant and lively place to visit, live and work in. The economy is relatvely diverse and dominated by small
businesses, giving it fexibility and dynamism. It has one of the highest business start-up rates in the UK
but also a high business failure rate. The most important sectors are culture, leisure and tourism, and the
creatve, digital and IT sectors. The approach to innovaton is to tap the potental which these cultural and
creatve communites ofer with actve engagement of the Faculty of Arts. The Brighton Fuse, involving
both Brighton and Sussex universites, starts with the belief that by connectng the arts, humanites and
design with digital and ICT, creatvity and innovaton can be enhanced (htp://www.brightonfuse.com/).
There is a similar commitment to a sustainable future: the university’s Green Growth Platorm will support
the organisaton and delivery of a ‘Green Deal’ with its private and public sector partners.
5.6 Building innovatve communites – Hastngs and Crawley
The strategies in two other catchment area towns, Hastngs and Crawley, are markedly diferent. In
Hastngs, the approach to innovaton rests on the ability to deliver educaton led regeneraton. The
decision to create a university centre some ten years ago was to use educaton to provide a soluton to
the economic and social issues of the town, which has high rates of unemployment and deprivaton. The
university has also become the major sponsor of two secondary academies, working closely with their
feeder schools and the college to improve performance. An entty called, “The Exchange” has also been
promoted to link teaching, learning and research with the needs of the community.
In Crawley, economic actvity and productvity levels are high. With a major London airport, Gatwick, at
its heart, the area is home to many successful internatonal businesses and has excellent communicaton
links. Yet there is a relatvely low level of partcipaton in higher educaton and skills levels are low. This
refects also on the rates of business start–up. Brighton, local colleges and Chichester University have
opened a university centre designed to create a new hub to promote research and development and a
curriculum that will address the challenge of how local people can derive more beneft from a high growth
area.
To sum up, the approach the university is using to organise knowledge exchange is primarily determined
by local not insttutonal need and is driven by co-creatng innovatve responses with partners. In this way
the university can judge its entrepreneurial endeavour by the value which others atach to how students,
graduates, staf and the insttuton respond to their specifc needs.
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5.7 Creatng and sustaining change
The challenge of positoning an insttuton to use its knowledge base to promote innovatve solutons
to economic and social development is problematc. Firstly, the process is politcal and involves dealing
with a public policy agenda that may be unhappy terrain for many staf. Secondly, working in partnership
takes tme to establish both trust and confdence. This, at tmes, appears agonisingly slow. Internally it is
ofen not recognised that managing change in this way is not always at the discreton of the university.
Furthermore the manner of university engagement is based on organisatonal and social networks which
may involve contradictory formal and informal relatonships.
The entrepreneurial actvity may also engage a narrow range of staf, leaving the majority untouched or
unresponsive to what is seen as someone else’s agenda. It is also difcult to respond if external needs
require diferent confguratons of knowledge that aren’t present in the way both the academy and
insttuton are organised. Finally, the model for funding this type of innovaton has relied on access to
regional development money to supplement insttutonal investment. The creaton of new funding
mechanisms means that generatng funding from the private sector has become more signifcant.
Nevertheless a university is important as a means of levering that investment locally. It is therefore adding
to public value but not always in a measurable way.
5.8 The challenge ahead
A key issue is how the above approach to creatng innovaton through partnership in local communites
might ultmately impact upon the future development of the university. For example, should it move to
grant more autonomy to the academic areas and/or campuses to enable them to devise more ambitous
local strategies? Set against that is the increasingly difcult task of enabling good practce to be more
widely shared across the whole insttuton transcending both geography and discipline. This in turn raises
the highly important issue of how porous or accessible the organisaton should become?
Many facilites are already under pressure at certain tmes of the year. This begs the queston of fnding
even more innovatve approaches that co-locate the university and community in a connected way. This
has been missing in all fve campuses to date but new developments in the pipeline ofer opportunites
to do just that. Physical locaton is, however, only one opton: using technology to drive openness and
transparency is another. This challenges the insttuton to work more closely with the digitally creatve in
the city. Learning from stakeholders is part of the future. For Brighton, the entrepreneurial challenge is
how the desire to be a force for economic and social transformaton is translated into a coherent package
of actons that drive not just the university’s strategy but also that of the many partners in the public and
private sector.
“…the approach the university is using to organise knowledge exchange is
primarily determined by local not insttutonal need and is driven by co-creatng
innovatve responses with partners.”
Chris Baker, Director, Economic and Social Engagement, University of Brighton
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6. Achieving Impact through Partnership
Professor Pete Downes, Principal and Vice Chancellor, University of Dundee
6.1 A transformatonal agenda
Although the University of Dundee has developed many entrepreneurial characteristcs, they alone
are not what wholly distnguish the university from others. Dundee should strive to make a unique
contributon to higher educaton drawing upon a range of sources. These include the evidence of its
history, the individual and collectve experiences of staf, students and other stakeholders and not least
instncts about what will excite and motvate staf. They include also my experience of joining the frst
Entrepreneurial Leadership Programme, the friendships made there and the eclectc range of tutors and
contributors to the Programme.
The university’s core purpose centres upon ‘Transforming Lives’ a vision with the goal of becoming
Scotland’s leading university within 25 years. The frst Principal of what was then University College
Dundee stated that the university would be distnguished by the applicaton of its academic work, frmly
nailing the university colours to the impact mast. Cross-disciplinary working then was not a new idea, but
something we had forgoten how to do, as the strength of specifc disciplines and supportng bodies such
as learned societes grew during the 20th century. Two of our founding professors, D’Arcy Thompson (who
invented mathematcal biology) and Patrick Geddes (a botanist who became known as the father of town
planning), were celebrated polymaths whose interests were piqued only by the complex problems they
wished to solve, who fashioned understanding from any relevant source and who trained their students
to think in the same way.
University College was also founded to support the educaton of the men and women of Dundee. An
intmate relatonship with the economic, cultural and social wellbeing of the city and its people
remains a driving force for the university today and sits at the heart of the vision for the future. It is not a
parochial view because the university’s internatonal reputaton is a vital stmulus for investment in jobs and
innovatve businesses, a source for recruitment of world class staf and students and opens doors to global
opportunites for our students, staf and other stakeholders.
6.2 Academic themes demanding cross-disciplinary engagement
A contemporary approach to problem-based learning and research fnds its voice in three academic
themes that will be the focus for future investment and development. These are:
• Promotng the sustainable use of global resources
• Shaping the future through innovatve design
• Improving social, cultural and physical well-being
They draw atenton to the stated purpose to encourage people with diferent backgrounds to work
together. All four of the University Colleges have or could have signifcant presence in each of the themes.
Total HE students: 16,500
including:
UK Postgraduates: 4,010
UK Undergraduates: 9,625
Internatonal: 2,860
This vignete focuses upon the philosophy of a university built upon academic excellence and its
eforts to embed, accelerate and reward impact through interdisciplinarity and partnership, thereby
enabling students to emerge with a beter understanding of how they can use the skills they have
acquired at university in the outside world.
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There are real challenges ahead to devise a curriculum that is genuinely interdisciplinary. Dundee
graduates will need to work in teams which are problem orientated and the decision makers and
queston-seters of the future will have to draw on knowledge and command skills from multple
disciplines. It will be the distnctve qualites of the university, its sense of place and the problems it sets
itself to address which will surpass the content of what is taught as to why students will want to study in
Dundee and not elsewhere or on-line.
6.3 Innovaton, impact and intellectual property (IP)
These three terms are ofen used in universites with varying meanings. In Dundee innovaton is seen as
a set of processes and insights which put new knowledge and understanding to good use on behalf of
society.
Neither curiosity-driven nor applied research is on its own innovatve and a key role of universites should
be to accelerate the uptake of new knowledge into innovaton chains. This can’t be done if they abandon
fundamental research: but taking responsibility for translaton which involves handing knowledge on to
those who can use it is an important source of impact.
Intellectual property should therefore primarily be used to catalyse the uptake of knowledge. This
understanding has been critcal in Dundee’s innovaton success stories. The defniton of IP stretches well
beyond patents and copyright to include the unique sets of knowledge, skills and know-how found in our
research staf and their teams. Its key use is to drive partnership formaton between researchers and the
users of research and not primarily as a windfall source of revenue.
6.4 Examples of acceleratng impact
Two quite diferent Dundee examples illustrate use of this wide defniton of intellectual property to drive
partnerships that deliver impact. The frst builds on Dundee’s expertse in bioscience to drive collaboraton
with some of the world’s leading pharmaceutcal companies over more than 15 years, generatng
£50million of inward investment and the founding of two spin-in companies. It is the frst example I know
of in the UK which uses an open innovaton model (though we didn’t know enough to call it that at the
tme).
The Division of Signal Transducton Therapy targets proteins called kinases which control many aspects
of cell behaviour which when defectve cause a range of diseases from cancer to rheumatoid arthrits.
Scientsts in Dundee lead possibly the most intensive fundamental research on these proteins anywhere
in the world. Their reputaton was used to broker a ground breaking agreement which all partcipatng
companies were prepared to sign up to in order to access the University’s expertse. There was general
astonishment that so many rival companies could be persuaded to co-operate. This programme has been
renewed three tmes and is currently reckoned to be driving drug discovery programmes worth several
$billions in the partcipatng companies.
The second, very diferent, example concerns the proposal to bring the frst branch of the Victoria and
Albert Museum (V&A) outside London to the banks of the River Tay in Dundee. Duncan of Jordanstone
College of Art and Design merged with the University of Dundee more than 15 years ago and ranks number
one in Scotland for research in art and design. The V&A recognised the strengths of the university in Art
and Design.
Building upon its reputaton, the University was swifly able to broker interest from Dundee’s City
Council, the University of Abertay Dundee, the Scotsh Government and its economic development agency,
Scotsh Enterprise. The speed with which this could be done and the spectacular site proposed for the
building jutng into the River Tay clinched the V&A’s commitment. With the expected opening stll a
couple of year’s away business investment in and around the waterfront site is already building. The
predicton is that this project, to be completed by 2015, will have even more impact on the percepton
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of the city and its economic fortunes than the combined impact of the bioscience and computer gaming
industries, for which today’s Dundee is renowned.
6.5 Embedding wider impact
The above stellar examples of engagement and innovaton, built upon academic excellence are not typical
outcomes of the insttuton’s current culture. To drive this agenda the new strategy assigns equal status to
three academic pillars; teaching, research and wider impact.
In Dundee wider impact combines knowledge exchange and public engagement. These are seen, in many
insttutons as extensions of the research agenda. But it is Dundee’s intenton that wider impact should
sit between research and teaching and overlap with each. Hence, engagement with the world beyond the
university will feed back into curricula, provide jobs and internships and, by illustratng the relevance of
our research, will create employable, enterprising and even entrepreneurial graduates.
6.6 Entrepreneurship educaton and impact
In Dundee there are the usual disagreements about embedding entrepreneurism in the curricula which,
at their most extreme, portray this aim as an atack upon academic freedom.
I disagree with such a view, but don’t think the answer to producing more entrepreneurial graduates will
come solely or mainly from formal approaches to teaching. It will come instead from the example of a
university that is fully engaged with the economic, social and cultural needs of society. This is a partcularly
important issue for postgraduate research students whose usual motvaton is to become an academic
research leader in the image of their supervisor. When that supervisor collaborates with industry, it isn’t
just the contacts made, but the fact that industry is seen as a respected sector by the student’s role model
that alters their perceptons.
6.7 Rewarding impact
A strategy to embed impact described above has a number of manifestatons. Perhaps the most important
of these will be to ensure that achievements within the wider impact agenda are coupled to rewards and
career development in the same way that success in research is rewarded.
No longer is diferental weightng applied to success in research, teaching, knowledge exchange or public
engagement as performance indicators for promoton. Stellar success in any one might be sufcient for
promoton to chair level. There are already examples of professors whose promoton was based more or
less exclusively on the reputatonal value of their teaching or through innovaton and not on fundamental
research; the task in moving this agenda forward is to make this common and to refne the performance
measures used to assess such contributons.
6.8 The future imperatve
When the above strategy is fully embedded students who study in Dundee will emerge with a beter
understanding of how they can use the skills they have acquired at university in the outside world.
UK universites punch well above their weight in terms of the academic impact of their research, but there
is a fundamental weakness because industry spends much less on its own research and innovaton than
compettors in other countries. As a consequence there is litle absorptve capacity for the knowledge
universites create within the natonal hinterland.
Only part of the soluton will come from universites working in collaboraton with UK businesses. In
the long term there is a need to build this absorptve capacity by ensuring UK employers have access to
graduates who will do much more than fll existng jobs. They will create new jobs by innovatng within the
organisatons they work for and by forming entrely new companies at some point in their careers.
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Universites are at their best when they teach by example. The efect of research and translatonal
competence on business innovaton is only part of the story. Its efect on students and their capacity to
innovate will be a more lastng legacy. This is why Dundee is determined to make the knowledge exchange
agenda an integral part of student experience.
“Neither curiosity-driven nor applied research is on its own innovatve and a key
role of universites should be to accelerate the uptake of new knowledge into
innovaton chains. This can’t be done if they abandon fundamental research: but
taking responsibility for translaton, which involves handing knowledge on to those
who can use it, is an important source of impact.”
Pete Downes, Vice Chancellor, University of Dundee
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7. The Role of Partnership in a Regional Innovaton Hub
Professor Paul Gough, Deputy Vice Chancellor, University of the West of England (UWE)
7.1 Introducton: an ethos of partnership
UWE Bristol is a highly enterprising university, with a successful record in co-creatng new ideas and new
solutons to deliver innovatve futures. The university has 30,000 students and 3,500 staf with an annual
budget of £223 million. UWE Bristol has strong links with business and industry to ensure that teaching
and research have direct relevance to society and the environment. Its vision from 2007-13 is to be the
UK’s best Knowledge and Learning Partnership University, with a mission to make a positve diference to
students, business and society. Its ethos of genuine partnership working has enabled UWE to successfully
promote and drive opportunity, social justce, creatvity and innovaton. As part of its partnership mission
over the past fve years, UWE Bristol has achieved a number of milestones in its ambiton to be a regional
innovaton hub.
Firstly, in 2012, the tally of knowledge transfer partnerships reached a record 25 over an 8 year
period; three months earlier (in Autumn 2010) the university became the lead organizaton for three of
the fve iNETS across the south-west UK
1
; in summer 2011, UWE became the lead organizaton for REACT
a 3 year creatve economy hub for the SW UK (England and Wales) leading fve other higher educaton
insttutons
2
; in 2012, the university was awarded one of the only four Business Technology Centres based
in higher educaton insttutons in the south-west.
Building on this success, a review of the strengths of university’s partnerships was undertaken with the
aim to identfy possible future improvements. The review aimed to:
• Draw on evidence to determine the characteristcs of an innovaton hub;
• Gather natonal and internatonal examples of successful regional leadership and positoning;
• Identfy through a needs analysis the missing components in UWE’s claims;
• Explore the role of enterprise in furthering our ambitons;
• Examine relevant examples of enterprise and entrepreneurial thinking to further develop the
ratonale;
• Devise a plan and set of actons that will realize (and actualize) the vision;
• Inform the university’s review of its Strategic Plan 2013-2020.
1
Five iNets were set up in autumn 2010 with £12.3 M funding from SWRDA, ERDF and partners to support small and medium sized
businesses with high growth potental in the South West priority sectors: Advanced Engineering and Aerospace, Biomedical, Creatve Industries,
Environmental, and Microelectronics. To date the fve iNets have established a support network of approximately 2500 businesses with over
400 being directly assisted. By July 2013, the end of the current project, there should be 4000 engaged and 900 assisted across the South West
of England excluding Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly.
2
UWE is leading a consortum that includes the Universites of Bristol, Exeter, Bath and Cardif and the Watershed Arts Trust. ‘The Research
and Enterprise in the Arts and Creatve Technologies (REACT)’ KE Hub will involve the consortum working closely with creatve businesses,
including SMEs, arts and culture organisatons and other agencies.
Total HE students: 30,390
including:
UK Postgraduates: 5,040
UK Undergraduates: 22,525
Internatonal: 2,825
This vignete explains how relevant examples of enterprise and entrepreneurial thinking can inform
a university’s actvites in a Regional Innovaton Hub.
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7.2 Audit and dialogue
During March 2012, work was undertaken with groups and individuals within UWE Bristol, harnessing
expertse from academic staf and professional services, and also turning to the UWE student enterprise
society to help test some ideas. The university drew upon an external consultancy to test the realites of
its partnership statements, conductng over 800 interviews with a diverse blend of private, public sector
users at micro and small and medium enterprises and mid-cap companies.
The audit revealed some real challenges. Although the university had made signifcant links in the
immediate city-region these were sometmes sporadic, lacked follow-through, and for many businesses
the university remained invisible or unapproachable. The very term ‘partnership’ was ofen regarded as
intmidatng by small businesses who expressed a strong desire to be afliated in some way, but for whom
the term ‘partner’ was too formal. There was also the issue of scalability - how to grow from a successful
knowledge transfer partnership to a strong, deep ongoing relatonship with a business – and the larger
issue of legacy planning or a host of major EU funded projects.
During the summer of 2012 the consultancy was used to inform the emerging UWE Bristol 2020 strategy,
specifcally ‘Priority Work-stream Four’ which set an ambiton to:
Enhance the local and global reputaton, health, sustainability and prosperity of Bristol and its
city-region through socially responsible civic engagement and leadership.
Through dialogue and testng with a wide range of users - including the Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP),
the Confederaton of Britsh Industry and Insttute of Directors - this has been further refned into three
priorites. One addresses the extensive schools and college partnership actvity; the second the leadership
role through community and public engagement; and the third the delivery of an impact to the city-region
through:
Strong partnership with and professional support for business, engaging with high impact networks
and working with key regional partners, helping to drive economic growth and well-being in the Bristol
city-region.
It was the process of gathering views and opinions – internally and externally – and then testng them
against the record to date that has proved the most valuable learning.
7.3 Taking partnerships forward: key actons
As a result of the audit and process of gathering views and opinions, a series of further steps were taken:
• ‘partnership’ typologies were reviewed, shifing from a ‘bronze, silver, gold’ tered approach to an
internal language that spoke of ‘prospectng’ and ‘foraging’, leading to a diverse range of ‘afliates’
which might in tme lead to close strategic work with a select few corporate partners. These ‘gold’ level
or strategic partnerships would be intended to have insttuton-wide beneft and impact. They would
be used selectvely and for strategic end only, endorsed by a formal memorandum of understanding or
a strategic alliance agreement between UWE Bristol and the partner. Unlike the network of ‘afliates’,
the ‘partners’ would provide a comprehensive framework for shared actvity covering a range of
defned benefts for students (e.g., curriculum development, internship programmes), and for staf (e.g.,
shared research or business-facing programmes, staf development or secondment opportunites).
• a focus was taken on legacy projects that would extend the life of major innovaton platorms. Major
catalyst project bids were launched, one aimed at developing a new model for higher educaton/
business engagement in the West of England, which would drive business growth through a bespoke
programme of skills, enterprise and employability; the other, working in conjuncton with other higher
educaton insttutons, the Science Park, and natonal industry on a cluster of actvity in robotcs,
autonomous and embedded systems.
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• Eforts were made to harness the collectve collaboratve energy of the universites in the region: UWE
Bristol has a close working rapport and formal collaboratons with the University of Bristol in four
discipline areas and the West of England LEP (the highest ranking LEP in England). It worked across
UWE Bristol to bid for contnuaton funding through European Regional Development Fund (ERDF)
for ‘Innovaton Accelerator’ (iNet-IAP) - overall project value of £4.42m - aiming to help companies
prepare for innovaton and guide them towards best practce, providing technical, management and
marketng support for innovaton development using expertse from the iNet-IAP partners, the current
South West-iNet membership network and the SW knowledge base. This has been accepted by the
Department of Communites and Local Government and, at tme of writng, is undergoing European
Union appraisal.
7.4 Concluding thoughts
Central Government (Department for Communites and Local Government) has shown tangible support
for the contnuaton of the iNET projects, resultng in a successful bid of 2.4m for a Business Technology
Centre in bio-medical applicatons. The city of Bristol’s success in securing the ttle of European Green
Capital for 2015 was developed through formal partnership with UWE Bristol, its chair is a university
professor who was also the Director of the Environment iNET, and the university has incorporated
sustainability and environmental issues across the undergraduate curriculum.
As is clear from this case study, the inter-relatonships between the private, public and higher educaton
sectors in the Bristol and West of England city-region have been essental in achieving these accolades.
However, the match funding requirements asked by government departments present a real challenge
for entrepreneurs in any higher educaton setng. This is especially where a university is sometmes
regarded as litle more than a banking pipeline, required to be just a ‘non-stcky-minimal-overhead’
conduit between Europe, central government and the regions. Through spin-out companies, social
enterprises and student-led initatves, universites can bring real and lastng beneft to regional
economies, while allowing an entrepreneurial culture to be tested in real world setngs. However, some of
the match-funding requirements and expectatons of private sector leverage are unrealistc and will stfe
innovaton at the tme that it needs to be liberated and supported.
“It was the process of gathering views and opinions – internally and externally –
and then testng them against the record to date that has proved the most valuable
learning.”
Paul Gough, Deputy Vice Chancellor, University of the West of England
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8. Partnering for Entrepreneurial Actvity
Professor Anthony Wheton, Vice Dean, Faculty of Medical and Human Sciences, University of Manchester
8.1 The University of Manchester and the Faculty of Medical and Human Sciences
The University of Manchester is one of the UK’s largest universites. It is research intensive with a
commitment to teaching and social responsibility, The Faculty of Medical and Human Sciences ofers a
full range of research and teaching for healthcare professionals, including nursing, midwifery, psychology,
pharmacy, dentstry and medicine. It has over 8,400 students including 2,300 postgraduate students. Its
teaching demands excellent relatonships with the Natonal Health Service (NHS) partner trusts to deliver
the clinical aspects of the curriculum appropriately. Equally, its research demands clinical context and
relevance.
8.2 Operatng in a demanding stakeholder environment
Healthcare is a dynamic environment for teaching and research in higher educaton. The General
Medical Council guideline, ‘Tomorrow’s Doctors’, portrays the development of the medical student as a
scholar, a scientst, a professional, and a practtoner. The student programme is lengthy (5 years) with many
diferent components. ‘Tomorrow’s Doctors’ states that the “four UK Health Departments have a duty to
make facilites in NHS hospitals and other premises available for students to receive clinical training. In
undergraduate medical educaton, students train ‘as a scholar and a scientst’.
The ‘scholarship and the science’ noted above is not only acquired in the university but also in the
teaching hospitals and in general practces. The major teaching hospitals are the sites for many research
groups in clinical medicine. The senior members of such groups are ofen university employees and
honorary NHS consultants, illustratng a key aspect of the complex relatonships between the universites
and the NHS. Growing the partnership between the NHS and universites is necessary but not always easy
as the two statutory bodies involved have diferent objectves and expectatons.
8.3 The broad entrepreneurial opportunity base
In his NHS ‘next stage’ review “High Quality Care for All”, Lord Darzi recognised the need to improve
the interactons between clinicians at the cutng edge of medical research based in hospitals and the
university sector. He stated, “We also intend to foster Academic Health Science Centres to bring together
a small number of health and academic partners to focus on world-class research, teaching and patent
care. Their purpose is to take new discoveries and promote their applicaton in the NHS and across the
world.”
The Department of Health had already developed its research strategy substantally via the
formaton of the Natonal Insttute for Health Research. This funds healthcare research in the NHS, ofen
supportng university employees. Other major funders of university and NHS-hospital based research
Total HE students: 40,680
including:
UK Postgraduates: 7,240
UK Undergraduates: 22,210
Internatonal: 11,230
This vignete describes a developing partnership between the Natonal Health Service and a university,
demonstratng how common interests are served by the partnership and the ways in which each
partner can leverage the other’s resources and increase investment in shared strategic objectves.
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include the Medical Research Council and medical research charites (e.g. the Britsh Heart Foundaton
and the Wellcome Trust).
8.4 The potental and the challenge
The delivery of high quality educaton and research in this set of relatonships, with multple
stakeholders, is complex. The University of Manchester, with six partnering NHS organisatons, became
one of fve UK designated Academic Health Science Centres afer an applicaton process set in train by
the NHS Darzi review. The Academic Health Science Centre has taken up the challenge of developing
synergistc interactons between the NHS, the university and other partners.
The opportunites for the Manchester Academic Health Science Centre to make a profound contributon
to cancer clinical service and research are palpable. In the government-led Research Assessment Exercise
2008, the University of Manchester was rated frst in the UK for its cancer studies research. In part this is
founded upon a strong relatonship with a major tertary referral centre for cancer, the Christe Foundaton
Trust. Christe run one of the largest early clinical trial units in the world (again involving university clinical
academic staf) based in a new £35 million patent treatment centre opened in 2010. With over 13,000
new patents a year and status as a pre-eminent cancer service provider, the opportunites for increased
cancer research actvity at the Christe are clear. It is also building a network of Christe radiotherapy
centres to bring treatment closer to people’s homes - the frst £17 million centre opened in Oldham in
2010 and a second £20 million centre opened in 2012 in Salford.
Against this backcloth, some external critques suggested that the major cancer-related challenge for the
centre was that of insufcient critcal mass for an infow of research income from bodies such as the
Natonal Insttute for Health Research. The University and the Christe Trust therefore focused upon ways
to improve the ofer with respect to clinical research and its translaton into improved patent outcome.
8.5 Reviewing the existng base
A startng point for the review was assessment of the existng university research base and its
benchmarking against other major cancer research centres. Despite Manchester’s top ranking in the
2008 Research Assessment Exercise, according to the UK Clinical Research Network (UKCRN) data it
performs fewer cancer clinical trials than some other major centres. Also, a comparison of the number of
UKCRN-badged cancer trials per centre versus the number of cancer patent referrals revealed
Manchester was missing an opportunity. Several other centres were more efectve at establishing trials
within their cancer patent populaton base. Given the patent numbers available and the facilites for
clinical trials actvity, radiotherapy, basic cancer research and cancer imaging research, Manchester
needed a strategy for further investment.
Strategy development is not a trivial pursuit given the complex governance issues surrounding NHS Trusts
and universites. A Trust Board, for example, has to be persuaded of the value of any new venture to
its portolio. From its perspectve the basis for partnership must lie in evidence that a more research
intensive environment can improve outcomes for patents. In general there is evidence to support this.
The outcome for patents enrolled in clinical trials is beter than for those not enrolled, even when
receiving standard therapy as opposed to experimental therapy. The university meanwhile, has to ensure
that investment serves its social responsibility, teaching and learning and research agenda.
8.7 A SWOT analysis and defniton of investment needs
The Trust and the university agreed that a review of strengths and areas for investment was necessary.
The exercise considered Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunites and Threats (SWOT). The major threat was
that by standing stll with no co-investment plan Manchester could fall behind other UK cancer academic
centres. Strengths included an efectve clinical research network, the presence of a Cancer Research UK
(CRUK) research insttute, excellent phase one trial and radiotherapy facilites.
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To begin the developmental planning process, NHS and University groups were invited to present cases
for increased investment. These were reviewed by Christe and University staf, with input from CRUK.
Areas where research was internatonally compettve were identfed and gaps in infrastructure or stafng
within them defned. These included women’s cancer, personalised medicine, hemato/oncology,
radiotherapy, lung cancer and melanoma.
8.9 Leveraging resource
Next, the Christe Trust and the university identfed the full costs associated with appointng major
research teams in these areas. The true costs could then be reported back to each statutory body
involved with a view to gaining appropriate buy-in at senior management level. The approach included an
academic case for the new venture with estmates of research income and impact on teaching quality. For
the NHS, the impact on clinical service in the short, medium and long term was to the fore.
An entrepreneurial approach, however, involves harnessing resources from a number of stakeholders.
Consideraton of the core values of a specialist cancer hospital and its partner university clarifed
overlapping areas of interest. The challenge then became one of identfying clearly how common
interests are best served by partnership. Clarity of thought on a common investment strategy and how
it might impact on healthcare provision for one partner (NHS Trust) and research, teaching and social
responsibility for the other (university) became absolutely essental. But by careful review of prospectve
partner’s needs, in terms, for example, of organisatonal structure and key strategic developments,
synergies could be identfed whereby each partner leverages the others resources and strengths in
pursuit of their major objectves. By this entrepreneurial process, the objectve of training tomorrow’s
doctor’s as scholars and scientsts, in line with the General Medical Council requirements, is being
clarifed, while providing new opportunites for development of research for patent beneft and therefore
for serving the wider community.
“An entrepreneurial approach… involves harnessing resources from a number of
stakeholders. Consideraton of the core values of a specialist cancer hospital and its
partner university clarifed overlapping areas of interest. The challenge then became
one of identfying how common interests are best served by partnership.”
Anthony Wheton, Vice Dean, Faculty of Medical and Human Sciences, University of Manchester
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THEME C: ENTREPRENEURIAL CURRICULUM AND PEDAGOGY
9. A Risk Based Approach to Curriculum Design
Ian Dunn, Deputy Vice-Chancellor for Student Experience, Coventry University
9.1 About Coventry University
Coventry University is a forward-looking, modern university with a proud traditon as a provider of high
quality educaton and a focus on applied research. Its students beneft from state-of-the-art equipment
and facilites in all academic disciplines including health, design and engineering laboratories, performing
arts studios and computng centres. Its city-centre campus is contnually developing, and the university is
a major presence in the city of Coventry. Through links with leading edge businesses and organisatons in
the public and voluntary sectors, students access project and placement opportunites that enhance their
employability. Times Higher Educaton Entrepreneurial University of the Year 2012, Coventry University
has a reputaton for entrepreneurship and innovaton.
9.2 Background to the example
The aim of this example is to present the outcomes of work exploring change in curriculum design to
support enterprise and entrepreneurship. The central thesis is that without the opportunity and
permission, to take responsibility for individuality at the course level, the course team becomes simply
administrators and organisers. This means that the university, with responsibility for quality assurance
and enhancement, needs to place a great deal of trust in the course team. The university also needs to
provide them with a framework that is a teaching and learning strategy. Efectvely, the university needs
to create a risk-based culture with permission to be experimental, whilst providing relevant data to allow
the outcomes of the experiments to be measured and evaluated quickly. The university must also develop
the ability to act quickly in oversight mode, if it believes that there is any abuse of the permission. Here we
will outline a process that has begun at Coventry University. It is entrely locally situated but may provide
some hints and tps that others may be able to use.
9.3 The task and key challenges
Historically, curriculum design is centrally managed to ensure that award and credit rules are met, along
with other centrally required outcomes. This can result in a distorton of the curriculum, which means
that academic subject areas adopt methods that are not best suited to the development of the student as
a professional in educaton and training.
The task was to create a teaching and learning narratve that was able to win large scale staf support,
with courses as the dominant unit of academic design and that would lead to signifcant change resultng
Total HE students: 31,045
including:
UK Postgraduates: 2,360
UK Undergraduates: 22,270
Internatonal: 6,420
This vignete considers the creaton of a risk-based organizatonal culture designed to support
botom-up initatves for changes in curriculum design and the development of student enterprise
and entrepreneurship.
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in more satsfed, more enterprising and ultmately beter employed students. There is a suggeston that
the fnal plan was thought through and then enacted in one simple instance. There have been a number
of smaller steps that are now coming together to form that narratve and are also yielding results.
The ultmate belief is that by creatng a culture of permission for the course team to be enterprising, the
university is demonstratng to course teams that they can innovate and thus excite the student and can
assess for the appropriate balance of skills and knowledge best suited to their subject situaton.
A range of challenges and pre-requirements was encountered. These included the need for:
• Data: if the project was to be measured, there was a need for data that could be compared on a year
for year cycle to demonstrate progress.
• Outcomes: actvity should only be undertaken if it can be shown to be leading towards enhancement
and excellence.
• Strategy and acton: the need for a modern teaching and learning strategy directly related to the
mission, values and corporate plan. The strategy then needs to lead to direct acton linked to the
classroom. This all needs an output mechanism that monitors progress against targets.
• People: an excellent human resource plan is required.
• Liberaton: all academic subject areas should be liberated to take acton, within the defned teaching
and learning strategy. This liberaton needs to be best suited to their subject area rather than to a
general university over-arching plan.
• A risk-based approach: the actvites are all designed to demonstrate a risk-based approach as an
essental element in the introducton of an enterprising curriculum.
9.5 The Coventry story so far....
This secton will present an overview chronology of the events that make up this story with litle narratve:
this will be reserved for later and largely for others to write.
- July 2010: NSS overall satsfacton 79%, the VC and PVC (Academic) require all Heads of Department
to construct an acton plan on how they intend to improve things.
- September 2010: redevelopment of the academic and personal tutorial scheme, to incorporate an
online employment skill based package. Tutors are to have no more than 8 students and to have an
allocaton of tme to permit both small group and individual tme across all three undergraduate years.
This work was supported by a range of online resources and a ‘short burst’ staf development training
programme (lunch tme sessions that became a standard input mode).
- September to November 2010: introducton of a whole university module evaluaton scheme. The
previous evaluaton scheme had been managed by tutors and the results were not regularly and
reliably used. The new scheme relies on an Natonal Student Survey (NSS) like set of questons,
distributed by student ambassadors during a module occurrence, afer about eight weeks. The paper
based forms are completed during the class and collected by the student ambassador. The forms are
processed centrally and the results, quanttatve and qualitatve, are returned to the tutor and the
head of department within ten days. The tutor has a further fve days to post any actons taken as a
result of the student feedback.
- January 2011: all of the quanttatve data were analysed and league table type ranking produced to
show overall weighted averages for each department. These are presented in tabulated form with
a red, amber, green ratng for each queston. The results are widely distributed startng with the
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academic executve. Green was originally set at 80% satsfacton or greater; this is now modifed to
90% or greater.
- July 2011: NSS outcome 85% overall satsfacton. Coventry is the second most improved insttuton in
the Sunday Times league table rising 30 places.
- October 2011: rewrite of the teaching and learning strategy to refect the corporate plan, mission and
values of the university. The new strategy has fve headings, pedagogical approach, research informed
learning, employment and entrepreneurship, internatonalisaton and digital fuency. This approach
was adopted by academic board in December 2011.
- October 2011: work on redeveloping the careers service structure and strategy. Responsibility for the
development of employability skills and internships now lies in the faculty employability units with
direct engagement of academics through the academic personal tutorial scheme. Students are
surveyed during their fnal year to explore whether they have graduate level employment and any
without become the responsibility of the central careers service. We changed the language from
employability to employment.
- May to June 2012: developed new course reportng process, sounds dull but essental. The report
enables the course team to express their proposed actons but equally that they need Faculty and
University management to take acton. This is designed to be an approach that is properly based on
enhancement but also encourages the course team to take some measured risk.
- July 2012: the learning and development team pull of the most amazing staf development
process, running facilitated day long workshops for all course teams training more than 1000 members
of academic staf in the new approach over a two week period. Course teams are now required to
meet twice per year, involving students in the rethinking of their course.
- September 2012: NSS overall student satsfacton 86%.
9.6 A specifc comment about enterprise
This approach is predicated on distributng the ability to act on course development to the team of
professionals responsible for the creaton and operaton of that course. This deliberate act is in itself
risk-based. For the courses to become risk-based and enterprising, it is felt that there needs to be a
demonstraton of such an approach by the management of the university. Individual staf have access to
a broad range of expertse in the teaching of entrepreneurial studies as well as embedding employment
skills through the university wide Add+vantage scheme. The course reportng template requires responses
against the entrepreneurial agenda. Thus it is the claim of this example from Coventry, that by the actons
taken, and the requirement to report against entrepreneurship, the course team is working towards a
more entrepreneurial culture.
“..by creatng a culture of permission for the course team to be enterprising, the
university is demonstratng to course teams that they can innovate and thus excite
the student.”
Ian Dunn, Deputy Vice Chancellor for Student Experience, Coventry University
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10. Embedding Enterprise in the Curriculum
Professor Mike Thomas, Pro Vice Chancellor (Academic), University Of Chester
10.1 Introducing Chester
While celebratng and beneftng from a long history in higher educaton, with roots that stretch back to
the 19th century, the University of Chester is a modern, dynamic and enterprising insttuton. In keeping
with its traditon as a Church of England insttuton, this distnctve university is a lively and friendly
learning community, which fosters a sense of individuality, creatvity and personal development – its
16,800 students and 1,400 plus staf actvely contribute towards that community as well as benefts from
it.
The university has seven academic facultes spread across three campuses, three NHS sites and four
Associate Colleges, and makes a substantal impact upon the economy, culture and innovaton
environment of Cheshire, Warrington, Wirral and North East Wales, contributng some £298 million per
year to the region.
Research is integral to the working life of staf, in partnership with local and regional providers of care,
while strategic focus is on further development in community/primary care, users and carers support, and
inter-professional learning.
10.2 The teaching and learning challenge
A major challenge for any new development in the higher educaton sector is the impact of the speed of
external change on the ability of the university to plan a strategic response. In respect of entrepreneurial
learning, strategic planning for new development is complicated by the fact that diferent subject
specialites have unique and specifc needs. Those needs range from Professional, Statutory and
Regulatory Bodies with their legislatve requirements, through to maintaining archive materials in subjects
such as law and history, through to being up to date and cutng edge with digital technology for those
areas such as media studies, computer studies and engineering. These needs demand a diferentated
response.
A further complicaton is that the enterprise concept is viewed diferently by individuals and groups from
diferent academic subject areas or professional support areas. There are diferent perspectves on issues
such as working with stakeholders, meetng external deadlines, recognising the commercial relevance of
enterprise and at another level, its contributon to innovaton, imaginaton and creatvity in curriculum
design.
10.3 The university’s response
A three-part approach was mounted in response to the above challenges:
• The frst was to stmulate a broad approach to stakeholder engagement in enterprise. This was achieved
Total HE students: 15,215
including:
UK Postgraduates: 3,065
UK Undergraduates: 11,725
Internatonal: 425
This vignete describes the challenges of determining a defniton of enterprise that could be
commonly accepted throughout a university and of embedding enterprise in a university’s teaching
and learning strategy.
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through the development of a Staf Enterprise Society and a Student Enterprise Society. The later
was supported by the university’s Innovaton Centre and covered: the development of students into
self-employment; the establishment of a Student Enterprise Society within the Students’ Union; the
linking of Student Enterprise with Careers and Employability; and the development of a range of
specifc actvites such as boot camps, cofee mat challenges, social enterprise actvites, so-called
“boiler rooms” and spotlight events.
The Staf Enterprise Society, currently engaging over 80 staf across the university, was set up to
provide the base for achieving the second strategic objectve by actng as a focal point for those
interested in innovaton, creatvity, imaginaton and commercialisaton and who can also collectvely
serve to clarify and disseminate the university policy regarding the enterprise agenda.
By these means a cross-university approach has been achieved with improved communicaton
between professional areas and academic departments and facultes.
• The second approach was to embed enterprise in the university’s Learning and Teaching Strategy 2013
– 2016. This was done by close collaboraton (using a botom up approach) led by the University
Academic Quality Team, the Deans’ Group and individual staf. For example the Faculty of Arts and
Media has as one of its major aims to foster a creatve and entrepreneurial environment, virtually,
physically and spiritually ft for contemporary challenges. It provides a very good example of how
enterprise can be embedded in the Learning and Teaching Strategy which in turn infuences faculty
m business plans and annual reviews, audits, resource allocaton, objectve setng and curriculum
planning.
• A third approach was to work with diferent teams and stakeholders within the university who were
interested in creatvity, imagine and enterprise so that by 2015 every student would complete a level 5
module (voluntary) looking specifcally at entrepreneurial actvity. For those students who wished to
contnue in that vein, they could complete their dissertaton at Level 6 as an optonal project in order
to develop their level 5 work into a potental business start-up or employability which would then
feed directly into the University Innovaton Centre who would provide support. This would allow the
University to support students in a cross-disciplinary manner and enable them to develop their
employability project and their business start-up before they graduate.
10.4 Enhancing understanding of the concept
The above approach provides both problems and opportunites. A key issue is gaining universal
acceptance of an overall university defniton of enterprise. Although staf have a general understanding
of the word it has a specifc meaning for each individual; so some therefore may view the word from a
negatve perspectve and some more positvely. The issue has partly been addressed by organising staf
forums and lunch tme sessions exploring enterprise as a concept. But to provide wider evidence base the
Innovaton Centre carried out a survey of the attude towards enterprise within the university covering
students and staf. This provided the basis for a comprehensive acton plan linking Innovaton Centre
support for the: teaching of entrepreneurial skills; student self employment; individual staf business
venturing; and in general the range of commercial actvity to be delivered by the university.
10.5 Embedding enterprise in the curriculum
The approach to implementaton was to select departments which scored high in annual reviews (from
the Natonal Student Survey scores, internal audits, student and staf evaluatons, employment outcomes
and a variety of other measurements). The Innovaton Centre works across the university in support
of this and departments work with other departments across facultes. Professional expert support is
provided by Careers and Employability and the Work Based Learning Team. There are also good links
between the Innovaton Centre and the Knowledge Transfer Ofce. The Postgraduate School has also
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developed a reward process and procedures for staf so there is some fnancial incentve for staf engaging
in entrepreneurial actvity.
10.6 The transformatonal impact
Enterprise is now embedded in the university Learning and Teaching Strategy 2013 – 2016. It has a
direct impact on faculty and departmental business planning and also reviews, monitoring and auditng
processes.
The Student Enterprise Society is hosted within the Student Union and contnues to go from strength
to strength with approximately ffy fve partcipants in boot camps now running all year within the
university. The Enterprise Survey has directly led to an Enterprise Project Plan which looks at teaching
enterprise skills, supportng students into self-employment, supportng staf to set up and spin of
companies and to develop, overall, commercial actvity within the university.
There is also cross-faculty collaboraton in entrepreneurial actvites between the Facultes of Business,
Arts and Media, Health and Social Care, Educaton and Children’s Service and Social Sciences.
10.7 The way forward
Enterprise as a concept frst raised its head within the university just under three years ago and from that
inital discussion and the support from the NCEE and the EULP Team the University has developed its
learning and teaching provision in the last twenty four months with the actvites summarised above. It is
expected that enterprise will now become so embedded in the University that within the next fve years it
will be seen to be the third leg in the University’s actvites alongside research and teaching.
“… enterprise will now become so embedded in the University that within the next
fve years it will be seen to be the third leg in the university’s actvites alongside
research and teaching.”
Mike Thomas, Pro Vice Chancellor (Academic), University of Chester
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11. Collaboraton between Students, Academic and Industry
Mikkel Trym, Director, Copenhagen Innovaton and Entrepreneurship Lab (CIEL)
11.1 Introducing the Copenhagen Innovaton and Entrepreneurship Lab (CIEL)
At CIEL we work to create excellence in knowledge-based innovaton and entrepreneurship through intensive
collaboraton between the University of Copenhagen, the Technical University of Denmark and Copenhagen
Business School. The CIEL alliance aims to demonstrate a new model for collaboraton by combining the
perspectves of each of the three universites and real life cases to produce innovaton with substantal societal
impact.
The university alliance was initated with support from industry and is part of the Danish Entrepreneurial
University Initatve. Each of the three partner universites is excellent in its feld. However, with the aim to
foster entrepreneurial mindset and behaviour, there are many more reasons to collaborate, than to compete.
Together, these three large universites in Copenhagen account for 53 per cent of the Danish university sector,
having more than 60,000 students and 15,000 PhD students and staf members.
CIEL has established nine novel programmes, applying a wide range of means to leverage innovaton and
entrepreneurship among the alliance members. The majority are educatonal programmes targetng both
students and staf; such as the Entrepreneurial Excellence Programs delivering new thematc innovaton and
entrepreneurship educaton for graduate students across the universites and the Innovaton Pedagogics
teachers-trainer program. Other actvites support the student entrepreneurship eco-system and innovaton
and entrepreneurship research.
CIEL has proved to be an efcient model for creatng high-level projects that are embedded across
departments. These novel initatves have atracted signifcant interest among staf, students and other
universites, including a nominaton as being one of the most innovatve projects of its kind in the European
Union.
11.2 The entrepreneurial challenge
Gradually, the Enterprising Concept is gaining more and more momentum. The number of students, teachers,
companies and decision-makers involved is increasing. Hundreds of students are now involved in the student-
driven initatves such as Suitable-for-Business and the Danish Social Innovaton Club. Some departments in
the Business School and the Technical University have developed a strong entrepreneurial mindset among
staf and students. The CIEL steering commitee members, consistng of university rectors, are all personally
commited to supportng the transiton towards a more entrepreneurial university.
Nevertheless, the change is largely occurring despite the core university culture and structures, where a lot
of barriers need to be worked on, and new incentves created. The top management is aware of the need
for change, but is uncertain on how to prioritze potental areas of acton. The university organizatons are
CIEL is an alliance between the University of Copenhagen, the Technical University of Denmark and
Copenhagen Business School. Together, these universites have more than 60,000 students.
This vignete describes how hundreds of researchers, teachers and students have become involved in
collaboratve entrepreneurship initatves and describes the challenges of creatng a culture that will
support the entrepreneurship eco-system.
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generally lacking entrepreneurial leadership, long-term funding, rewards, coordinaton and integraton across
management and facultes.
Most of the university staf involved work in isolaton of each other, whereas the students are more
organised – although they are not aware of their newly gained power.
11.3 Specifc objectves and intended outcomes
The project will seek to connect the dots – the vast number of internal and external champions – those great
resources that can create the entrepreneurial tpping point through the creaton of a collaboratve movement.
The aim is to create momentum for substantal organisatonal change. Initally, a number of meetngs among
opinion leaders, champion staf and change agents will be organized to identfy required actons, including the
elaboraton of a joint manifesto and publicity in a natonal newspaper.
Simultaneously, the university management will undertake a process of identfying their current situaton and
potental areas of acton, based on the EU/OECD Guiding Framework for Entrepreneurial Universites. A new
self-assessment guideline will be used, created with support from NCEE, to assist universites to determine
their own strengths, weaknesses and fnd ways forward.
11.4 Obstacles and opportunites
The process of insttutonal and cultural change does not happen overnight. The pace of change and the nature
of the current incremental change in universites are major obstacles, in partcular, for the large traditonal
research university. It is a great opportunity to speed up the change process through collaboraton, where
a mutual sense of directon and alertness is created. It seems possible to create awareness and substantal
change of norms through a collaboratve movement, whereas, a substantal change of the core organisatonal
culture also involves a large porton of contnuous entrepreneurial leadership and management commitment.
Strong leadership and good governance is crucial in order to develop an entrepreneurial culture. The CIEL
programs have proved very efcient in creatng novel and viable entrepreneurial actvites, embedded at
departmental level and with a high degree of ownership.
Further atenton needs to be given to strengthen the core university leadership and governance, in
partcular, at faculty and middle management level. It seems that the Guiding Framework ofer a sound startng
point for such a working process. In additon, new governance structures of the entrepreneurial actvites will
seek to strengthen the leadership commitment among faculty and middle management.
11.5 Transformatonal impact
It is stll too early to describe the long-term transformatonal impacts. It is, however, quite evident that
collaboraton among insttutons and stakeholders, and the creaton of critcal mass, is a very efcient tool in
fostering a more entrepreneurial mindset in the organisatons. It also seems reasonable to assume that the
broad awareness about the importance of entrepreneurial culture and behaviour will eventually change the
core structures of the university.
Last but not least, we should not forget the main collaboratve impact in the feld of entrepreneurial educaton;
the cross-disciplinary approach is highly motvatng for both students and researchers and produces new and
ofen surprising solutons for industry and society at large.
“The process of insttutonal and cultural change does not happen overnight. The
pace of change and the nature of incremental change in universites are major
obstacles….It is a great opportunity to speed up the change process through
collaboraton, where a mutual sense of directon and alertness is created.”
Mikkel Trym, Director, Copenhagen Innovaton and Entrepreneurship Lab (CIEL)
Natonal Centre for Entrepreneurship in Educaton (NCEE)
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APPENDICES
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Appendix A: The University Entrepreneurial Scorecard
(Exploring the Entrepreneurial Potental of a University)
The Scorecard on the following pages embraces all of the issues associated with a strategic leadership
approach to embedding enterprise and entrepreneurship in the university. It can be used for a
comprehensive analysis of the university or for a more focused review of a number of key areas of interest
to readers and exploraton of areas of potental synergy (see fgure below).
A version of this scorecard has been used by entrepreneurship educators in development programmes
to test their knowledge of entrepreneurship actvity in the university in order to form a basis for their
‘embedding strategies’ and/or to provide an impressionistc view of the ‘state of play’ based upon existng
personal knowledge.
It has also been used, not as a formal scorecard, but as an informal checklist for discussions with staf
and students across the university in an exploraton of areas of potental synergy. ‘Scoring’ is therefore
optonal. As the diagram below demonstrates, the main focus is upon how key over-riding objectves
of the university may be enhanced by the harmonising of personal and insttutonal enterprise and
entrepreneurship actvity.
If the Likert scale is used, then the points can be connected up to give a visual display of areas of strength
and weakness.
Exploring Synergies in Entrepreneurial University Development The Potental Contributon to Key
Strategic Goals
Mission, Governance and Strategy
Mission and Strategy
Governance
Organisaton Design
Knowledge Organisaton
Measuring Excellence and Public Value
Leveraging Public Finance
Stakeholder Engagement
Regional and Local
Partnerships
Business Partnerships
Engaging Entrepreneurs
Alumni Engagement
Social Enterprise
Student Ownership
Entrepreneurship Educaton
Exploring the Potental
Linking to University Goals
Organising and Locatng the
Efort
Pedagogy and Staf
Development
Cross Campus Initatves
Supportng Students Initatves
IMPACT UPON:
Higher Innovaton
Research Excellence
Research Relevance
Compettveness
Diverse Revenue Flow
Student Employability
Teaching Quality
Learning Organisaton
Stakeholder Orientaton
Knowledge Transfer,
Exchange and Support
Knowledge Transfer
IP Policies
Spin ofs
Incubators
Science Park Engagement
Loan and Equity Finance
Academic Entrepreneurship
Internatonalisaton
Sharing Culture
Staf and Student Mobility
Partnership and Network Building
Overseas Campus
Development
Organising to Build Commitment
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The University Entrepreneurial Scorecard
(Exploring the Entrepreneurial Capacity of a University)
Strength of: 1 2 3 4 5
CONCEPT, VISION, MISSION AND STRATEGY
1. Strategic commitment in the university’s vision statement to the
‘imaginatve use of knowledge and development from research
2. Strategic commitment to achievement of university status via wide
stakeholder credibility
3. Clarity of recogniton of the scholarship of relevance and integraton
in the strategy
4. Clarity of shared concept of enterprise and entrepreneurship across
the university
5. Degree to which Enterprise and Entrepreneurship are seen as central
in University strategy
6. Degree to which innovaton in the broadest sense is seen as central
to all university work
7. Strategic commitment to knowledge exchange
8. Strategic commitment to local and regional development
9. Strategic commitment to business development and partnerships
10. Strategic commitment to leveraging public and fee income
11. Strength of university strategic and practcal focus upon the
problems and opportunites of society
12. Commitment to a broad stakeholder view of university excellence
(as per the public value concept)
GOVERNANCE
13. Understanding of, and support from, the VC/Principal and executve
team for the entrepreneurship/enterprise concept
14. Level of understanding of the relevance of the entrepreneurial
agenda by the Council or Board
15. Level of understanding of the relevance and agenda (and actve
engagement) of the Chairman of the Board or Council in this
16. Strength of entrepreneur membership of Board or Council
17. Level of actve engagement of entrepreneur members of Board or
Council with the university
18. Actve engagement of university staf in local/regional economic,
social and cultural development
19. Level of trust and actve relatonships between professional staf
charged with external links and the academic staf
20. Existng working relatonships and synergies between those engaged
in employability, business development, knowledge exchange and
regional and local development
21. Level of commitment of faculty heads and departments to the
entrepreneurial agenda as above
22. Overall actve leadership of the enterprise and entrepreneurial
agenda in the university
Low High
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Strength of: 1 2 3 4 5
ORGANISATION DESIGN
23. Organisaton design to facilitate and support botom-up
entrepreneurial and innovatve behaviour
24. Decentralizaton in decision making
25. Devolvement of responsibility for the employability, knowledge
exchange, local and regional interface and business and organizaton
development agendas to departments
26. Degree to which botom-up risk taking behavior is rewarded and
protected in general
27. Reward systems for wider forms of innovaton in the university
TRANSDISCIPLINARITY
28. Levels of actve co-operaton between facultes and departments in
teaching and research
29. Numbers of multdisciplinary degrees
30. Numbers of transdisciplinary research and/or teaching centres
focused upon societal issues
31. Number of departments engaged in vocatonal/professional
development areas
32. Level of commitment across the university to creatng opportunites
for students to explore the relevance of their knowledge
33. Levels of intellectualism (as opposed to scholastcism) in the
university
FINANCIAL LEVERAGE
34. University commitment and capacity to raising revenue from
non-fee and traditonal public sources
35. Existng rato of private to fee and public funding
36. Delegaton of revenue raising actvity to departments (with targets)
37. Proactvity of deans and faculty heads in fund and revenue raising
PUBLIC VALUE & STAKEHOLDER ENGAGEMENT
38. Focus across the university on areas of societal and cultural concern
39. Degree to which university assesses its value on the basis of wide
legitmacy with stakeholders
40. Actve partnerships with key regional stakeholders across the
university
41. University actve engagement with individual SMEs
42. University actve partnerships with SME associatons
43. Level of actve engagement of arts and humanites departments in
regional culture initatves
44. Level of consultancy actvity (and revenue from) across the
university
45. Relatve scale of R&D funded work with business
46. Strengths of students interface (across facultes) with local business
and civic organisatons
Low High
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Strength of: 1 2 3 4 5
47. Numbers of degrees with actve business and professional
engagement
48. Strength of university extra mural training partnerships with external
organisatons excluding business school
49. Engagement of the business school in SME and local enterprise
development
50. Actve partnerships with local vocatonal colleges
51. Level of actve engagement with local entrepreneurs in teaching and
research
52. Status given to local entrepreneurs through ‘associateships’,
‘fellowships’, professorships or teachers of practce
53. Engagement across the university in Social Enterprise
54. The university as a learning organizaton (porous to actve learning
from a wide range of sources)
ALUMNI
55. Alumni ofce and its related actvity across the university
56. Ability of alumni department to identfy and build relatonships with
entrepreneurs locally, natonally and internatonally
57. Actve engagement of alumni in the university
KNOWLEDGE EXCHANGE AND INCUBATION
58. University technology transfer and knowledge exchange actvity
59. Degree to which knowledge transfer and exchange is embedded in
departments
60. Level of actve student and staf engagement with science park
companies
61. Openness of IP policy for staf and students
62. Support ofce for IP and licensing
63. Numbers of patents and licenses and revenues received
64. Student engagement in knowledge transfer actvity
65. University rewards for knowledge transfer performance
66. Doctoral student exposure to the relevance of their research to the
‘real world’
67. Staf numbers with business ownership stakes or stakes in social
enterprise organisatons
68. Numbers of spin-ofs recorded
69. Support for spin-of actvity
70. Incubator support physical and/or virtual
71. Clarity in incubator targetng
72. Clarity in performance indicators
73. Incubator mentoring and service support
74. Joint venture funding partnership arrangements – angel connectons
75. Links to and/or provision of, special loan arrangements for graduate/
staf enterprise
76. University engagement in public/private seed capital actvity
Low High
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Strength of: 1 2 3 4 5
INTERNATIONALISATION
77. University focus upon internatonalisaton
78. Level of actvity
79. Levels of internatonal staf
80. Internatonal research and development links
81. Engagement with local players in internatonal actvity
82. University support system for internatonal actvity
83. Impact of internatonalism on the curriculum of the university
84. Revenue from internatonal actvity
85. Numbers of joint ventures with overseas universites
86. Overseas licenses and joint degrees
87. Internatonal campus initatves
88. Overseas alumni relatons
89. Student exchanges
90. Internatonal distance educaton
91. Internatonal business partnerships
ENTERPRISE AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP EDUCATION
92. Entrepreneurial skills agenda accepted across the university
93. Each department with entrepreneurial curriculum champion
94. Entrepreneurship educaton embedded in each department
curriculum
95. Entrepreneur self-efcacy training embedded across the university
96. Start up new venture training availability for all staf and students
97. Enterprise educator training opportunity for all staf
98. Student entrepreneurship society
99. Actve student engagement and leadership in the entrepreneurship
feld
100. University personal development contract and related actvity with
students in general
101. Central support unit actvity for entrepreneurship and enterprise
educaton
102. Placement actvity in SMEs and small organisatons across the
university
103. Careers services engagement with SMEs and entrepreneurship
training
104. Employability agenda addressing the self-employment and
entrepreneurship opton
105. Use of external partnerships in enterprise training
106. Wide use of enterprising pedagogies across the university
(embedded in teaching and learning strategy?)
107. Capacity for entrepreneurship educaton beyond the business school
108. The university as an entrepreneurial organisaton
Low High
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Appendix B: Background Readings
Crow, M. M. (2008) ‘Building an Entrepreneurial University’ in ‘The Future of the Research University. Meetng the
Challenges of the Global C21st University’. Paper to 2008 Kaufman-Planck Summit on Entrepreneurship Research
and Policy , June 8-11, Bavaria, Germany. Pgs 31-41
Etzkowitz, H. (2008) ‘The Triple Helix. University- Industry- Government, Innovaton in Acton’. Routledge.
Gibb, A.A. (2005) ‘Towards the Entrepreneurial University. Entrepreneurship educaton as a lever for change’.
Natonal Council for Graduate Entrepreneurship (NCGE) Policy Paper. – see NCEE website
Gibb, A.A., Haskins, G., Hannon, P., and Robertson, I. (2012) ‘Leading the Entrepreneurial University. Meetng the
Entrepreneurial Development Needs of Higher Educaton Insttutons’. A Natonal Council for Entrepreneurship in
Educaton (NCEE) Policy (Updated) Paper – see NCEE website
Gibb, A. A. (2012) ‘Exploring the synergistc potental in entrepreneurial university development: towards the
building of a strategic framework’. Annals of Innovaton & Entrepreneurship 2012, 3: pgs 1-24 - see NCEE website
Gibb, A.A. and Haskins, G. (2013) ‘The University of the Future. An Entrepreneurial Stakeholder Learning
Organisaton’, in Fayolle A.and Redford D. Edts. ‘Handbook on the Entrepreneurial University’, Edward Elgar
Publishing (forthcoming, January 2014) – see NCEE website
Heseltne, M. Rt. Hon., (2012) ‘No Stone Unturned. In Pursuit of Growth’ UK Department of Business Innovaton
and Skills; Crown Copyright. October.
Moore, M. H. (1995) ‘Creatng Public Value: Strategic Management in Government’. Harvard University Press
Newman, J. H. (1852) ‘ Knowledge, Learning and Professional Skill’ in Alden, R.M. (edt) (1917) ‘Readings in English
Prose of the 19th Century’. Cambridge Press. Mass. USA pgs: 418-439
Nowotny, H., Scot, P., Gibbons, M. (2003) ‘Mode 2’ Revisited: The New Producton of Knowledge’. Minerva 41:
pgs:. 179–194
Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Educaton (QAA) (2012) ‘Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Educaton.
Guidance for UK Enterprise Educaton Providers’. UK Department of Business Innovaton and Skills (2011) ‘Higher
Educaton. Students at the Heart of the System’. Command 8122 June
UK Higher Educaton Internatonal Unit. (2011). Internatonal Pricing Study: A snapshot of UK and Key compettor
country internatonal student fees. Research Series 9.
Universites UK (2012) ‘Futures for Higher Educaton: analyzing trends’
Universites UK (2012) ‘Universites enabling social enterprise: delivering benefts for all’.
Universites UK (2013) ‘Massive open online courses: Higher educaton’s digital moment?
Watson, D., Hollister, R.M., Stroud, S.E. and Babcock, E. (2011) ‘The Engaged University. Internatonal Perspectves
on Civic Engagement’. Routledge.
Wilkins, S. & Huisman J. (2012) The Internatonal Branch Campus as transnatonal strategy in higher educaton. Higher
Educaton 64(5): 627-645
Wilson, T. (2012) ‘A Review of Business-University Collaboraton’. Department of Business and Skills UK
Wity, Sir Andrew (2013) ‘Independent Review of Universites in their Local Communites: Enabling Economic
Growth’.
World Educatonal Services (2012) ‘Not all internatonal students are the same’ & ‘Beyond more of the same’
Research Report 02 and 03
World Educatonal Services (2013) ‘Internatonal student mobility trends 2013’. Research Report 04.
Young, Lord, (2013) ‘Growing Your Business. A Report on Growing Micro Business’.
www.natonalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence
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THE ENTREPRENEURIAL UNIVERSITY LEADERS PROGRAMME
Other papers in the EULP series available from NCEE
The papers listed below illustrate some of the progressive thinking behind the Entrepreneurial University
Leaders Programme. They can be downloaded from htp://eulp.co.uk/publicatons/
1. (2005) ‘Towards the Entrepreneurial University. Entrepreneurship educaton as a lever for
change’.
This paper demonstrates a broad model of entrepreneurship and its relatonship to personal
enterprise. It defnes these concepts and their links to innovatons of all kinds. It also sets out a
range of associated personal competencies for development and describes three models of an
entrepreneurial university.
2. (2009) updated (2012) ‘Leading the Entrepreneurial University. Meetng the entrepreneurial
development needs of higher educaton insttutons’.
By way of a substantal review of the literature, this paper sets out the major challenges to, and
opportunites for, leadership of universites arising from changes in the global environment and
the implicatons for the entrepreneurial design of the higher educaton sector. The focus is upon
the impact of a growing complex and uncertain environment on key areas of university actvity and
the specifc leadership challenges involved.
3. (2012) ‘Exploring the synergistc potental in entrepreneurial university development: towards
the building of a strategic framework’.
This paper develops a strong basic framework for reviewing the entrepreneurial development
capacity of a university by exploraton of existng and potental enterprising and entrepreneurial
actvity in fve key areas of: Strategy, Governance, Organisaton and Leadership; Knowledge
Exchange; Stakeholder Relatonship Development and Partnership (local, regional. natonal and
internatonal); Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Educaton; and Internatonalisaton. It describes
the potental benefts of bringing the various actvites together and introduces a comprehensive
scorecard.
4. (2013) ‘The University of the Future. An Entrepreneurial Stakeholder Learning Organisaton’.
This paper explores in some detail the ‘specifcs’ of turbulence in the Higher Educaton ‘task
environment’ in the UK and England in partcular and the immediate challenges and opportunites
these pose. It describes the responses and demonstrates how universites are adoptng a wider
entrepreneurial stakeholder model of development.
NCEE
The Innovaton Centre, Coventry University Technology Park, Puma Way, Coventry, CV1 2TT
+44 (0)2476 158125 www.ncee.org.uk
Registraton Number: 5011518
NCEE is the trading name of the Natonal Council for Graduate Entrepreneurship
www.eulp.co.uk
doc_695434895.pdf
Detailed description regarding the entrepreneurial university from concept to action.
THE ENTREPRENEURIAL UNIVERSITY:
FROM CONCEPT TO ACTION
December 2013
The Natonal Centre for Entrepreneurship in Educaton (NCEE) drives insttutonal change throughout
the further and higher educaton sectors in the UK. It works in partnership to create beter conditons for
long-term sustainable entrepreneurship. It plays a central role in the Entrepreneurial University Leaders
Programme (EULP) which was launched in 2010. Past partcipants to the EULP are key contributors to this
publicaton.
ABOUT THE ENTREPRENEURIAL UNIVERSITY LEADERS PROGRAMME
Programme Objectves, Partners and Partcipants
The Entrepreneurial University Leadership Programme (EULP) is a pioneering development
programme for senior university leaders. It explores the changing roles of universites and
the benefts of enterprise, entrepreneurship and innovaton within the university context. It
facilitates learning from worldwide experience and focuses upon acton for entrepreneurial
development within partcipant universites.
The programme is delivered annually through a partnership between the Natonal Centre
for Entrepreneurship in Educaton (NCEE) and Universites UK (UUK). Three modules take
place each year: the frst at the Saïd Business School, University of Oxford; the second at
the recipient insttuton of The Times Higher Educaton Entrepreneurial University of the
Year Award and the third at UUK’s head ofce at Woburn House, London. The partcipants
represent a mix of Vice Chancellors, Deputy and Pro-Vice Chancellors and Academic and
Professional Heads of university departments. Up to 30 partcipants are accepted for each
programme, and there is an actve alumni network for contnuing learning and experience
exchange. To date, partcipants from ten countries have taken part.
Programme Design
The entrepreneurial concept provides the framework for the programme. It explores the
nature of the imperatve to respond to increasing uncertainty and complexity. The concept is
not used solely in the narrow sense of new venturing and the commercializaton of knowledge
but importantly, covers key areas of wider entrepreneurial university development. These
include: mission, governance and strategy; organisaton design and development;
inter-departmental co-operaton and transdisciplinarity; fnancial leverage; public value and
internatonal, natonal, regional and local stakeholder engagement; knowledge
confguraton, exchange, transfer and support; curriculum development, enterprise,
entrepreneurship educaton and employability; alumni relatons and engagement; and
internatonalisaton.
The programme works from concept to acton in three modules. It examines practce in Asia,
Europe and the USA. It explores future economic, social, technological and environmental
trends and their impact on universites. It discusses the leadership skills and atributes
required to make change happen. The modules are interspersed with an acton agenda
focused upon partcipant implementaton of entrepreneurial change initatves. These are
facilitated by an experienced tutor team of past partcipants on the programme.
The three modules are:
1. The Entrepreneurial University: Concept & Visioning;
2. The Entrepreneurial University: Applying the Concept and Exploring Good Practce;
3. The Entrepreneurial University: The Way Ahead - Actons for Change.
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THE ENTREPRENEURIAL UNIVERSITY: FROM CONCEPT TO ACTION
October 2013
Editors:
Paul Coyle
Co-Director, Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme, Natonal Centre for Entrepreneurship in
Educaton (NCEE)
[email protected]
Allan Gibb
Professor Emeritus, University of Durham, UK
[email protected]
Gay Haskins
Co-Director, Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme, NCEE & Associate Fellow, Sa?d Business
School, University of Oxford, UK
[email protected]
Contributors:
Chris Baker, Director, Economic and Social Engagement, University of Brighton
Paul Coyle, Co-Director, Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme, NCEE
Professor Lesley Dobree, Deputy Vice Chancellor, Anglia Ruskin University
Professor Pete Downes, Principal and Vice Chancellor, University of Dundee
Ian Dunn, Deputy Vice-Chancellor for Student Experience, Coventry University
Professor Allan Gibb, Professor Emeritus, University of Durham
Professor Paul Gough, Deputy Vice Chancellor, University of the West of England
Professor John Gratan, Pro Vice Chancellor, Aberystwyth University
Professor Stephen Hagen, Professor Emeritus, University of South Wales
Professor Andrew Hamilton, Vice Chancellor, University of Oxford
Professor Mike Thomas, Pro Vice Chancellor (Academic), University of Chester
Mikkel Trym, Director, Copenhagen Innovaton & Entrepreneurship Lab (CIEL)
Professor Anthony Wheton, Vice Dean, Faculty of Medical and Human Sciences,
University of Manchester
Laura Woods, Director of Academic Enterprise, Teesside University
The Editorial Team would also like to thank Professor Paul Hannon, Director, Insttute for Entrepreneurial
Leadership, Swansea University (former Chief Executve Ofcer, NCEE) for his support in the early stages of
this publicaton and Lisa Hunt, Programme Coordinator, NCEE for her assistance in its fnalisaton.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
About the Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme 2
Introducton - About this Publicaton 6
Preface by Keith Burnley, Chief Executve, NCEE and Nicola
Dandridge, Chief Executve, Universites UK 7
Foreword: Oxford’s Commitment to Acton by Andrew Hamilton,
Vice Chancellor, University of Oxford 8
Part I: The Entrepreneurial University Concept - 20 Key Questons
by Allan Gibb, Professor Emeritus, University of Durham 10
1. What is the entrepreneurial concept that challenges universites? 10
2. What is the link between enterprise, entrepreneurship and innovaton in universites? 10
3. Is there really a need for universites to become more entrepreneurial? 10
4. What are the major challenges to traditonal university models? 11
5. In general, how are these challenges shaping the sector? 11
6. Is the essental ‘idea’ and autonomy of a university under threat? 11
7. What are the external pressures shaping the entrepreneurial future of universites? 12
8. How are universites responding to these pressures? 12
9. Are these responses leading to an even more diferentated higher educaton sector? 13
10. What will be the future private sector role? 13
11. Is diferentaton leading to change in the ways that knowledge is organized and delivered? 13
12. Does the debate about new sources of learning mean acceptance of the ‘Triple Helix’ model? 14
13. In the light of all these changes how is the public value of a university to be judged? 14
14. How can the entrepreneurial potental of a university be explored and developed? 14
15. How can a review of entrepreneurial potental contribute to achievement of university
objectves? 15
16. What does this mean for the overall balance of university/stakeholder relatonships? 15
17. What are the implicatons for individual university departments? 16
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18. Overall, what does the entrepreneurial concept mean for the design of the university? 16
19. What are the implicatons for leadership? 16
20. In summary, what might be the shape of the future entrepreneurial university? 16
Part II The Entrepreneurial University in Acton: 11 Examples 18
Theme A: Entrepreneurial Strategy
1. A Strategy to Foster Enterprise by Lesley Dobree, Deputy Vice Chancellor, Anglia Ruskin
University 20
2. Towards an Internatonal Strategy by John Gratan, Pro Vice Chancellor, Aberystwyth
University 22
3. A Strategy for Developing an Entrepreneurial University by Stephen Hagen, Actng Vice
Chancellor, and Paul Coyle, Professor of Entrepreneurial Leadership at the former
University of Wales, Newport 25
4. A Strategy for Business Engagement – developing an Entrepreneurial Culture by Laura
Woods, Director of Academic Enterprise, University of Teesside 28
Theme B: Entrepreneurial Partnerships
5. Creatng Innovaton in Partnership with Local Communites by Chris Baker, Director,
Economic and Social Engagement, University of Brighton 31
6. Achieving Impact through Partnerships by Pete Downes, Principal and Vice Chancellor,
University of Dundee 34
7. The Role of Partnership in a Regional Innovaton Hub by Paul Gough, Deputy Vice Chancellor,
University of the West of England 38
8. Partnering for Entrepreneurial Actvity by Anthony Wheton, Vice Dean, Faculty of
Medical and Human Sciences, University of Manchester 41
Theme C: Entrepreneurial Curriculum and Pedagogy
9. A Risk Based Approach to Curriculum Design by Ian Dunn, Deputy Vice Chancellor for
Student Experience, Coventry University 44
10. Embedding Enterprise in the Curriculum by Mike Thomas, Pro Vice Chancellor (Academic),
University of Chester 47
11. Collaboraton between Students, Academics and Industry by Mikkel Trym, Director,
Copenhagen Innovaton & Entrepreneurship Lab (CIEL) 50
Appendices:
A. The University Entrepreneurial Scorecard: Exploring the Entrepreneurial Potental of
a University 54
B. Background Readings 58
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INTRODUCTION: ABOUT THIS PUBLICATION
This publicaton seeks to demonstrate concept, acton and impact associated with
development of the entrepreneurial university. It is writen to familiarise the reader with many
of the issues raised and discussed in the Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme and to
share the experiences of some of the past partcipants.
It begins with a foreword by the Vice Chancellor of the University of Oxford, outlining some of
the innovatons that Oxford has introduced in recent years.
Part one explores a number of key concepts and issues underpinning the programme. It does
so by addressing twenty major questons which have emerged both from the experience of
running the programme, refectons upon it, and research. There are no academic references,
but a short reading list is included from which many of the arguments are drawn. A further
appendix sets out a framework and scorecard for a review of a University’s ‘entrepreneurial
potental.’
The second part consists of eleven short vignetes writen by senior university personnel who
have atended the programme. These do not take the form of refectons on the programme,
nor are they designed to be part of an evaluaton. They are writen to enhance the reader’s
understanding of how diferent universites may approach the issue of university enterprise,
entrepreneurship and innovaton. As such they demonstrate a rich seam of experience and
motvaton.
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PREFACE
December, 2013
Following exceptonally positve feedback from alumni, and the commitment of its faculty and
founders, The Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme (EULP) is about to begin its fourth iteraton
with record demand for partcipaton.
The Entrepreneurial University: from Concept to Acton is the latest in a series of papers available on the
website of the Natonal Centre for Entrepreneurship in Educaton (NCEE) tracing the development of the
entrepreneurial university concept. These papers give the EULP a strong research underpinning and are
used to update its design on a regular basis.
This new publicaton highlights innovaton and change that has taken place within the universites
represented by the partcipants on the programme. NCEE aims to collect further examples of change
management on a regular basis. These will provide a valuable record of enterprise, innovaton and the
pursuit of entrepreneurial opportunity in the university sector.
We would like to thank all involved for their ongoing eforts and dedicaton to the success of the
programme and look forward to our contnuing partnership in its development.
Keith Burnley,
Chief Executve Ofcer,
Natonal Centre for Entrepreneurship in Educaton (NCEE)
Nicola Dandridge,
Chief Executve,
Universites UK
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FOREWORD: OXFORD’S COMMITMENT TO ACTION
Professor Andrew Hamilton, Vice Chancellor, University of Oxford
It is now almost four years since the Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme (EULP) began in 2010.
On each of the three iteratons to date, Oxford has been delighted to host the frst module and to welcome
senior partcipants from a wide range of universites to the City of Oxford.
Why is this so? Why should an 800 year-old university, steeped in traditon and renowned for its ancient
buildings and gleaming spires place a strong emphasis on entrepreneurship, innovaton, change and the
impact of our endeavours?
In the University of Oxford’s 2011/2012 Annual Review, I wrote that one of the defning characteristcs
of Oxford is its inexhaustble curiosity. We want to know and to explore the unknown. We want to know
and explore because with knowledge and exploraton come the possibility of change, of making a positve
impact and of meetng the many challenges of life in the 21st Century.
Let me share with you just three of the many initatves that illustrate the innovaton and enterprise within
the Oxford community:
• Vision and values in student enterprise: launched in February 2002, Oxford Entrepreneurs has
become the largest entrepreneurship society in Europe with over 7,000 members, undergraduates,
graduates, MBA students, alumni and external members. Its mission is to encourage and support
student entrepreneurship by providing inspiraton, educaton, networking and the chance to learn the
skills to become a leading entrepreneur.
Five years later, in 2007, the Oxford Hub was founded by a group of equally visionary students.
Their vision was of a network that would connect students working across diferent causes to share
insight and experience, create social change and assist coordinaton, thereby making all groups more
efectve.
Today, the Oxford Hub is an energetc network of 500 students involved in creatng positve social
change. It ofers contnuous opportunites to get involved, provides weekly training sessions and
speaker events, runs conferences throughout the year and places a host of student volunteers in the
local community. The immense success that Oxford Hub has enjoyed has led to the development of
a natonal network of student hubs. Today, Oxford University is proud to support the actvites of the
Oxford Hub, alongside Barclays, Ashoka, Man Charitable Trust and Deloite’s.
In additon, every year, I grant the Vice Chancellor’s Civic Awards. These are given to students who
show exceptonal achievement and commitment to creatng positve social or environmental change.
The awards have been presented for volunteering locally, natonally and internatonally, raising funds
for charity, campaigning and research on social and environmental issues.
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• Innovaton with impact: Isis Innovaton Limited (ISIS) was established by the University of
Oxford in 1988, as its wholly-owned technology transfer company. Its mission is to be the leading
internatonal technology transfer organisaton, to transfer technology and expertse from the
University of Oxford, to deliver value to all clients. ISIS works on projects from all areas of the
University’s research actvites: life sciences, physical sciences, social sciences and humanites.
Today ISIS has three main business actvites. ISIS Technology Transfer helps Oxford University
researchers to commercialise intellectual property arising from their research including:
patentng, promoton, licensing and spin-out teams and companies. Oxford University Consultng helps
Oxford University researchers to identfy and manage consultng opportunites and helps clients access
experts from Oxford’s world-class, interdisciplinary research base. ISIS Enterprise provides consultng
expertse and advice in technology transfer and innovaton management to clients across the public
and private sectors around the world.
ISIS is therefore a key interface between the university, industry, investors and government. In 2012,
ISIS generated a return to the University and its researchers of £5.3 million, and created shareholdings
for the University in fve new spin-out companies worth £3 million.
• Interdisciplinary research and teaching on global 21st Century issues: Oxford has a strong
commitment to research and teaching on topics related to global 21st century issues and opportunites.
Interdisciplinarity and co-operaton with faculty across the university and beyond are keys to our
success. For instance:
Oxford Martn School is an interdisciplinary research community of over 300 scholars working to
address the global challenges and opportunites of the 21st century. From the governance of
geo-engineering and the possibilites of quantum physics, to the future of food and the implicatons
of our ageing populaton, the Martn School supports over 30 individual research teams across the
university to consider some of the biggest questons of our future.
Tropical Medicine is a collecton of research groups focused on infectous diseases and is permanently
based in Africa and Asia. Our research in tropical medicine ranges from clinical studies to behavioural
sciences with the capacity to build and pursue collaboraton with colleagues around the world as a key
success requirement.
Oxford’s Blavatnik School of Government, launched in 2010, is pursuing a vision of beter government,
stronger societes and richer human opportunites across the world. Its research is challenge-focused
and practce-based, taking historical, comparatve, multdisciplinary and collaboratve approaches to
develop practcal strategies for dealing with challewnges facing policy makers. It welcomed its frst
class of future leaders in 2012 when it launched its Masters in Public Policy. This excitng programme
draws its curriculum from across the University’s four divisions: humanites; medical sciences; social
sciences; and mathematcal, physical and life sciences. It includes a component on how to use
medical and scientfc advice critcally; practcal skills in areas such as negotaton, fnance and project
management; and the use of Oxford philosophers to teach students how to reason through the ethical
dilemmas they will face in politcal leadership.
These are among a myriad of potental examples of Oxford’s commitment to making an impact. I hope
that they, together with the eleven examples from previous partcipants to the Entrepreneurial University
Leaders Programme, will provide inspiraton to many other universites to create the change required to
meet the many challenges we face.
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Part I : THE ENTREPRENEURIAL UNIVERSITY CONCEPT - 20 KEY QUESTIONS
Allan Gibb, Professor Emeritus, University of Durham
1. What is the entrepreneurial concept that challenges universites?
Central to the debate on the idea of the ‘entrepreneurial university’ is the queston of how the
‘entrepreneurship concept’, and the ofen associated meaning and use of the word ‘enterprise’, are
interpreted. Entrepreneurship is perceived by many academics to be associated solely with business and the
commercialisaton of university intellectual property (partcularly in the science and engineering felds) and
is therefore ted in with innovaton in the context of the work of technology transfer ofces, incubators and
science parks. This view is strengthened substantally by government and even internatonal (OECD)
perspectves that perceive universites as sources of technological innovaton and ‘engines of growth’.
The concepts of entrepreneurship and enterprise have, however, in the academic literature, been
substantally clarifed to embrace applicaton to a wide range of contexts. These concepts are adopted as
follows in the EULP.
The Enterprise Concept focuses upon the development of the ‘enterprising person and entrepreneurial
mindset’. The former consttutes a set of personal skills, atributes, behavioural and motvatonal capacites
(associated with those of the entrepreneur) but which can be used in any context (social, work, leisure etc).
Prominent among these are; intuitve decision making, capacity to make things happen autonomously,
networking, initatve taking, opportunity identfcaton, creatve problem solving, strategic thinking, and self
efcacy. The ‘Mindset’ concept focuses not just upon the noton of ‘being your own boss’ in a business context
but upon the ability of an individual to cope with an unpredictable external environment and the associated
entrepreneurial ways of doing, thinking, feeling, communicatng, organising and learning.
The Entrepreneurship Concept focuses upon the applicaton of these personal enterprising skills, atributes
and mindsets to the context of setng up a new venture or initatve of any kind, developing/growing an
existng venture or initatve and designing an entrepreneurial organisaton (one in which the capacity for
efectve use of enterprising skills will be enhanced). The context is therefore not confned to business but is
equally applicable to social enterprise, educaton, health, NGOs and mainstream public organisatons (e.g.
universites and governments).
2. What is the link between enterprise, entrepreneurship and innovaton in universites?
The Innovaton Concept in the university context broadens beyond technology with the above defnitons. In
general innovaton is defned as creatng, fnding and exploitng opportunites for new ways of doing things
resultng in beter products and services, systems and ways of leading/managing people and organisatons.
Innovaton in an entrepreneurial university development context may therefore be viewed in terms of: new
organisaton and leadership development initatves; experiments in pedagogy, knowledge organisaton and
programme development; internal and external stakeholder engagement; trans-disciplinary actvity; and new
research exploratons, methods and applicatons to practce.
The successful pursuit of innovaton is a functon of individual enterprising endeavour and entrepreneurial
organisaton capacity. Innovaton is impossible without these. They are both necessary conditons, sufcient
only when combined with an organisaton culture and broader environment that is conducive to, and
supportve of, such actvity.
3. Is there really a need for universites to become more entrepreneurial?
It is the levels of uncertainty and complexity in any environment and the associated threats and opportunites
that dictate the need for entrepreneurial response. It is also the case that entrepreneurial persons within
organisatons may themselves create uncertainty and complexity by their actons which may at tmes be
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deviant (challenging accepted norms). It will be argued below that organisatons can be designed to crush such
enterprise or encourage and channel it. A major goal of the EULP is to explore the dynamics of the environment
of universites, the relevance of the entrepreneurial concept to the design of response and the implicatons for
strategies, organisaton and leadership.
Universites are facing higher levels of uncertainty and complexity in their environment as well as greater
entrepreneurial pressures from within. Throughout the world there have been, for many years, mountng
challenges to the concept of the university as a ‘protected’ place for individual research and teaching in
pursuit of truth. In many countries the ‘protecton’ has come mainly through the public purse. The
‘massifcaton’ of Higher Educaton whereby a very large minority of the young populaton is given access,
together with an associated growth in the number of higher educaton insttutons, has made the costs of
this model unsustainable. Universites have had increasingly to look elsewhere for resource for research and
extensions of their scholarship. Pressures in this respect have increased with the global recession.
4. What are the major challenges to traditonal university models?
Over the past two decades UK governments have become ever more directve in their funding of the higher
educaton sector with more pressure for relevance in research and teaching ted into contributon to economic
growth, social mobility, technical innovaton and employability. This pressure operates against a backcloth of
increasing global competton as the higher educaton sector expands rapidly in many developing countries.
The sources of knowledge have also been opened up considerably via the global IT revoluton and universites
can no longer claim to the unique knowledge environment that they were once were. Some of the detail of
these pressures on universites and responses in the UK context is given below.
5. In general, how are these challenges shaping the sector?
The above pressures in the environment provide opportunites as well as threats leading to: pursuit of
internatonal partnerships in research and teaching; the building of wider networks of relatonships: actve
partnering to leverage resources; greater understanding of the wider contexts of knowledge sourcing and
applicaton; and actve pursuit of relevance. The pressure for accountability in terms of public value has also
grown considerably. Measures by which university excellence is now judged include: graduate employability,
employment and salary; impact of research; contributon to natonal, regional and local economic and social
development; teaching quality; and social mobility.
6. Is the essental ‘idea’ and autonomy of a university under threat?
There has been for some tme in the UK a body of academics opposed to the directon in which the
higher educaton sector is moving. The main thrust of their argument is that the model of the university as a
‘disinterested’ organisaton concerned with pursuit of truth and dependent upon individual eforts in this
respect, regardless of the utlity of the ‘discovery’ or relevance to the immediate needs of society, has been
undermined. The main culprit in this respect is seen as government with its pressure for relevance and impact,
its infuence upon the directon of research funding, its view of universites as ‘engines of growth’ and more
recently in England, via its creaton of a ‘market’ by the transfer of funds for teaching directly into the hands
of students (under a student loan scheme). It is argued that the combinaton of these pressures, with their
focus upon utlity, threatens the very idea of a university as derived from the traditonal Bologna and Humboldt
models. The development of numerous metrics to measure university performance is regarded as a substantal
intrusion upon a model of academic freedom where accountability was through peer review.
An alternatve view is that universites were not always focused upon discovery via the linking of
research and teaching. The infuental 19th century Newman model of the university was primarily that of a
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teaching insttuton. There is also a heritage of the original ‘old’ universites focusing upon the ‘professions’,
medicine, law and divinity, and therefore ‘useful’ knowledge (albeit underpinned by philosophy). In the
UK the growth in emphasis upon social and economic utlity, alongside local and regional engagement, to
some degree refects the culture and history of the post-92 wave of new universites. They are more strongly
focused upon creatng useful knowledge and are more likely to be refectve of government views and those of
wider social and economic pressure groups. There is also a strong competency, and in many cases vocatonal,
component in their approaches to learning. The Russell Group of UK universites arguably are more responsive
to traditonal academic power structures within and without the university and argue for the equatng of
excellence in research with excellence in teaching. Nevertheless they are also responding to the pressures
noted above and explored in more detail below.
7. What are the external pressures shaping the entrepreneurial future of universites?
Within the broad spectrum of the environment described above, there are many specifc uncertaintes and
complexites creatng both challenges and opportunites for universites. Paramount among these is the need
to maintain and increase student numbers. Notably, there are falls in part-tme and postgraduate student
applicatons, partcularly from overseas.
The fall-out from this and the changes in the English funding regime are at the root of the challenge to
harvest new resources and leverage and/or replace public monies. The ever broadening range of ‘ofcial’
accountability metrics noted earlier feeds a climate of competton, but also stmulates pursuit of cooperaton
and partnership. Adding to pressures from this scenario is a wide range of further concerns some of which
are more immediate than others. On the immediate horizon are issues such as the move to Open Access
publicaton and the additonal cost burden that this may place on universites, the challenge of developing
entrepreneurship educaton across the university following the 2012 natonal Quality Assurance Agency (QAA)
guidelines and the recommendatons of the UK Government Wilson report in this respect with its specifc focus
upon business engagement, subsequently reinforced by recommendatons of reports by Lord Heseltne and
Young and the Wity consultatons with universites (see bibliography).
More fundamental is the task of facing up to the detail of the growth of overseas competton partcularly from
South East Asia, India and China, the associated demand for a more global curriculum and the threat to what
has been labelled the ‘colonial’ model of a university with its emphasis upon knowledge for its own sake. An
additonal signifcant development is the emergence of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) ofering free
tuiton to tens of thousands of students world-wide. This initatve has been led by US elite universites but
is now also actvely engaging UK universites and the private sector although issues remain as to the
availability of accreditaton and credit accumulaton towards degree status. When added to the growth and use
of social media these initatves pose distnctve challenges to the pedagogy of teaching and learning and the
organisaton of knowledge. The opening up of opportunitesfor the private sector to increase its visibility in
higher educaton provides potental for collaboraton as well as competton. Private sector engagement is
not limited to teaching but is increasingly evident in the subcontractng out by universites of a wide range of
services.
Overall, there are also growing pressures to broaden student experiental learning partcularly with the small
and medium enterprise sector of the economy: also to engage with social entrepreneurship by partnering with
a wider range of local, regional, natonal and internatonal stakeholders.
8. How are universites responding to these pressures?
The main focus of response is upon the atracton of students with a wide range of incentves and
overtures including scholarships for those from less privileged background and innovatve relatonship-building
actvites with schools, teachers, parents, local authorites and potental future students themselves.
Beyond the conventonal taster days, school staf liaison days, fairs and student briefngs the newer initatves
include: development of satellite subject actvites in local schools; the designaton of university staf as schools
ambassadors; summer schools for potental students; direct support for school curriculum development and
linked ‘passport’ certfcaton; school sponsorship and wide use of dialogue through the social media.
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Addressing the new ‘accountability’ metrics provides also a key focus for response. ‘Employability’ is
being embedded contextually in the curriculum in many departments. Greater responsibility for employment
outcomes is also being delegated to individual departments. Wider opportunites for student experiental
learning experiences are being explored alongside entrepreneurial and enterprise skills development. Student
voluntarism is being more widely and formally supported ofen with a social enterprise orientaton. There is
greater emphasis upon student ownership of learning and engagement in assessment processes; and eforts
are also being made to engage employers and other stakeholders in the processes of curriculum design and
delivery. Such responses are not as yet uniformly widespread. Linked with the above is a growing emphasis
upon local/regional partnership in economic and social development with a number of universites building
strong community development initatves into their formal strategies.
In the feld of on-line learning, a growing number of UK universites are providing graduate and post-graduate
programmes substantally through this medium, while groups of UK universites are taking up the challenge
of the MOOCs in developing their own ‘free’ ofers. Somewhat forgoten amidst the present debate is that
individual UK universites have been ofering undergraduate and postgraduate programmes online for many
years building on the UK Open University’s pioneering eforts in this respect.
The IT and social media revoluton in general has highlighted the potental for internatonal partnerships
in research and teaching. Many universites heavily depend upon income from foreign students: to build
this outreach there has been a substantal growth in partnerships with overseas private and public
insttutons alongside initatves in the development of overseas campuses usually in partnership with
local universites.
9. Are these responses leading to an even more diferentated higher educaton sector?
In the UK this is clearly the case. While the sector as a whole has for many years been highly diferentated in
its commitment to wide stakeholder engagement, undoubtedly more higher educaton insttutons are buying
in to the concept of the ‘engaged’ university each startng from areas of existng strength. The former
polytechnics (post ’92 universites), as noted above, have a substantal history of wider community engagement.
The older self labelled ‘research based’ universites have focused upon their value in science and technology
development and related network building. The ‘impact’ agenda introduced into the ofcial UK Research
Assessment process is also infuencing the noton of engagement in all universites. In the feld of teaching and
learning there are fewer distnctve diferentatons. While there is much rhetoric, the link between excellence
in teaching and excellence in research is not always clear.
Given the ofcial emphasis upon accountability and engagement of universites, it is unsurprising that it is the
former polytechnic and newer universites that are leading the way in rebranding themselves in a distnctve
way to ft the new metrics, for example as universites for employability and/or employment, universites for
useful knowledge, universites for enterprise, universites for social enterprise and the ‘business engaged’
university.
10. What will be the future private sector role?
The private sector is actvely responding to many of the above challenges and is engaging substantally in
the online learning process, partcularly in the US while expanding more incrementally in the UK. There is a
growing number of established UK university partnerships with private companies. Private sector actvity has
partcular resonance in the professional and vocatonal felds: this opens up opportunites for public
universites to partner in recruitng from private enttes into their postgraduate programmes. Opportunites
for established universites to link up with vocatonal colleges are also being taken up with support from ofcial
programmes.
11. Is diferentaton leading to change in the ways that knowledge is organised and delivered?
There is a substantal ongoing debate as to how universites are managing the burgeoning internatonal fow
of informaton and knowledge or ‘Big Data’ as it is being labelled. The debate is not only stmulated by the
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global impact of the internet and social media but, more fundamentally, by recogniton that the university is
no longer the sole or, as some would argue, the dominant domain for discovery and learning. Much of the
discussion centres on the concept of a move from a Mode 1 form of learning, where the university is
confgured as an independent space for discovery and learning, to a Mode 2 typology of an organisaton with
high levels of engagement in learning and knowledge exchange with a wide range of stakeholders.
In the Mode 2 model, knowledge development and producton becomes more contextualised to diferent
situatons, more problem/issue centred and more refectve of use in practce. This, it is argued, will challenge
existng forms of knowledge organisaton, will demand more trans-disciplinary approaches and may lead to
the creaton of new interdisciplinary concepts and paradigms. It will lead to a strengthening of the university’s
capacity for knowledge exchange; will stmulate closer partnerships with external stakeholders, more learning
from practce and the discovery of new ways of distributng knowledge. In this conceptualisaton, the university
moves from being a niche organisaton to a more open and comprehensive learning organisaton. In extremis
this might lead to the abandonment of universites organised around conventonal disciplinary departments
with a focus more upon the creaton of strategic areas of learning and discovery, linked to distnctve areas of
present and future needs of society, cultural, economic, environmental, social and technological.
In this debate the concept of useful knowledge is not confned to a focus upon ‘know how‘ in the
technical sense but refers as much, if not more, to the need to link the development of student knowledge
to values and to broad areas of society need for development and the enrichment of culture. This marries up
withthe concept of ‘wisdom’ as being concerned with the individual’s capacity to embrace a combinaton of
experience/knowledge and deeper understanding of a life world of uncertainty and complexity. Overall, while
the academic debate is intensive, the practce, in the UK is limited.
12. Does the debate about new sources of learning mean acceptance of the ‘triple helix’ model?
The triple helix model of a university, presented in numerous conferences around the world, and
accompanied by equally numerous papers, is focused upon the noton of partnership between the university,
business and government. The original tripartte model has been broadened to accommodate the culture of
a society and the distnctve environment in which universites operate. The model, which has had a strong
impact upon practce, is in line with the Mode 2 concept described above. Its focus has been heavily centred
on the role of universites in support of technological innovaton. It will be argued below that the challenge to
universites of entrepreneurial engagement with society can be beter characterised in a diferent way.
13. In the light of all of these changes how is the public value of a university to be judged?
The pressure for accountability for public value from universites comes from a variety of sources. As noted
above, the ofcial focus upon ‘performance’ and the student- led demand conditons in England lead the way
in this respect. The emphasis is substantally upon ‘economic value’, determined on a cost beneft (value for
money) basis. It is this approach that the UK Commitee for Defence of the Universites is so much opposed to.
The public value concept can, however, be approached diferently.
As espoused by Mark Moore of Harvard University, and subsequently widely explored by governments,
the ‘public value’ concept focuses substantally upon the processes and organisaton of the creaton of
value. In this model excellence is pursued and judged by the achievement of ‘legitmacy’ with a range of key
stakeholders. The insttuton’s value is derived from the stakeholder perspectves which are then built
into operatonal capacity and refected back in pursuit of outcomes. This fts into the concept of a broader
stakeholder model of a university’s pursuit of value, wider yet more precise, than that of the triple helix model
and its derivatves.
14. How can the entrepreneurial potental of a university be explored and developed?
Even a superfcial review of most university actvity will provide evidence of a substantal degree of personal
enterprise and pockets of entrepreneurial organisatonal behaviour as defned above. These may not be
branded as ‘enterprising’ or ‘entrepreneurial’ by the university as long as these labels remain associated with
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business and commercialisaton of knowledge processes. The entrepreneurial potental of a university is
therefore best explored by an informal process without formal labelling. Such a review can be organised
through examinaton of actvity in fve key areas of:
• research, knowledge transfer and exchange;
• stakeholder relatonship and partnership development at the local, regional and natonal level;
• internatonalisaton processes;
• enterprise and entrepreneurship pedagogy and knowledge organisaton across the university; and
• governance, strategy, organisaton design and leadership at all levels.
This process will almost certainly uncover areas of interdependence and future development potental. For
example, exploraton of enterprise and entrepreneurial educaton actvity will reveal the potental for linking it
with: existng knowledge exchange programmes; incubator and technology park actvity; internatonal alumni
engagement; local and regional social enterprise partnership actvity; joint ventures with business associatons
and local authorites in enterprise development; formal teaching and learning strategies; staf development
programmes; and student led initatves. A university review, even startng from a single area as above, may
provide a platorm for wider exploraton of the university’s entrepreneurial potental.
15. How can a review of entrepreneurial potental contribute to achievement of key university
objectves?
The overall objectve of a review process is to identfy how enterprise and entrepreneurship can add value in
meetng a university’s key strategic objectves, for example:
• enhancing the student experience, employability and employment;
• achieving excellence in teaching and learning;
• innovaton in research approaches, achieving impact and fnding resource;
• broadening revenue fows;
• improving knowledge exchange processes;
• contributng to local and regional economic and social development;
• creatng an internatonal presence; and
• above all, enhancing the reputaton, compettveness and distnctveness of the university
16. What does this mean for the overall balance of university/stakeholder relatonships?
Universites have always needed to be responsive to the interests of a variety of external stakeholders. But
traditonally in the UK, the dominant infuental stakeholders have been those who directly infuence the fow
of resources for teaching and research namely the government, the ofcial funding agencies, other universites
who provide peer review of excellence and research funding bodies, public and private.
The changes in funding arrangements described above, together with the broad changes in the ‘task
environment’ of the university also described earlier, have created an imperatve for wider stakeholder
engagement and partnership. All of those who, for example, infuence student choice, have become more
important in stakeholder relatonship development.
The creaton of actve partnerships with other universites, natonal and internatonal, with local government
and development agencies, with NGOs in the feld of social enterprise and economic and social development
has also become much more important. Internally, working with student representatve bodies and
entrepreneurship societes and actve involvement with alumni groups have become imperatves.
Partnerships with businesses and their associatons have become of partcular signifcance. The university is
therefore emerging as a broader stakeholder relatonship organisaton witha natural imperatve to adopt a
Mode 2 focus of learning.
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17. What are the implicatons for individual university departments?
Universites are pluralistc organisatons embodying not only a variety of scholarly disciplines but also
diferent values, cultures and dominant modes of learning and approaches to research. Importantly, there
are also distnctve diferences in the nature and thrust of relatonships with the stakeholder environment.
The humanites are sometmes judged to be weak in stakeholder relatonship development although in
practce they are ofen strong. Within each disciplinary domain, however, the relevant key stakeholders will be
diferent. A music department will have very diferent external relatonship networks than a department of
divinity or arts, although there will be overlap and therefore scope for cross disciplinary boundary actvity. The
balance of university stakeholder relatonship and partnership potental can therefore only be fully explored on
a botom up basis.
18. Overall, what does the entrepreneurial concept mean for the design of the university?
Organisatons of all kinds need to be designed around the nature and dynamics of the task environment
they face (defned as the relevant stakeholders and the demands they place upon the organisaton). The
multple uncertaintes and complexites noted above challenge the university to develop its capacity to respond
fexibly to the demands of a widening stakeholder environment. The Mode 2 knowledge concept also demands
capacity to respond to learning and discovery challenges in new, innovatve, ways. It was noted above that the
capacity to innovate is a functon of individual enterprising behaviour and entrepreneurial organisaton design.
In general, organisatons can be designed to enhance or constrain personal enterprising behaviour.
Enterprising behaviour demands freedom for individuals to take ownership of initatves, see such initatves
through, enjoy and take personal ownership of external and internal relatonships, and make mistakes and
learn from them by ‘doing’.
Essentally entrepreneurial organisatons are designed to encourage and support botom-up initatve and
reward and empower such initatve. They facilitate informal relatonships and network building as a
necessary conditon for the promoton of innovaton via the building of individual and collectve social capital.
Such organisatons are held together more by shared values and culture than by formal control systems and
more by informal fexible strategic thinking and awareness than by highly formal planning systems.
19. What are the implicatons for leadership?
The key leadership challenges relate to championing of the organisaton design model described in the
response to queston 18 above, and the creaton of shared values and ratonale for ways of doing things in
pursuit of this model across the university.
The entrepreneurial leader is a role model for enterprising behaviour, is an opportunity seeker, paves the
way for others to fnd and realise opportunites, sets the climate for behaviour through example, coaches the
shared vision, empowers and supports botom-up innovaton and risk taking and shares the responsibility for
any associated failure. She/he is an enterprising person, valuing intuitve thinking and supportve of fexible
strategic orientaton (strategy and acton intertwined) tailored to operatng within a climate of uncertainty and
complexity. Importantly, she/he is able to communicate strongly the university vision, internally and externally,
through the building of personal trust-based relatonships combined with an intellectual capacity to confront
many of the issues referred to above. The style of this transformatonal leadership model will need to be
adjusted to the existng and traditonal cultures and values of the insttuton.
20. In summary, what might be the shape of the future entrepreneurial university?
If such an entty was to be designed from scratch it might classically described as a dynamic entrepreneurial
learning organisaton in a Mode 2 mould. As such it would be geared to engage and learn from all key
stakeholders internally and externally. It would judge its excellence through the eyes of these stakeholders and
be unafraid to give them a role, through partnership, in the design and developmentof its actvity. It would
therefore have a very strong community orientaton. It would combine excellence in research with a constant
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eye upon key areas of future needs of society, domestc and internatonal and would build fexible scenarios
accordingly. It would constantly explore and exploit the opportunites ofered by global IT networks and social
media. Its curriculum would be developed with a global audience in mind and would be shaped by actve
learning as to how other cultures see things.
Internally, it would be organised to empower individuals ‘botom up’ and would seek to reward innovatons
from this source, charging each department head to be accountable for these and share risk. Its overarching
reward and promoton systems would be transparently linked to ability to reward innovaton in the broadest
sense set out in this paper with clear promotonal tracks. It would recruit enterprising and entrepreneurial
staf and encourage them to share a common culture of trust and learning by and through acton. It would
encourage them to build strong personal trust-based external relatonship networks and therefore social
capital which would enhance the capacity of the university to truly engage. As such it would be constantly in
tune with the ‘community of practce’ and each department would need to be aligned in this way.
The entrepreneurial university would build into its stafng a body of externals as professors/fellows of practce
and be unafraid to engage even the smallest economic and social entrepreneurs. In the feld of teaching and
learning, entrepreneurial pedagogies would be embedded in each department across the university, students
and externals would be actvely engaged in curriculum design and assessment processes. There would be
multple opportunites to learn by doing and refect conceptually. Student entrepreneurial societes would
be strongly supported as would social enterprise hubs and given encouragement to lead entrepreneurial
venturing of all kinds. Overall, in research and teaching the entrepreneurial university will encourage the
crossing of disciplinary boundaries perhaps leading to new trans-disciplinary departments.
Such an entrepreneurial organisaton would not be alien to much of the traditonal culture and values
of a university with the emphasis upon autonomy and freedom for acton. The only constraint is that of
management of the interdependence upon a widening range of stakeholders. The opportunity and challenge
is to manage this in such a way that maximises autonomy, freedom of thought and the empowerment of
individuals.
The reality of the university world at present is somewhat removed from the above scenario. But it is clear that
individual examples of many of the characteristcs described above can be found. Individual universites and
university groupings are diferentatng themselves in diferent ways with selectve emphasis upon research
values, research relevance and development from research, innovatons in teaching and learning and wider
outcomes, some, but not all, ted in with ofcial policy. Many of these innovatons are in deliberate pursuit of
enterprise and entrepreneurial actvity as described above. It will become clear from the vignetes in Part II
that the concepts of enterprise and entrepreneurship can be used to enhance and contribute to the distnctve
philosophies and practce of very diferent universites.
“Such an entrepreneurial organisaton would not be alien to much of the traditonal
culture and values of a university with the emphasis upon autonomy and freedom
for acton. The only constraint is that of management of the interdependence upon
a widening range of stakeholders. The opportunity and challenge is to manage this
in such a way that maximises autonomy, freedom of thought and the empowerment
of individuals.”
Allan Gibb, Professor Emeritus, University of Durham
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PART II: THE ENTREPRENEURIAL UNIVERSITY IN ACTION - 11 EXAMPLES
Part II focuses on eleven short vignetes writen by senior university personnel who have atended the
Entrepreneurial University Leaders Programme (EULP). These short case studies do not necessarily
relate directly to the experience of the programme. Rather they give a personal perspectve of the range
of challenges faced by universites in becoming more entrepreneurial and of some actons taken to
address them. The case studies are grouped and presented in three themes: Entrepreneurial Strategy,
Entrepreneurial Partnerships and Entrepreneurial Curriculum & Pedagogy.
A major goal of the EULP is to explore the dynamics of the environment of universites, the relevance of
the entrepreneurial concept, the design of response and the implicatons for strategies, organisaton and
leadership. These eleven examples have been writen to enhance the reader’s understanding and draw
atenton to the challenges of leadership involved in enabling universites to become more
entrepreneurial. As such, they demonstrate a rich seam of experience and illustrate how diferent
universites may approach the issue of enterprise and entrepreneurial development.
A. ENTREPRENEURIAL STRATEGY
Four case studies explore questons of strategy relatng to questons in Part I such as how universites
are responding to the local and internatonal environment, how individual universites and university
groupings are diferentatng themselves and ways in which universites are establishing the base of
enterprising and entrepreneurial behaviour that already exists and using that as the foundaton for future
development.
In “A Strategy to Foster Enterprise,” Professor Lesley Dobree ( Anglia Ruskin University) considers the
challenge of drawing together many and varied entrepreneurial actvites taking place across a university
and of getng the diferent parts of the organisaton talking, sharing and working together.
In “Towards an Internatonal Strategy,” John Gratan (Aberystwyth University) presents a review of the
university’s internatonal strategy to date with recommendatons for actons going forward.
In “A Strategy for Developing an Entrepreneurial University”, Stephen Hagen and Paul Coyle (formerly both
members of the Executve Commitee of the former University of Wales, Newport), describe the work
undertaken to develop and positon a university as an Entrepreneurial University, primarily through the
development of an ambitous and radical strategy, and also through support for graduate start-up business
and curriculum development.
In “A Strategy for Business Engagement – Developing an Entrepreneurial Culture,” Laura Woods
(Teesside University) provides an example of how a university can take an entrepreneurial approach to
developing enterprising staf with the capability to deliver innovaton in their teaching, research and
business collaboratons.
B. ENTREPRENEURIAL PARTNERSHIPS
Four case studies address some of the questons in Part I related to partnerships between universites and
external stakeholders, the creaton of public value, the contributons to economic and social development
and the ways in which partnership can support excellence in research.
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In “Creatng Innovaton in Partnership with Local Communites” Chris Baker (University of Brighton),
describes the challenge of innovaton that is driven by partnership to meet the needs of very diferent
local communites. The challenge for the university is to create an entrepreneurial organisaton that can
marry the drive of enterprising individuals, both staf and students, to the economic and social needs of
these communites.
“Achieving Impact through Partnership” by Professor Pete Downes (University of Dundee) focuses upon
the philosophy of a university built upon academic excellence and its eforts to embed, accelerate and
reward impact through interdisciplinarity and partnership, thereby enabling students to emerge with a
beter understanding of how they can use the skills they have acquired at university in the outside world.
In “The Role of Partnership in a Regional Innovaton Hub,” Professor Paul Gough (University of the West of
England) explains how relevant examples of enterprise and entrepreneurial thinking can inform a
university’s actvites in a Regional Innovaton Hub.
“Partnering for Entrepreneurial Actvity” by Professor Anthony Wheton (University of Manchester)
describes a developing partnership between the Natonal Health Service and a university, demonstratng
how common interests are served by the partnership, and the ways in which each partner can leverage
the other’s resources and increase investment in shared strategic objectves.
C. ENTREPRENEURIAL CURRICULUM AND PEDAGOGY
Three vignetes look at key questons about curriculum and pedagogy from part one above, including
the challenge of developing entrepreneurship educaton across a university and of encouraging and
supportng botom-up initatves.
In “A Risk Based Approach to Curriculum Design,” Ian Dunn (Coventry University) considers the creaton
of a risk-based organisatonal culture designed to support botom-up initatves for changes in curriculum
design and the development of student enterprise and entrepreneurship.
“Embedding Enterprise in the Curriculum” by Professor Mike Thomas (University of Chester) describes
the challenges of determining a defniton of enterprise that could be commonly accepted throughout a
university and of embedding enterprise in a university’s teaching & learning strategy.
In “Collaboraton between Students, Academics and Industry” Mikkel Trym (Copenhagen Innovaton and
Entrepreneurship Lab) describes how hundreds of researchers and students have become involved in
student-driven entrepreneurship initatves and describes the challenges of creatng a culture amongst
staf that will support a student entrepreneurship eco-system.
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THEME A: ENTREPRENEURIAL STRATEGY
1. A Strategy to Foster Enterprise
Professor Lesley Dobree, Deputy Vice Chancellor, Anglia Ruskin University
1.1 The entrepreneurial potental
With nearly 32,000 students, over 10,000 of whom are studying in a range of collaboratve and employer
partnerships, Anglia Ruskin University contnues to grow and is one of the largest universites in the East of
England. The two major campuses are situated in Cambridge and Chelmsford. We also have joint venture
partnerships with Peterborough Regional College and the College of West Anglia to form University
Centres in Peterborough and King’s Lynn. Along with our own smaller campus in Peterborough, we
therefore have a strong presence in three important cites in the East of England.
We have a large number of collaboratve partnerships both in the UK and internatonally with 9,000
students studying at these various locatons. Our distance learning portolio is growing: the Degrees at
Work project, including employers such as Harrods, Barclays, Timberland, the RAF and Willmot Dixon,
among others, achieves favourable publicity.
Our Cambridge Campus (the home of the Cambridge School of Art opened by John Ruskin 1819-1900)
has been engaging with the business community for many years ofering ‘enterprise for everyone, not
enterprise for the elite!’
Our Chelmsford Campus has a history of excellence in technical and vocatonal educaton. Our innovatve
and expanding Postgraduate Medical Insttute (PMI) at the heart of the Campus, houses a state-of-the-
art Biomedical Engineering Laboratory, an acute care Simulaton Unit complete with control room and
a 400 and a 200 seated lecture theatre linking live to hospital operatng theatres around the world. We
have also launched the new MedTech Campus in Essex, a partnership with local authorites, to promote
innovaton in medical technology and to create 12,500 jobs in the Essex area. We are also establishing
the Chelmsford Medical Business Incubaton Centre, to open in 2014, to atract student startups and
businesses in the early stages of their development.
1.2 The entrepreneurial challenge
The Anglia Ruskin Corporate Plan highlights the focus upon entrepreneurship. The strategy is to develop
this agenda further as the higher educaton landscape contnues to change and to gain wider recogniton
locally, natonally and globally as an entrepreneurial university. Some seriously challenging targets have
been set, focused upon entrepreneurial actvites, as part of a diversifcaton of the university’s income
and employer engagement strategy. Whilst we at Anglia Ruskin remain commited to achieving excellence
Total HE students: 21,605
including:
UK Postgraduates: 2,220
UK Undergraduates: 16,075
Internatonal: 3,305
This vignete considers the challenge of drawing together many and varied entrepreneurial
actvites taking place across a university and of getng the diferent parts of the organisaton
talking, sharing and working together.
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in teaching, learning and research and supportng the achievement of its diverse student populaton, we
also need to foster the enterprise concept in all staf and students.
One of the main challenges is drawing together and sharing the many and varied actvites taking place.
This requires getng the diferent parts of the organisaton talking, sharing and working together to
exploit synergistc potental. There is no doubt, that the whole is greater and likely to exert greater impact,
than the sum of the various parts or pockets of actvity.
1.3 Responding to the challenge
The holistc approach needed involves coordinaton of the many varied and successful entrepreneurial
actvites across the insttuton. With the aim of boostng confdence and reputaton, staf and students
are being encouraged to become more involved in a diverse range of enterprising actvites in pursuit
of innovaton. As an outcome of the learning on the EULP, I undertook a review of existng provision
relatng to enterprise and entrepreneurship; this included auditng knowledge transfer, exchange and
support, external stakeholder engagement, internatonalizaton and entrepreneurship educaton. This has
helped to create a narratve to share more widely.
Additonally, a cross-university group of those staf involved in those actvites, including representaton
from the students union, was brought together to share knowledge and actvites and exploit
opportunites. The group is commited, amongst other things, to making a submission for the UK Times
Higher Educaton Entrepreneurial University of the Year Award in 2014.
1.4 Problems and opportunites
Some of the opportunites arising from being a large, diverse, mult-sited growing organisaton also create
a challenge to developing a holistc approach. Facultes and support services are highly engaged with their
respectve actvites at a local level and are sometmes too occupied, and occasionally reluctant, to share
informaton. The University Lord Ashcrof Internatonal Business School is at the forefront of many of the
enterprising initatves but is not necessarily best able to disseminate the learning from these initatves
across the wider university.
My role of Deputy Vice Chancellor enables a “helicopter view” of the full range of our actvites and allows
synergistc links to be made’.
1.5 Transformatonal impact
Although there is stll much work to do, the creaton of the narratve and introducton of a cross-University
group, focused on developing enterprise and entrepreneurship has encouraged a diverse range of staf to
work more closely together. The intenton is to apply the enterprising skills and entrepreneurial
mindset that already exists to grow and develop existng actvites, set up new ventures and enhance
Anglia Ruskin’s ability and reputaton as an entrepreneurial insttuton.
“My role of Deputy Vice Chancellor enables a “helicopter view” of the full range of
our actvites and allows synergistc links to be made.”
Lesley Dobree, Deputy Vice Chancellor, Anglia Ruskin University
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2. Towards an Internatonal Strategy
Professor John Gratan, Pro Vice Chancellor, Aberystwyth University
2.1 About Aberystwyth University
Aberystwyth University was founded in 1872. Today, it is known for its excellence in research,
teaching and the quality of the student experience. It is a traditonal; campus based university that ofers
internatonal partners a friendly welcome, great student satsfacton and a high-quality university
environment. It delivers world class research and all degree programmes are internatonally recognised.
Aberystwyth’s strengths lie in the felds of food and water security, earth science and environmental
quality, computer science (partcularly artfcial intelligence and machine learning), internatonal politcs,
modern languages, the performing arts and health and exercise science.
2.2. Aberystwyth’s internatonal strategy to 2012
Any successful business in a compettve market must establish a number of complimentary factors: i) the
quality of its product; ii) its uniqueness; iii) its reputaton; iv) its products which match market demand;
v) a well-developed understanding of the market. However, with the excepton of markets such as
Malaysia, Aberystwyth’s approach has concentrated on a single actvity, atractng students to study in
Wales. Despite this, internatonal actvity, properly managed and scrupulously risk assured, represents a
signifcant potental source of revenue.
2.3 Local successes and failures
Aberystwyth has enjoyed some success in two internatonal markets, Malaysia and Norway. The lesson of
these is that Aberystwyth can succeed in the internatonal market if it invests in its actvites and develops
its relatonships. Characteristcs of both success stories are that the university and specifc departments
(psychology has developed strong relatonships in Norway) have invested in and developed mature
relatonships with agents and higher educaton partners in both countries.
2.4 Internatonal student demand beyond 2013
The internatonal market for students is huge and proftable with much growth potental.
Degree and foundaton pathways which are linked to high calibre intensive English language programmes
are rising in popularity. While internatonal post graduate training is under great compettve pressure,
the undergraduate market stll has great growth potental. Partcularly strong sources of undergraduate
enrolment are Malaysia, Indonesia, India, Turkey and Saudi Arabia.
A massive market, largely ignored by UK higher educaton (with some notable exceptons, such as the
Open University and the University of Derby) is the worldwide market in self-paced E-learning products.
E-learning is increasingly being seen as an important means for developing economies to educate their
populaton and the strategy is natonally mandated in countries such as Malaysia, Vietnam, China and
Nigeria.
No HE students: 11,705
including:
UK Postgraduates: 1,225
UK Undergraduates: 8,630
Internatonal: 1,850
This vignete presents a review of Aberystwyth University’s internatonal strategy to date with
recommendatons for actons going forward.
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All universites should be alert to natonal initatves. It is clear that the governments of many
developing economies wish to expand their domestc higher educaton sector and raise the quality of the
universites they currently have. Schemes such as Brazil’s Science without Borders, Vietnam’s Project
911, both of which will support up to 1000 fully funded overseas PhD scholarships each year, must be
vigorously engaged with.
2.5 Branch campuses/regional hubs
Research strongly suggests that internatonal branch campuses will succeed if the ofer is based around
insttutonal reputaton, quality of programmes, employability prospects and internatonal rankings.
Research has also modelled typical confguratons of internatonal actvity, and universites should pay
atenton to alternatve models when determining their own approach.
Acton 1: Aberystwyth should explore the establishment of branch campuses and determine the specifc
approach to take in this regard.
2.6 Validaton and franchising
In the process of revising collaboratve partnership processes, universites should take steps to establish
clear guidelines which will enable them to enter into the validaton and franchising market in a manner
which is scrupulously quality assured. The process is two-fold. Firstly, there must be approval of the
partner (a decision of senate) prior to validaton or franchising the provision. Secondly, insttutes must
design and validate framework programmes which can be easily ofered to overseas partners. These must
be of exceptonally high quality and supported by embedded learning resources.
Acton 2: Aberystwyth should seek overseas partners who can deliver a franchised and validated provision.
Acton 3: Aberystwyth should design and establish high quality programmes which can be quickly adapted
and delivered overseas.
2.7 Foundaton partners: foundaton colleges, partner schools, internatonal schools
These kinds of foundaton partners represent a large source of potental students. A mature internatonal
strategy will develop and nurture an extensive network of them. In additon, Aberystwyth should
consider the delivery of intensive English language training and foundaton programmes through these
kinds of partners, from which students may matriculate with a validated qualifcaton, matriculate to a
higher educaton partner, or artculate to the home campus or foundaton partner colleges and schools in
the UK.
Acton 4: Aberystwyth should design and pre-approve high quality foundaton programmes which may be
franchised to foundaton partners overseas.
Acton 5: Aberystwyth should consider the design and delivery of an intensive English language training
programme which can be delivered by overseas foundaton partners.
Acton 6: Aberystwyth should establish strategic alliances with UK school and further educaton partners
through which incoming students may be prepared for study at framework for higher educaton (FHEQ)
level 5 and above.
2.8 Internatonal higher educaton insttuton alliances
A strategy should be developed including: a range of partnerships with higher educaton insttutons
in target countries; relatonships based on profle-raising staf and student exchanges; alliances where
Aberystwyth works in partnership to jointly develop, deliver and validate distance learning programmes
in strategically important areas.
Acton 7: Each memorandum of understanding should actvely deliver regular staf and/or student
exchanges.
Acton 8: Aberystwyth should investgate the development of internatonal distance learning programmes
with major internatonal higher educaton insttutons.
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2.9 Mapping the exit points
Aberystwyth should make available and celebrate its full menu of qualifcatons, from foundaton and
undergraduate to taught post graduate and research degrees. By leveraging this full spectrum of awards,
considerable numbers of overseas students may be accessed who may not initally aspire to a full degree
but for whom an Aberystwyth qualifcaton will be a considerable career asset.
Acton 9: make available, map and market all the qualifcatons that Aberystwyth ofers in order to reach
the widest possible market.
2.10 E-distance learning & certfed professional development (CPD)
This is a potentally massive market. High quality E-distance learning provision is a means by which
Aberystwyth may access a large internatonal market, satsfying demand for high quality. The E-language
training market also ofers an opportunity. In additon, Aberystwyth’s adult learning CPD is currently aimed
at a local market and is extremely modestly priced. The University could develop an electronic version
of these courses, mirroring the University of Cape Town’s “Get Smarter” site, which reached over 20 000
students annually and generates a revenue in excess of £18 million.
Acton 10: Aberystwyth should aim to develop an E-Learning arm with a remit of reaching a wide internatonal
audience and challenging targets for revenue generaton.
2.11 Marketng
Aberystwyth should develop bespoke plans for entry into selected markets. The university should also
conduct its own market research by assembling data from the many high quality informaton sources
which are available.
Acton 11: Conduct thorough market research/analysis and develop bespoke plans market entry.
2.12 Conclusion
Research suggests that an internatonally actve UK university has as many students studying its
programmes overseas as it does domestcally.
Acton 12: Aberystwyth – and indeed all universites - should answer the queston ‘How ambitous do we
want to be internatonally?’ and ‘Are we prepared to invest to get there, and to what level of investment?’
“…all universites should answer the queston: “How ambitous do we want to be
internatonally?” and “Are we prepared to invest to get there, and to what level of
investment”.
John Gratan, Pro Vice Chancellor, Aberystwyth University
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3. A Strategy for Developing an Entrepreneurial University
Professor Stephen Hagen, Actng Vice-Chancellor, and Paul Coyle, Professor of Entrepreneurial Leadership,
at the former University of Wales, Newport
3.1 Introducton
From 2011-2013, the University of Wales, Newport undertook a range of actvites designed to enable it
to become more entrepreneurial and with a view to creatng, over the longer term, an ‘entrepreneurial
university’. In 2013, merger with University of Glamorgan to create the new University of South Wales
led to the dissoluton of the University of Wales, Newport. This vignete captures useful lessons from the
period prior to merger regarding the path to developing an ‘entrepreneurial university’.
3.2 A strategy for the whole organisaton
One of the frst and most important steps was the artculaton of a strategy that would defne what the
concept of the ‘entrepreneurial university’ would specifcally mean at the University of Wales, Newport.
The distnctve principle of the ‘entrepreneurial university’ for Newport was that it would empower staf,
students and external organisatons and communites to efect meaningful change in the world around
them.
Whilst the scope of such an entrepreneurial university’s actvites would include opportunites and
support for new business start-ups, it was thought that innovaton within the structure and culture of
the organizaton would lead to the development of new initatves and provide a clear directon and
purpose within the university itself. The emphasis of the ‘entrepreneurial university’ was also to be on the
curriculum: developing and translatng knowledge across diferent disciplines in line with a closer
applicaton to employment. The aim was to establish closer partnerships with external organisatons and
communites who were interested in engaging in the transformaton.
3.3 Support from the top
The adopton of the ‘entrepreneurial university’ as the primary strategy for Newport was approved by the
Board of Governors in autumn 2011. Support from the top was deemed crucial for the strategy to become
an ‘entrepreneurial university’ to be successful. Professor Stephen Hagen took on the lead role within
the Executve, frst as Deputy Vice Chancellor (Academic) and then as Actng Vice-Chancellor, giving the
opportunity for the implementaton of the strategy to be pursued across the entre organisaton.
The appointment of Paul Coyle, as Professor of Entrepreneurial Leadership and Executve Dean of the
Faculty of Arts & Business, brought additonal expertse to the organisaton to support the implementaton
of the strategy. At the Actng Vice-Chancellor’s request, Professor Coyle established and ran the
Entrepreneurial University Development Group, whose membership was drawn from experienced and
Total HE students: 9,990
including:
UK Postgraduates: 1,350
UK Undergraduates: 7,650
Internatonal: 985
In this vignete, Stephen Hagen and Paul Coyle, (both formerly members of the Executve of the
former University of Wales, Newport), describe work undertaken to develop an entrepreneurial
university, both through an ambitous and radical strategy, and through support for graduate start-up
business and curriculum development.
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enthusiastc champions of entrepreneurship in facultes and professional support departments. The group
worked to ensure that the university’s strategy to become an ‘entrepreneurial university’ was inclusive
of all staf, identfed staf development priorites, delivered developmental events, and recommended
ways of recognizing, incentvizing and rewarding staf. In additon, the group sought to devise working
defnitons of entrepreneurial atributes for staf and students.
3.4 A strategy embedded in the curriculum
A major principle of the strategy was to focus on developing the ‘citzen-entrepreneur’ whose skills would
be necessary not just to the individual, but to the regeneraton of the South Wales economy, leading to
curriculum development that would be mapped to the target sectors identfed for its regeneraton. It was
also recognised that the strategy would support public services in the region, assistng them to be at the
forefront of efectve innovaton in their felds. Newport was already a university with a powerful focus on
the development of its region – with 50% of its students being over 30 years old.
The impact of a strategic focus on entrepreneurship resulted in a much stronger emphasis on
entrepreneurial skills, employability and embedding of (social) enterprise in academic programmes. In
2011-12 this manifested itself in a greater emphasis on employability and the development of specifc
modules enttled ‘entrepreneurship’ or ‘enterprise’ at undergraduate level. The underlying cultural
impact was harder to measure but was arguably more signifcant in that small scale initatves were
undertaken across the university as a result of the increased profle of entrepreneurship.
The process of validaton and revalidaton of programmes was the key mechanism for embedding
entrepreneurship across the curriculum. There were two notable manifestatons of this: changes to
programme content and to the number of trans-disciplinary cross-school and faculty initatves that were
undertaken.
The reconfguraton of the university’s four academic schools in 2011-12 into two facultes with
cross-cutng responsibilites was designed to support cross- and trans-disciplinary innovatons. The
creaton of the Faculty of Arts and Business, and its locaton on the new city centre campus where staf
from a range of disciplines were co-located, countered the silo efect of previous academic confguratons.
Professor Paul Coyle was also appointed to lead the planned development of the new faculty and to
embed the ‘entrepreneurial university’ as a tangible, living cross-university process.
The largest scale new curriculum development was a suite of MA programmes that focussed on business
creaton. The core modules capitalised on the expertse of specialists in entrepreneurship and business
innovaton but used the experience of specialists in art and design to contextualise the delivery and
assessment and support individual students’ ideas. Students were provided with studio space to launch
creatve businesses and be linked in to the university’s business incubaton unit and ‘bright ideas’
(start-up) programme. Social enterprise was also included as a new form of supported business creaton
within this suite of programmes as a progression route for the wider undergraduate populaton.
The underpinning change of university ethos to one that is more entrepreneurial also impacted on
signifcant revisions made to programmes as they were being revalidated. The undergraduate business
programmes, for example, were given a compulsory module requiring work based learning or an
enterprise project. All full-tme students also studied a business collaboratons module, designed to aid
employability and include content such as professional networking and social capital.
History is perhaps a less obvious subject area to embed entrepreneurship but the teams’ success with
digital heritage projects and the interests of staf together with the strong insttutonal support for
innovaton led to a greater emphasis on heritage rather than History. The revalidaton of the MA in
Regional History saw the introducton of Heritage into its ttle and an emphasis on employability through
closer working with a range of heritage projects and local partners. This theme was also refected in a new
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foundaton degree in Heritage Management that embedded entrepreneurial and business skills.
3.5 Support for start-ups
Central to the university becoming an ‘entrepreneurial university’ was increasing the opportunity for
student start-ups. In November 2012, the Bright Ideas (‘Innovaton’) Centre opened alongside the
University’s Business Development Team adjacent to the Arts and Business Faculty and mentoring
sessions started for students and staf. In March 2013, a Graduate Incubaton Centre opened with ofces
for new graduate start-ups, an open plan incubator area for hot-desks, a training room and meetng room.
This space could be used by new businesses and for the Student Enterprise Club. These actvites built
on Newport’s track-record of success in business/community engagement, including a fow of student
start-ups and, broadly speaking, the existence of a vocatonal/professional curriculum.
3.6 Key messages
Some of the useful lessons learned from the period of tme spent on this project to create an
‘entrepreneurial university’ include:
• Defning what the concept of the ‘entrepreneurial university’ means to the specifc context of an
insttuton in terms of its history, culture and locaton;
• Obtaining the support of the governing body for the strategy to become an ‘entrepreneurial
university’;
• Allocatng lead responsibilites within an executve for the implementaton of the strategy;
• Establishing close links with the businesses and communites that will beneft from and can support
the strategy;
• Identfying staf development priorites, delivering developmental events, and recognizing,
incentvizing and rewarding staf;
• Creatng a strong emphasis on entrepreneurial skills, employability and embedding of (social)
enterprise in academic programmes;
• Using validaton and review events to embed change in curriculum content and learning strategies;
• Confguring academic structures to support collaboraton and interdisciplinarity;
• Providing support for student start-ups.
“A strategic focus on entrepreneurship resulted in a stronger emphasis on
entrepreneurial skills, employability and …. enterprise in academic programmes.”
Stephen Hagen, former Actng Vice Chancellor of the former University of Wales, Newport
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4. A Strategy for Business Engagement - Developing an Entrepreneurial Culture
Laura Woods, Director of Academic Enterprise, Teesside University
4.1 About Teesside University
Teesside University is the primary higher educaton provider in the Tees Valley in north east England. Its
six academic Schools (Business, Computng, Science & Engineering, Social Sciences & Law, Arts & Media
and Health & Social Care) cater for both full-tme undergraduates and a large non-traditonal student
market; while research of natonal and internatonal quality is delivered through its fve research insttutes.
The university has a strong reputaton for digital technologies, and a track record in supportng
graduate enterprise. It works closely with business and community partners and plays a key role in the Tees
Valley Unlimited Local Enterprise Partnership. It opened a new Darlington campus in 2011 to expand HE
provision in the west of the Tees Valley and to grow its professional and organizatonal development.
Teesside won the Times Higher Educaton University of the Year award in 2009, the frst post-1992
university to do so.
4.2 The complex environment
In common with much of the higher educaton sector, Teesside University is facing radical change.
Public funding for teaching is reducing, research funding is increasingly concentrated and new private
competton is being introduced. At the same tme, an increasing number of organisatons in the
immediate locality are looking to the university for support, partnership and stability, and the university
has a signifcant role to play in the delivery of the Local Enterprise Partnership’s economic development
strategy.
4.3 A focus upon business relatonships
A key response from the university to this changing external environment is a reafrmaton of its
commitment to working with business. Much more than a mission diferentator, this underpinning
approach is seen as critcal for ensuring that both teaching and research are business-relevant; atractng
students and producing employable and entrepreneurial graduates; supportng new business creaton in
its own right; embedding innovaton and skills in businesses with the capacity for growth; and sustaining
and increasing income.
The university’s objectve is to cement its reputaton for understanding, working with and responding
to business, in ways that deliver measurable added value not only for its partners, but critcally for its
students, staf, teaching and research.
The university embarked on a strategic change project some four years ago to inculcate a stronger
entrepreneurial culture in the insttuton. The project involved the appointment of senior academic
managers in schools with responsibility for business engagement; a programme of incentves and
Total HE students: 27,980
including:
UK Postgraduates: 2,465
UK Undergraduates: 23,435
Internatonal: 2,085
This vignete provides an example of how a university can take an entrepreneurial approach to
developing enterprising staf with the capability to deliver innovaton in their teaching, research and
business collaboratons.
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rewards; creaton of a university-wide team of business development managers, underpinning
infrastructure and systems, including a customer relatonship management system; an extensive staf
development and mentoring programme; and networks and events to develop a business-facing
community with real critcal mass in the university.
4.4 Organising for success
The above actvity was underpinned by a central department charged with supportng all aspects of
work with business, from knowledge transfer and consultancy, through enterprise and entrepreneurship,
to tailored workforce development for employers. Success was measured both quanttatvely, through
performance indicators such as new businesses created and supported, workforce development student
numbers and Higher Educaton Business and Community Interacton survey income; and qualitatvely
through internal and external percepton surveys.
4.5 Present and future development
The second stage of development now under way seeks to drive change, positvely and efectvely, through
the contributons, collaboraton and lastng engagement with the business agenda of a wider group of
colleagues. To be successful and sustained, this engagement needs to be characterised by entrepreneurial
behaviour, and to be efected in diferent, innovatve ways.
With an infrastructure in place, the key elements of this second stage are strongly people-focused. They
include:
• A new and diferent staf development programme, linking partcipants directly with business through
mentoring (for new staf), a cross-disciplinary team project with business, and a series of business
partnership challenges (for more experienced staf). Funding has been used to free up both staf and
business tme to facilitate partnership working.
• A stronger focus on internal communicaton, through mechanisms such as events, lunches and TeesBe,
an online platorm for the exchange of news, views and informaton and the creaton of an online staf
community.
• A social enterprise strategy, supported by a social entrepreneur in residence, support and funding for
new social entrepreneurs amongst staf and students, and a programme of high-profle speakers.
• entrepreneurs@tees, an initatve designed to stmulate entrepreneurial mindsets in students through
events, projects and partnerships with local entrepreneurs – as well as engaging academic colleagues
in new curriculum development
• Enterprise fellowships: a new career route for staf who develop strong relatonships with business.
• Buy-out of tme and access to fnance for new entrepreneurial teaching or business initatves through
a business investment fund.
• Commercial Spark – a major practcal initatve focused on the further development of business
development managers as a cohesive and infuental community of “boundary spanners” between
academe and the wider business and community world.
4.6 Problems and Opportunites
This focus on embedding an entrepreneurial approach more widely, brings with it familiar challenges
posed by structure (internal competton vs. internal collaboraton); resources and capacity (workloads
and headroom); competng priorites at school and university level; attudes; and communicaton. In
many ways, this last is the greatest challenge, and consultaton and discussion, the enlistng of
credible expertse, innovatve approaches, and building and using efectve networks within the insttuton
are all fundamentally important. The importance, too, of contnuity, reinforcement and an emphasis on
contnuous improvement cannot be overestmated.
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4.7 Targeted Outcomes
The impact of the change being sought is the development of a signifcant community of enterprising staf
with the capacity and capability to exploit opportunites and deliver innovaton in their teaching, research
and business work. As with all cultural change, this is a long game, and one which crucially is dependent
upon strategic commitment at the highest level.
The fact that this is led from the top, by the Vice Chancellor and his team, is the biggest critcal success
factor for Teesside.
“The impact of the change being sought is the development of a signifcant
community of enterprising staf with the capacity and capability to exploit
opportunites and deliver innovaton in their teaching, research and business work.”
Laura Woods, Director of Academic Enterprise, Teesside University
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THEME B: ENTREPRENEURIAL PARTNERSHIPS
5. Creatng Innovaton in Partnership with Local Communites
Chris Baker, Director of Economic and Social Engagement, University of Brighton
5.1 Introducton
The University of Brighton is a community of 22,000 students and 2,600 staf based on fve campuses
in Brighton, Eastbourne and Hastngs. Forty-fve per cent of all undergraduates are aged 21 or over on
entry. Ninety-four per cent of full-tme undergraduates have the opportunity to partcipate in work-based
or work-related learning as part of their course. The majority of courses are accredited by professional
and statutory bodies. Results from the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise confrmed that 79% of the
university’s research output is of internatonal standing. Brighton is also ranked as the leading modern
university in terms of the quality of its research by Research Fortnight. For these reasons it seeks to
describe itself as ‘a professional and applied university.’
5.2 The organisaton culture
The University of Brighton can be characterised as a pluralistc organisaton where decision making is
devolved to school level. Individuals enjoy a good deal of freedom and individual autonomy in the
absence of a performance management culture. This means that the way change is conceived, created and
managed will vary signifcantly at the level of the individual, discipline and school.
5.3 The entrepreneurial challenge of localisaton
Brighton embraces many of the ingredients of an innovatve insttuton; but these ingredients are
distributed geographically and buried deep within diferent academic disciplines. Therefore describing a
pan-insttutonal distnctve noton of an entrepreneurial organisaton is difcult. This should not imply
that leaders, staf and students themselves are not enterprising (many are). The values which underpin
the sense of enterprise are likely to be couched in the language and practce of partnership, collaboraton
and individual philosophy rather than in a broad insttutonal mission statement. The partnerships sought
are likely to be for mutual beneft with a desire to make a positve diference to the communites locally,
globally and professionally.
5.4 Pursuit of social engagement
It is hardly surprising in these circumstances that social engagement resonates strongly as a basis for
the university’s pursuit of innovaton. For example, Brighton’s Community University Partnerships
Programme, now in its tenth year, won the THES award for outstanding contributon to the local
Total HE students: 22,075
including:
UK Postgraduates: 3,385
UK Undergraduates: 15,775
Internatonal: 2,915
This vignete describes the challenge of innovaton driven by partnership to meet the needs of very
diferent local communites. The challenge for the university is to create an entrepreneurial
organisaton that can marry the drive of enterprising individuals, both staf and students, to the
economic and social needs of these communites.
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community as far back as 2008 and has gone on to collect further accolades. As a result the
commercial imperatve of exploitaton for university gain is not (and is unlikely to be) one that drives
strategy or acton in the immediate future. Strategies to move the insttuton forward can only succeed if
they acknowledge this as the basis for development. The current strategy (2012-2015) sees both
economic and social engagement not as simply ends in themselves but fowing from translatonal research
and teaching that have an impact on both the student experience and the experience of those living in our
communites.
5.5 Building innovatve communites - Brighton
The university, to support innovaton, has to do so within the specifc context of the way that knowledge
exchange is being supported and organised in the diferent stakeholder communites. Innovaton
strategies are determined locally in partnership with external stakeholders so that they refect specifc
challenges of a given area. The university’s innovaton support is based around four spatal areas that
relate to Brighton, Eastbourne, Hastngs and Crawley including the broader area known as the Gatwick
Diamond’.
The approach in Brighton, the home city of the university, is determined by the town’s reputaton as a
vibrant and lively place to visit, live and work in. The economy is relatvely diverse and dominated by small
businesses, giving it fexibility and dynamism. It has one of the highest business start-up rates in the UK
but also a high business failure rate. The most important sectors are culture, leisure and tourism, and the
creatve, digital and IT sectors. The approach to innovaton is to tap the potental which these cultural and
creatve communites ofer with actve engagement of the Faculty of Arts. The Brighton Fuse, involving
both Brighton and Sussex universites, starts with the belief that by connectng the arts, humanites and
design with digital and ICT, creatvity and innovaton can be enhanced (htp://www.brightonfuse.com/).
There is a similar commitment to a sustainable future: the university’s Green Growth Platorm will support
the organisaton and delivery of a ‘Green Deal’ with its private and public sector partners.
5.6 Building innovatve communites – Hastngs and Crawley
The strategies in two other catchment area towns, Hastngs and Crawley, are markedly diferent. In
Hastngs, the approach to innovaton rests on the ability to deliver educaton led regeneraton. The
decision to create a university centre some ten years ago was to use educaton to provide a soluton to
the economic and social issues of the town, which has high rates of unemployment and deprivaton. The
university has also become the major sponsor of two secondary academies, working closely with their
feeder schools and the college to improve performance. An entty called, “The Exchange” has also been
promoted to link teaching, learning and research with the needs of the community.
In Crawley, economic actvity and productvity levels are high. With a major London airport, Gatwick, at
its heart, the area is home to many successful internatonal businesses and has excellent communicaton
links. Yet there is a relatvely low level of partcipaton in higher educaton and skills levels are low. This
refects also on the rates of business start–up. Brighton, local colleges and Chichester University have
opened a university centre designed to create a new hub to promote research and development and a
curriculum that will address the challenge of how local people can derive more beneft from a high growth
area.
To sum up, the approach the university is using to organise knowledge exchange is primarily determined
by local not insttutonal need and is driven by co-creatng innovatve responses with partners. In this way
the university can judge its entrepreneurial endeavour by the value which others atach to how students,
graduates, staf and the insttuton respond to their specifc needs.
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5.7 Creatng and sustaining change
The challenge of positoning an insttuton to use its knowledge base to promote innovatve solutons
to economic and social development is problematc. Firstly, the process is politcal and involves dealing
with a public policy agenda that may be unhappy terrain for many staf. Secondly, working in partnership
takes tme to establish both trust and confdence. This, at tmes, appears agonisingly slow. Internally it is
ofen not recognised that managing change in this way is not always at the discreton of the university.
Furthermore the manner of university engagement is based on organisatonal and social networks which
may involve contradictory formal and informal relatonships.
The entrepreneurial actvity may also engage a narrow range of staf, leaving the majority untouched or
unresponsive to what is seen as someone else’s agenda. It is also difcult to respond if external needs
require diferent confguratons of knowledge that aren’t present in the way both the academy and
insttuton are organised. Finally, the model for funding this type of innovaton has relied on access to
regional development money to supplement insttutonal investment. The creaton of new funding
mechanisms means that generatng funding from the private sector has become more signifcant.
Nevertheless a university is important as a means of levering that investment locally. It is therefore adding
to public value but not always in a measurable way.
5.8 The challenge ahead
A key issue is how the above approach to creatng innovaton through partnership in local communites
might ultmately impact upon the future development of the university. For example, should it move to
grant more autonomy to the academic areas and/or campuses to enable them to devise more ambitous
local strategies? Set against that is the increasingly difcult task of enabling good practce to be more
widely shared across the whole insttuton transcending both geography and discipline. This in turn raises
the highly important issue of how porous or accessible the organisaton should become?
Many facilites are already under pressure at certain tmes of the year. This begs the queston of fnding
even more innovatve approaches that co-locate the university and community in a connected way. This
has been missing in all fve campuses to date but new developments in the pipeline ofer opportunites
to do just that. Physical locaton is, however, only one opton: using technology to drive openness and
transparency is another. This challenges the insttuton to work more closely with the digitally creatve in
the city. Learning from stakeholders is part of the future. For Brighton, the entrepreneurial challenge is
how the desire to be a force for economic and social transformaton is translated into a coherent package
of actons that drive not just the university’s strategy but also that of the many partners in the public and
private sector.
“…the approach the university is using to organise knowledge exchange is
primarily determined by local not insttutonal need and is driven by co-creatng
innovatve responses with partners.”
Chris Baker, Director, Economic and Social Engagement, University of Brighton
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6. Achieving Impact through Partnership
Professor Pete Downes, Principal and Vice Chancellor, University of Dundee
6.1 A transformatonal agenda
Although the University of Dundee has developed many entrepreneurial characteristcs, they alone
are not what wholly distnguish the university from others. Dundee should strive to make a unique
contributon to higher educaton drawing upon a range of sources. These include the evidence of its
history, the individual and collectve experiences of staf, students and other stakeholders and not least
instncts about what will excite and motvate staf. They include also my experience of joining the frst
Entrepreneurial Leadership Programme, the friendships made there and the eclectc range of tutors and
contributors to the Programme.
The university’s core purpose centres upon ‘Transforming Lives’ a vision with the goal of becoming
Scotland’s leading university within 25 years. The frst Principal of what was then University College
Dundee stated that the university would be distnguished by the applicaton of its academic work, frmly
nailing the university colours to the impact mast. Cross-disciplinary working then was not a new idea, but
something we had forgoten how to do, as the strength of specifc disciplines and supportng bodies such
as learned societes grew during the 20th century. Two of our founding professors, D’Arcy Thompson (who
invented mathematcal biology) and Patrick Geddes (a botanist who became known as the father of town
planning), were celebrated polymaths whose interests were piqued only by the complex problems they
wished to solve, who fashioned understanding from any relevant source and who trained their students
to think in the same way.
University College was also founded to support the educaton of the men and women of Dundee. An
intmate relatonship with the economic, cultural and social wellbeing of the city and its people
remains a driving force for the university today and sits at the heart of the vision for the future. It is not a
parochial view because the university’s internatonal reputaton is a vital stmulus for investment in jobs and
innovatve businesses, a source for recruitment of world class staf and students and opens doors to global
opportunites for our students, staf and other stakeholders.
6.2 Academic themes demanding cross-disciplinary engagement
A contemporary approach to problem-based learning and research fnds its voice in three academic
themes that will be the focus for future investment and development. These are:
• Promotng the sustainable use of global resources
• Shaping the future through innovatve design
• Improving social, cultural and physical well-being
They draw atenton to the stated purpose to encourage people with diferent backgrounds to work
together. All four of the University Colleges have or could have signifcant presence in each of the themes.
Total HE students: 16,500
including:
UK Postgraduates: 4,010
UK Undergraduates: 9,625
Internatonal: 2,860
This vignete focuses upon the philosophy of a university built upon academic excellence and its
eforts to embed, accelerate and reward impact through interdisciplinarity and partnership, thereby
enabling students to emerge with a beter understanding of how they can use the skills they have
acquired at university in the outside world.
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There are real challenges ahead to devise a curriculum that is genuinely interdisciplinary. Dundee
graduates will need to work in teams which are problem orientated and the decision makers and
queston-seters of the future will have to draw on knowledge and command skills from multple
disciplines. It will be the distnctve qualites of the university, its sense of place and the problems it sets
itself to address which will surpass the content of what is taught as to why students will want to study in
Dundee and not elsewhere or on-line.
6.3 Innovaton, impact and intellectual property (IP)
These three terms are ofen used in universites with varying meanings. In Dundee innovaton is seen as
a set of processes and insights which put new knowledge and understanding to good use on behalf of
society.
Neither curiosity-driven nor applied research is on its own innovatve and a key role of universites should
be to accelerate the uptake of new knowledge into innovaton chains. This can’t be done if they abandon
fundamental research: but taking responsibility for translaton which involves handing knowledge on to
those who can use it is an important source of impact.
Intellectual property should therefore primarily be used to catalyse the uptake of knowledge. This
understanding has been critcal in Dundee’s innovaton success stories. The defniton of IP stretches well
beyond patents and copyright to include the unique sets of knowledge, skills and know-how found in our
research staf and their teams. Its key use is to drive partnership formaton between researchers and the
users of research and not primarily as a windfall source of revenue.
6.4 Examples of acceleratng impact
Two quite diferent Dundee examples illustrate use of this wide defniton of intellectual property to drive
partnerships that deliver impact. The frst builds on Dundee’s expertse in bioscience to drive collaboraton
with some of the world’s leading pharmaceutcal companies over more than 15 years, generatng
£50million of inward investment and the founding of two spin-in companies. It is the frst example I know
of in the UK which uses an open innovaton model (though we didn’t know enough to call it that at the
tme).
The Division of Signal Transducton Therapy targets proteins called kinases which control many aspects
of cell behaviour which when defectve cause a range of diseases from cancer to rheumatoid arthrits.
Scientsts in Dundee lead possibly the most intensive fundamental research on these proteins anywhere
in the world. Their reputaton was used to broker a ground breaking agreement which all partcipatng
companies were prepared to sign up to in order to access the University’s expertse. There was general
astonishment that so many rival companies could be persuaded to co-operate. This programme has been
renewed three tmes and is currently reckoned to be driving drug discovery programmes worth several
$billions in the partcipatng companies.
The second, very diferent, example concerns the proposal to bring the frst branch of the Victoria and
Albert Museum (V&A) outside London to the banks of the River Tay in Dundee. Duncan of Jordanstone
College of Art and Design merged with the University of Dundee more than 15 years ago and ranks number
one in Scotland for research in art and design. The V&A recognised the strengths of the university in Art
and Design.
Building upon its reputaton, the University was swifly able to broker interest from Dundee’s City
Council, the University of Abertay Dundee, the Scotsh Government and its economic development agency,
Scotsh Enterprise. The speed with which this could be done and the spectacular site proposed for the
building jutng into the River Tay clinched the V&A’s commitment. With the expected opening stll a
couple of year’s away business investment in and around the waterfront site is already building. The
predicton is that this project, to be completed by 2015, will have even more impact on the percepton
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of the city and its economic fortunes than the combined impact of the bioscience and computer gaming
industries, for which today’s Dundee is renowned.
6.5 Embedding wider impact
The above stellar examples of engagement and innovaton, built upon academic excellence are not typical
outcomes of the insttuton’s current culture. To drive this agenda the new strategy assigns equal status to
three academic pillars; teaching, research and wider impact.
In Dundee wider impact combines knowledge exchange and public engagement. These are seen, in many
insttutons as extensions of the research agenda. But it is Dundee’s intenton that wider impact should
sit between research and teaching and overlap with each. Hence, engagement with the world beyond the
university will feed back into curricula, provide jobs and internships and, by illustratng the relevance of
our research, will create employable, enterprising and even entrepreneurial graduates.
6.6 Entrepreneurship educaton and impact
In Dundee there are the usual disagreements about embedding entrepreneurism in the curricula which,
at their most extreme, portray this aim as an atack upon academic freedom.
I disagree with such a view, but don’t think the answer to producing more entrepreneurial graduates will
come solely or mainly from formal approaches to teaching. It will come instead from the example of a
university that is fully engaged with the economic, social and cultural needs of society. This is a partcularly
important issue for postgraduate research students whose usual motvaton is to become an academic
research leader in the image of their supervisor. When that supervisor collaborates with industry, it isn’t
just the contacts made, but the fact that industry is seen as a respected sector by the student’s role model
that alters their perceptons.
6.7 Rewarding impact
A strategy to embed impact described above has a number of manifestatons. Perhaps the most important
of these will be to ensure that achievements within the wider impact agenda are coupled to rewards and
career development in the same way that success in research is rewarded.
No longer is diferental weightng applied to success in research, teaching, knowledge exchange or public
engagement as performance indicators for promoton. Stellar success in any one might be sufcient for
promoton to chair level. There are already examples of professors whose promoton was based more or
less exclusively on the reputatonal value of their teaching or through innovaton and not on fundamental
research; the task in moving this agenda forward is to make this common and to refne the performance
measures used to assess such contributons.
6.8 The future imperatve
When the above strategy is fully embedded students who study in Dundee will emerge with a beter
understanding of how they can use the skills they have acquired at university in the outside world.
UK universites punch well above their weight in terms of the academic impact of their research, but there
is a fundamental weakness because industry spends much less on its own research and innovaton than
compettors in other countries. As a consequence there is litle absorptve capacity for the knowledge
universites create within the natonal hinterland.
Only part of the soluton will come from universites working in collaboraton with UK businesses. In
the long term there is a need to build this absorptve capacity by ensuring UK employers have access to
graduates who will do much more than fll existng jobs. They will create new jobs by innovatng within the
organisatons they work for and by forming entrely new companies at some point in their careers.
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Universites are at their best when they teach by example. The efect of research and translatonal
competence on business innovaton is only part of the story. Its efect on students and their capacity to
innovate will be a more lastng legacy. This is why Dundee is determined to make the knowledge exchange
agenda an integral part of student experience.
“Neither curiosity-driven nor applied research is on its own innovatve and a key
role of universites should be to accelerate the uptake of new knowledge into
innovaton chains. This can’t be done if they abandon fundamental research: but
taking responsibility for translaton, which involves handing knowledge on to those
who can use it, is an important source of impact.”
Pete Downes, Vice Chancellor, University of Dundee
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7. The Role of Partnership in a Regional Innovaton Hub
Professor Paul Gough, Deputy Vice Chancellor, University of the West of England (UWE)
7.1 Introducton: an ethos of partnership
UWE Bristol is a highly enterprising university, with a successful record in co-creatng new ideas and new
solutons to deliver innovatve futures. The university has 30,000 students and 3,500 staf with an annual
budget of £223 million. UWE Bristol has strong links with business and industry to ensure that teaching
and research have direct relevance to society and the environment. Its vision from 2007-13 is to be the
UK’s best Knowledge and Learning Partnership University, with a mission to make a positve diference to
students, business and society. Its ethos of genuine partnership working has enabled UWE to successfully
promote and drive opportunity, social justce, creatvity and innovaton. As part of its partnership mission
over the past fve years, UWE Bristol has achieved a number of milestones in its ambiton to be a regional
innovaton hub.
Firstly, in 2012, the tally of knowledge transfer partnerships reached a record 25 over an 8 year
period; three months earlier (in Autumn 2010) the university became the lead organizaton for three of
the fve iNETS across the south-west UK
1
; in summer 2011, UWE became the lead organizaton for REACT
a 3 year creatve economy hub for the SW UK (England and Wales) leading fve other higher educaton
insttutons
2
; in 2012, the university was awarded one of the only four Business Technology Centres based
in higher educaton insttutons in the south-west.
Building on this success, a review of the strengths of university’s partnerships was undertaken with the
aim to identfy possible future improvements. The review aimed to:
• Draw on evidence to determine the characteristcs of an innovaton hub;
• Gather natonal and internatonal examples of successful regional leadership and positoning;
• Identfy through a needs analysis the missing components in UWE’s claims;
• Explore the role of enterprise in furthering our ambitons;
• Examine relevant examples of enterprise and entrepreneurial thinking to further develop the
ratonale;
• Devise a plan and set of actons that will realize (and actualize) the vision;
• Inform the university’s review of its Strategic Plan 2013-2020.
1
Five iNets were set up in autumn 2010 with £12.3 M funding from SWRDA, ERDF and partners to support small and medium sized
businesses with high growth potental in the South West priority sectors: Advanced Engineering and Aerospace, Biomedical, Creatve Industries,
Environmental, and Microelectronics. To date the fve iNets have established a support network of approximately 2500 businesses with over
400 being directly assisted. By July 2013, the end of the current project, there should be 4000 engaged and 900 assisted across the South West
of England excluding Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly.
2
UWE is leading a consortum that includes the Universites of Bristol, Exeter, Bath and Cardif and the Watershed Arts Trust. ‘The Research
and Enterprise in the Arts and Creatve Technologies (REACT)’ KE Hub will involve the consortum working closely with creatve businesses,
including SMEs, arts and culture organisatons and other agencies.
Total HE students: 30,390
including:
UK Postgraduates: 5,040
UK Undergraduates: 22,525
Internatonal: 2,825
This vignete explains how relevant examples of enterprise and entrepreneurial thinking can inform
a university’s actvites in a Regional Innovaton Hub.
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7.2 Audit and dialogue
During March 2012, work was undertaken with groups and individuals within UWE Bristol, harnessing
expertse from academic staf and professional services, and also turning to the UWE student enterprise
society to help test some ideas. The university drew upon an external consultancy to test the realites of
its partnership statements, conductng over 800 interviews with a diverse blend of private, public sector
users at micro and small and medium enterprises and mid-cap companies.
The audit revealed some real challenges. Although the university had made signifcant links in the
immediate city-region these were sometmes sporadic, lacked follow-through, and for many businesses
the university remained invisible or unapproachable. The very term ‘partnership’ was ofen regarded as
intmidatng by small businesses who expressed a strong desire to be afliated in some way, but for whom
the term ‘partner’ was too formal. There was also the issue of scalability - how to grow from a successful
knowledge transfer partnership to a strong, deep ongoing relatonship with a business – and the larger
issue of legacy planning or a host of major EU funded projects.
During the summer of 2012 the consultancy was used to inform the emerging UWE Bristol 2020 strategy,
specifcally ‘Priority Work-stream Four’ which set an ambiton to:
Enhance the local and global reputaton, health, sustainability and prosperity of Bristol and its
city-region through socially responsible civic engagement and leadership.
Through dialogue and testng with a wide range of users - including the Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP),
the Confederaton of Britsh Industry and Insttute of Directors - this has been further refned into three
priorites. One addresses the extensive schools and college partnership actvity; the second the leadership
role through community and public engagement; and the third the delivery of an impact to the city-region
through:
Strong partnership with and professional support for business, engaging with high impact networks
and working with key regional partners, helping to drive economic growth and well-being in the Bristol
city-region.
It was the process of gathering views and opinions – internally and externally – and then testng them
against the record to date that has proved the most valuable learning.
7.3 Taking partnerships forward: key actons
As a result of the audit and process of gathering views and opinions, a series of further steps were taken:
• ‘partnership’ typologies were reviewed, shifing from a ‘bronze, silver, gold’ tered approach to an
internal language that spoke of ‘prospectng’ and ‘foraging’, leading to a diverse range of ‘afliates’
which might in tme lead to close strategic work with a select few corporate partners. These ‘gold’ level
or strategic partnerships would be intended to have insttuton-wide beneft and impact. They would
be used selectvely and for strategic end only, endorsed by a formal memorandum of understanding or
a strategic alliance agreement between UWE Bristol and the partner. Unlike the network of ‘afliates’,
the ‘partners’ would provide a comprehensive framework for shared actvity covering a range of
defned benefts for students (e.g., curriculum development, internship programmes), and for staf (e.g.,
shared research or business-facing programmes, staf development or secondment opportunites).
• a focus was taken on legacy projects that would extend the life of major innovaton platorms. Major
catalyst project bids were launched, one aimed at developing a new model for higher educaton/
business engagement in the West of England, which would drive business growth through a bespoke
programme of skills, enterprise and employability; the other, working in conjuncton with other higher
educaton insttutons, the Science Park, and natonal industry on a cluster of actvity in robotcs,
autonomous and embedded systems.
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• Eforts were made to harness the collectve collaboratve energy of the universites in the region: UWE
Bristol has a close working rapport and formal collaboratons with the University of Bristol in four
discipline areas and the West of England LEP (the highest ranking LEP in England). It worked across
UWE Bristol to bid for contnuaton funding through European Regional Development Fund (ERDF)
for ‘Innovaton Accelerator’ (iNet-IAP) - overall project value of £4.42m - aiming to help companies
prepare for innovaton and guide them towards best practce, providing technical, management and
marketng support for innovaton development using expertse from the iNet-IAP partners, the current
South West-iNet membership network and the SW knowledge base. This has been accepted by the
Department of Communites and Local Government and, at tme of writng, is undergoing European
Union appraisal.
7.4 Concluding thoughts
Central Government (Department for Communites and Local Government) has shown tangible support
for the contnuaton of the iNET projects, resultng in a successful bid of 2.4m for a Business Technology
Centre in bio-medical applicatons. The city of Bristol’s success in securing the ttle of European Green
Capital for 2015 was developed through formal partnership with UWE Bristol, its chair is a university
professor who was also the Director of the Environment iNET, and the university has incorporated
sustainability and environmental issues across the undergraduate curriculum.
As is clear from this case study, the inter-relatonships between the private, public and higher educaton
sectors in the Bristol and West of England city-region have been essental in achieving these accolades.
However, the match funding requirements asked by government departments present a real challenge
for entrepreneurs in any higher educaton setng. This is especially where a university is sometmes
regarded as litle more than a banking pipeline, required to be just a ‘non-stcky-minimal-overhead’
conduit between Europe, central government and the regions. Through spin-out companies, social
enterprises and student-led initatves, universites can bring real and lastng beneft to regional
economies, while allowing an entrepreneurial culture to be tested in real world setngs. However, some of
the match-funding requirements and expectatons of private sector leverage are unrealistc and will stfe
innovaton at the tme that it needs to be liberated and supported.
“It was the process of gathering views and opinions – internally and externally –
and then testng them against the record to date that has proved the most valuable
learning.”
Paul Gough, Deputy Vice Chancellor, University of the West of England
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8. Partnering for Entrepreneurial Actvity
Professor Anthony Wheton, Vice Dean, Faculty of Medical and Human Sciences, University of Manchester
8.1 The University of Manchester and the Faculty of Medical and Human Sciences
The University of Manchester is one of the UK’s largest universites. It is research intensive with a
commitment to teaching and social responsibility, The Faculty of Medical and Human Sciences ofers a
full range of research and teaching for healthcare professionals, including nursing, midwifery, psychology,
pharmacy, dentstry and medicine. It has over 8,400 students including 2,300 postgraduate students. Its
teaching demands excellent relatonships with the Natonal Health Service (NHS) partner trusts to deliver
the clinical aspects of the curriculum appropriately. Equally, its research demands clinical context and
relevance.
8.2 Operatng in a demanding stakeholder environment
Healthcare is a dynamic environment for teaching and research in higher educaton. The General
Medical Council guideline, ‘Tomorrow’s Doctors’, portrays the development of the medical student as a
scholar, a scientst, a professional, and a practtoner. The student programme is lengthy (5 years) with many
diferent components. ‘Tomorrow’s Doctors’ states that the “four UK Health Departments have a duty to
make facilites in NHS hospitals and other premises available for students to receive clinical training. In
undergraduate medical educaton, students train ‘as a scholar and a scientst’.
The ‘scholarship and the science’ noted above is not only acquired in the university but also in the
teaching hospitals and in general practces. The major teaching hospitals are the sites for many research
groups in clinical medicine. The senior members of such groups are ofen university employees and
honorary NHS consultants, illustratng a key aspect of the complex relatonships between the universites
and the NHS. Growing the partnership between the NHS and universites is necessary but not always easy
as the two statutory bodies involved have diferent objectves and expectatons.
8.3 The broad entrepreneurial opportunity base
In his NHS ‘next stage’ review “High Quality Care for All”, Lord Darzi recognised the need to improve
the interactons between clinicians at the cutng edge of medical research based in hospitals and the
university sector. He stated, “We also intend to foster Academic Health Science Centres to bring together
a small number of health and academic partners to focus on world-class research, teaching and patent
care. Their purpose is to take new discoveries and promote their applicaton in the NHS and across the
world.”
The Department of Health had already developed its research strategy substantally via the
formaton of the Natonal Insttute for Health Research. This funds healthcare research in the NHS, ofen
supportng university employees. Other major funders of university and NHS-hospital based research
Total HE students: 40,680
including:
UK Postgraduates: 7,240
UK Undergraduates: 22,210
Internatonal: 11,230
This vignete describes a developing partnership between the Natonal Health Service and a university,
demonstratng how common interests are served by the partnership and the ways in which each
partner can leverage the other’s resources and increase investment in shared strategic objectves.
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include the Medical Research Council and medical research charites (e.g. the Britsh Heart Foundaton
and the Wellcome Trust).
8.4 The potental and the challenge
The delivery of high quality educaton and research in this set of relatonships, with multple
stakeholders, is complex. The University of Manchester, with six partnering NHS organisatons, became
one of fve UK designated Academic Health Science Centres afer an applicaton process set in train by
the NHS Darzi review. The Academic Health Science Centre has taken up the challenge of developing
synergistc interactons between the NHS, the university and other partners.
The opportunites for the Manchester Academic Health Science Centre to make a profound contributon
to cancer clinical service and research are palpable. In the government-led Research Assessment Exercise
2008, the University of Manchester was rated frst in the UK for its cancer studies research. In part this is
founded upon a strong relatonship with a major tertary referral centre for cancer, the Christe Foundaton
Trust. Christe run one of the largest early clinical trial units in the world (again involving university clinical
academic staf) based in a new £35 million patent treatment centre opened in 2010. With over 13,000
new patents a year and status as a pre-eminent cancer service provider, the opportunites for increased
cancer research actvity at the Christe are clear. It is also building a network of Christe radiotherapy
centres to bring treatment closer to people’s homes - the frst £17 million centre opened in Oldham in
2010 and a second £20 million centre opened in 2012 in Salford.
Against this backcloth, some external critques suggested that the major cancer-related challenge for the
centre was that of insufcient critcal mass for an infow of research income from bodies such as the
Natonal Insttute for Health Research. The University and the Christe Trust therefore focused upon ways
to improve the ofer with respect to clinical research and its translaton into improved patent outcome.
8.5 Reviewing the existng base
A startng point for the review was assessment of the existng university research base and its
benchmarking against other major cancer research centres. Despite Manchester’s top ranking in the
2008 Research Assessment Exercise, according to the UK Clinical Research Network (UKCRN) data it
performs fewer cancer clinical trials than some other major centres. Also, a comparison of the number of
UKCRN-badged cancer trials per centre versus the number of cancer patent referrals revealed
Manchester was missing an opportunity. Several other centres were more efectve at establishing trials
within their cancer patent populaton base. Given the patent numbers available and the facilites for
clinical trials actvity, radiotherapy, basic cancer research and cancer imaging research, Manchester
needed a strategy for further investment.
Strategy development is not a trivial pursuit given the complex governance issues surrounding NHS Trusts
and universites. A Trust Board, for example, has to be persuaded of the value of any new venture to
its portolio. From its perspectve the basis for partnership must lie in evidence that a more research
intensive environment can improve outcomes for patents. In general there is evidence to support this.
The outcome for patents enrolled in clinical trials is beter than for those not enrolled, even when
receiving standard therapy as opposed to experimental therapy. The university meanwhile, has to ensure
that investment serves its social responsibility, teaching and learning and research agenda.
8.7 A SWOT analysis and defniton of investment needs
The Trust and the university agreed that a review of strengths and areas for investment was necessary.
The exercise considered Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunites and Threats (SWOT). The major threat was
that by standing stll with no co-investment plan Manchester could fall behind other UK cancer academic
centres. Strengths included an efectve clinical research network, the presence of a Cancer Research UK
(CRUK) research insttute, excellent phase one trial and radiotherapy facilites.
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To begin the developmental planning process, NHS and University groups were invited to present cases
for increased investment. These were reviewed by Christe and University staf, with input from CRUK.
Areas where research was internatonally compettve were identfed and gaps in infrastructure or stafng
within them defned. These included women’s cancer, personalised medicine, hemato/oncology,
radiotherapy, lung cancer and melanoma.
8.9 Leveraging resource
Next, the Christe Trust and the university identfed the full costs associated with appointng major
research teams in these areas. The true costs could then be reported back to each statutory body
involved with a view to gaining appropriate buy-in at senior management level. The approach included an
academic case for the new venture with estmates of research income and impact on teaching quality. For
the NHS, the impact on clinical service in the short, medium and long term was to the fore.
An entrepreneurial approach, however, involves harnessing resources from a number of stakeholders.
Consideraton of the core values of a specialist cancer hospital and its partner university clarifed
overlapping areas of interest. The challenge then became one of identfying clearly how common
interests are best served by partnership. Clarity of thought on a common investment strategy and how
it might impact on healthcare provision for one partner (NHS Trust) and research, teaching and social
responsibility for the other (university) became absolutely essental. But by careful review of prospectve
partner’s needs, in terms, for example, of organisatonal structure and key strategic developments,
synergies could be identfed whereby each partner leverages the others resources and strengths in
pursuit of their major objectves. By this entrepreneurial process, the objectve of training tomorrow’s
doctor’s as scholars and scientsts, in line with the General Medical Council requirements, is being
clarifed, while providing new opportunites for development of research for patent beneft and therefore
for serving the wider community.
“An entrepreneurial approach… involves harnessing resources from a number of
stakeholders. Consideraton of the core values of a specialist cancer hospital and its
partner university clarifed overlapping areas of interest. The challenge then became
one of identfying how common interests are best served by partnership.”
Anthony Wheton, Vice Dean, Faculty of Medical and Human Sciences, University of Manchester
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THEME C: ENTREPRENEURIAL CURRICULUM AND PEDAGOGY
9. A Risk Based Approach to Curriculum Design
Ian Dunn, Deputy Vice-Chancellor for Student Experience, Coventry University
9.1 About Coventry University
Coventry University is a forward-looking, modern university with a proud traditon as a provider of high
quality educaton and a focus on applied research. Its students beneft from state-of-the-art equipment
and facilites in all academic disciplines including health, design and engineering laboratories, performing
arts studios and computng centres. Its city-centre campus is contnually developing, and the university is
a major presence in the city of Coventry. Through links with leading edge businesses and organisatons in
the public and voluntary sectors, students access project and placement opportunites that enhance their
employability. Times Higher Educaton Entrepreneurial University of the Year 2012, Coventry University
has a reputaton for entrepreneurship and innovaton.
9.2 Background to the example
The aim of this example is to present the outcomes of work exploring change in curriculum design to
support enterprise and entrepreneurship. The central thesis is that without the opportunity and
permission, to take responsibility for individuality at the course level, the course team becomes simply
administrators and organisers. This means that the university, with responsibility for quality assurance
and enhancement, needs to place a great deal of trust in the course team. The university also needs to
provide them with a framework that is a teaching and learning strategy. Efectvely, the university needs
to create a risk-based culture with permission to be experimental, whilst providing relevant data to allow
the outcomes of the experiments to be measured and evaluated quickly. The university must also develop
the ability to act quickly in oversight mode, if it believes that there is any abuse of the permission. Here we
will outline a process that has begun at Coventry University. It is entrely locally situated but may provide
some hints and tps that others may be able to use.
9.3 The task and key challenges
Historically, curriculum design is centrally managed to ensure that award and credit rules are met, along
with other centrally required outcomes. This can result in a distorton of the curriculum, which means
that academic subject areas adopt methods that are not best suited to the development of the student as
a professional in educaton and training.
The task was to create a teaching and learning narratve that was able to win large scale staf support,
with courses as the dominant unit of academic design and that would lead to signifcant change resultng
Total HE students: 31,045
including:
UK Postgraduates: 2,360
UK Undergraduates: 22,270
Internatonal: 6,420
This vignete considers the creaton of a risk-based organizatonal culture designed to support
botom-up initatves for changes in curriculum design and the development of student enterprise
and entrepreneurship.
Natonal Centre for Entrepreneurship in Educaton (NCEE)
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in more satsfed, more enterprising and ultmately beter employed students. There is a suggeston that
the fnal plan was thought through and then enacted in one simple instance. There have been a number
of smaller steps that are now coming together to form that narratve and are also yielding results.
The ultmate belief is that by creatng a culture of permission for the course team to be enterprising, the
university is demonstratng to course teams that they can innovate and thus excite the student and can
assess for the appropriate balance of skills and knowledge best suited to their subject situaton.
A range of challenges and pre-requirements was encountered. These included the need for:
• Data: if the project was to be measured, there was a need for data that could be compared on a year
for year cycle to demonstrate progress.
• Outcomes: actvity should only be undertaken if it can be shown to be leading towards enhancement
and excellence.
• Strategy and acton: the need for a modern teaching and learning strategy directly related to the
mission, values and corporate plan. The strategy then needs to lead to direct acton linked to the
classroom. This all needs an output mechanism that monitors progress against targets.
• People: an excellent human resource plan is required.
• Liberaton: all academic subject areas should be liberated to take acton, within the defned teaching
and learning strategy. This liberaton needs to be best suited to their subject area rather than to a
general university over-arching plan.
• A risk-based approach: the actvites are all designed to demonstrate a risk-based approach as an
essental element in the introducton of an enterprising curriculum.
9.5 The Coventry story so far....
This secton will present an overview chronology of the events that make up this story with litle narratve:
this will be reserved for later and largely for others to write.
- July 2010: NSS overall satsfacton 79%, the VC and PVC (Academic) require all Heads of Department
to construct an acton plan on how they intend to improve things.
- September 2010: redevelopment of the academic and personal tutorial scheme, to incorporate an
online employment skill based package. Tutors are to have no more than 8 students and to have an
allocaton of tme to permit both small group and individual tme across all three undergraduate years.
This work was supported by a range of online resources and a ‘short burst’ staf development training
programme (lunch tme sessions that became a standard input mode).
- September to November 2010: introducton of a whole university module evaluaton scheme. The
previous evaluaton scheme had been managed by tutors and the results were not regularly and
reliably used. The new scheme relies on an Natonal Student Survey (NSS) like set of questons,
distributed by student ambassadors during a module occurrence, afer about eight weeks. The paper
based forms are completed during the class and collected by the student ambassador. The forms are
processed centrally and the results, quanttatve and qualitatve, are returned to the tutor and the
head of department within ten days. The tutor has a further fve days to post any actons taken as a
result of the student feedback.
- January 2011: all of the quanttatve data were analysed and league table type ranking produced to
show overall weighted averages for each department. These are presented in tabulated form with
a red, amber, green ratng for each queston. The results are widely distributed startng with the
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academic executve. Green was originally set at 80% satsfacton or greater; this is now modifed to
90% or greater.
- July 2011: NSS outcome 85% overall satsfacton. Coventry is the second most improved insttuton in
the Sunday Times league table rising 30 places.
- October 2011: rewrite of the teaching and learning strategy to refect the corporate plan, mission and
values of the university. The new strategy has fve headings, pedagogical approach, research informed
learning, employment and entrepreneurship, internatonalisaton and digital fuency. This approach
was adopted by academic board in December 2011.
- October 2011: work on redeveloping the careers service structure and strategy. Responsibility for the
development of employability skills and internships now lies in the faculty employability units with
direct engagement of academics through the academic personal tutorial scheme. Students are
surveyed during their fnal year to explore whether they have graduate level employment and any
without become the responsibility of the central careers service. We changed the language from
employability to employment.
- May to June 2012: developed new course reportng process, sounds dull but essental. The report
enables the course team to express their proposed actons but equally that they need Faculty and
University management to take acton. This is designed to be an approach that is properly based on
enhancement but also encourages the course team to take some measured risk.
- July 2012: the learning and development team pull of the most amazing staf development
process, running facilitated day long workshops for all course teams training more than 1000 members
of academic staf in the new approach over a two week period. Course teams are now required to
meet twice per year, involving students in the rethinking of their course.
- September 2012: NSS overall student satsfacton 86%.
9.6 A specifc comment about enterprise
This approach is predicated on distributng the ability to act on course development to the team of
professionals responsible for the creaton and operaton of that course. This deliberate act is in itself
risk-based. For the courses to become risk-based and enterprising, it is felt that there needs to be a
demonstraton of such an approach by the management of the university. Individual staf have access to
a broad range of expertse in the teaching of entrepreneurial studies as well as embedding employment
skills through the university wide Add+vantage scheme. The course reportng template requires responses
against the entrepreneurial agenda. Thus it is the claim of this example from Coventry, that by the actons
taken, and the requirement to report against entrepreneurship, the course team is working towards a
more entrepreneurial culture.
“..by creatng a culture of permission for the course team to be enterprising, the
university is demonstratng to course teams that they can innovate and thus excite
the student.”
Ian Dunn, Deputy Vice Chancellor for Student Experience, Coventry University
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10. Embedding Enterprise in the Curriculum
Professor Mike Thomas, Pro Vice Chancellor (Academic), University Of Chester
10.1 Introducing Chester
While celebratng and beneftng from a long history in higher educaton, with roots that stretch back to
the 19th century, the University of Chester is a modern, dynamic and enterprising insttuton. In keeping
with its traditon as a Church of England insttuton, this distnctve university is a lively and friendly
learning community, which fosters a sense of individuality, creatvity and personal development – its
16,800 students and 1,400 plus staf actvely contribute towards that community as well as benefts from
it.
The university has seven academic facultes spread across three campuses, three NHS sites and four
Associate Colleges, and makes a substantal impact upon the economy, culture and innovaton
environment of Cheshire, Warrington, Wirral and North East Wales, contributng some £298 million per
year to the region.
Research is integral to the working life of staf, in partnership with local and regional providers of care,
while strategic focus is on further development in community/primary care, users and carers support, and
inter-professional learning.
10.2 The teaching and learning challenge
A major challenge for any new development in the higher educaton sector is the impact of the speed of
external change on the ability of the university to plan a strategic response. In respect of entrepreneurial
learning, strategic planning for new development is complicated by the fact that diferent subject
specialites have unique and specifc needs. Those needs range from Professional, Statutory and
Regulatory Bodies with their legislatve requirements, through to maintaining archive materials in subjects
such as law and history, through to being up to date and cutng edge with digital technology for those
areas such as media studies, computer studies and engineering. These needs demand a diferentated
response.
A further complicaton is that the enterprise concept is viewed diferently by individuals and groups from
diferent academic subject areas or professional support areas. There are diferent perspectves on issues
such as working with stakeholders, meetng external deadlines, recognising the commercial relevance of
enterprise and at another level, its contributon to innovaton, imaginaton and creatvity in curriculum
design.
10.3 The university’s response
A three-part approach was mounted in response to the above challenges:
• The frst was to stmulate a broad approach to stakeholder engagement in enterprise. This was achieved
Total HE students: 15,215
including:
UK Postgraduates: 3,065
UK Undergraduates: 11,725
Internatonal: 425
This vignete describes the challenges of determining a defniton of enterprise that could be
commonly accepted throughout a university and of embedding enterprise in a university’s teaching
and learning strategy.
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through the development of a Staf Enterprise Society and a Student Enterprise Society. The later
was supported by the university’s Innovaton Centre and covered: the development of students into
self-employment; the establishment of a Student Enterprise Society within the Students’ Union; the
linking of Student Enterprise with Careers and Employability; and the development of a range of
specifc actvites such as boot camps, cofee mat challenges, social enterprise actvites, so-called
“boiler rooms” and spotlight events.
The Staf Enterprise Society, currently engaging over 80 staf across the university, was set up to
provide the base for achieving the second strategic objectve by actng as a focal point for those
interested in innovaton, creatvity, imaginaton and commercialisaton and who can also collectvely
serve to clarify and disseminate the university policy regarding the enterprise agenda.
By these means a cross-university approach has been achieved with improved communicaton
between professional areas and academic departments and facultes.
• The second approach was to embed enterprise in the university’s Learning and Teaching Strategy 2013
– 2016. This was done by close collaboraton (using a botom up approach) led by the University
Academic Quality Team, the Deans’ Group and individual staf. For example the Faculty of Arts and
Media has as one of its major aims to foster a creatve and entrepreneurial environment, virtually,
physically and spiritually ft for contemporary challenges. It provides a very good example of how
enterprise can be embedded in the Learning and Teaching Strategy which in turn infuences faculty
m business plans and annual reviews, audits, resource allocaton, objectve setng and curriculum
planning.
• A third approach was to work with diferent teams and stakeholders within the university who were
interested in creatvity, imagine and enterprise so that by 2015 every student would complete a level 5
module (voluntary) looking specifcally at entrepreneurial actvity. For those students who wished to
contnue in that vein, they could complete their dissertaton at Level 6 as an optonal project in order
to develop their level 5 work into a potental business start-up or employability which would then
feed directly into the University Innovaton Centre who would provide support. This would allow the
University to support students in a cross-disciplinary manner and enable them to develop their
employability project and their business start-up before they graduate.
10.4 Enhancing understanding of the concept
The above approach provides both problems and opportunites. A key issue is gaining universal
acceptance of an overall university defniton of enterprise. Although staf have a general understanding
of the word it has a specifc meaning for each individual; so some therefore may view the word from a
negatve perspectve and some more positvely. The issue has partly been addressed by organising staf
forums and lunch tme sessions exploring enterprise as a concept. But to provide wider evidence base the
Innovaton Centre carried out a survey of the attude towards enterprise within the university covering
students and staf. This provided the basis for a comprehensive acton plan linking Innovaton Centre
support for the: teaching of entrepreneurial skills; student self employment; individual staf business
venturing; and in general the range of commercial actvity to be delivered by the university.
10.5 Embedding enterprise in the curriculum
The approach to implementaton was to select departments which scored high in annual reviews (from
the Natonal Student Survey scores, internal audits, student and staf evaluatons, employment outcomes
and a variety of other measurements). The Innovaton Centre works across the university in support
of this and departments work with other departments across facultes. Professional expert support is
provided by Careers and Employability and the Work Based Learning Team. There are also good links
between the Innovaton Centre and the Knowledge Transfer Ofce. The Postgraduate School has also
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developed a reward process and procedures for staf so there is some fnancial incentve for staf engaging
in entrepreneurial actvity.
10.6 The transformatonal impact
Enterprise is now embedded in the university Learning and Teaching Strategy 2013 – 2016. It has a
direct impact on faculty and departmental business planning and also reviews, monitoring and auditng
processes.
The Student Enterprise Society is hosted within the Student Union and contnues to go from strength
to strength with approximately ffy fve partcipants in boot camps now running all year within the
university. The Enterprise Survey has directly led to an Enterprise Project Plan which looks at teaching
enterprise skills, supportng students into self-employment, supportng staf to set up and spin of
companies and to develop, overall, commercial actvity within the university.
There is also cross-faculty collaboraton in entrepreneurial actvites between the Facultes of Business,
Arts and Media, Health and Social Care, Educaton and Children’s Service and Social Sciences.
10.7 The way forward
Enterprise as a concept frst raised its head within the university just under three years ago and from that
inital discussion and the support from the NCEE and the EULP Team the University has developed its
learning and teaching provision in the last twenty four months with the actvites summarised above. It is
expected that enterprise will now become so embedded in the University that within the next fve years it
will be seen to be the third leg in the University’s actvites alongside research and teaching.
“… enterprise will now become so embedded in the University that within the next
fve years it will be seen to be the third leg in the university’s actvites alongside
research and teaching.”
Mike Thomas, Pro Vice Chancellor (Academic), University of Chester
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11. Collaboraton between Students, Academic and Industry
Mikkel Trym, Director, Copenhagen Innovaton and Entrepreneurship Lab (CIEL)
11.1 Introducing the Copenhagen Innovaton and Entrepreneurship Lab (CIEL)
At CIEL we work to create excellence in knowledge-based innovaton and entrepreneurship through intensive
collaboraton between the University of Copenhagen, the Technical University of Denmark and Copenhagen
Business School. The CIEL alliance aims to demonstrate a new model for collaboraton by combining the
perspectves of each of the three universites and real life cases to produce innovaton with substantal societal
impact.
The university alliance was initated with support from industry and is part of the Danish Entrepreneurial
University Initatve. Each of the three partner universites is excellent in its feld. However, with the aim to
foster entrepreneurial mindset and behaviour, there are many more reasons to collaborate, than to compete.
Together, these three large universites in Copenhagen account for 53 per cent of the Danish university sector,
having more than 60,000 students and 15,000 PhD students and staf members.
CIEL has established nine novel programmes, applying a wide range of means to leverage innovaton and
entrepreneurship among the alliance members. The majority are educatonal programmes targetng both
students and staf; such as the Entrepreneurial Excellence Programs delivering new thematc innovaton and
entrepreneurship educaton for graduate students across the universites and the Innovaton Pedagogics
teachers-trainer program. Other actvites support the student entrepreneurship eco-system and innovaton
and entrepreneurship research.
CIEL has proved to be an efcient model for creatng high-level projects that are embedded across
departments. These novel initatves have atracted signifcant interest among staf, students and other
universites, including a nominaton as being one of the most innovatve projects of its kind in the European
Union.
11.2 The entrepreneurial challenge
Gradually, the Enterprising Concept is gaining more and more momentum. The number of students, teachers,
companies and decision-makers involved is increasing. Hundreds of students are now involved in the student-
driven initatves such as Suitable-for-Business and the Danish Social Innovaton Club. Some departments in
the Business School and the Technical University have developed a strong entrepreneurial mindset among
staf and students. The CIEL steering commitee members, consistng of university rectors, are all personally
commited to supportng the transiton towards a more entrepreneurial university.
Nevertheless, the change is largely occurring despite the core university culture and structures, where a lot
of barriers need to be worked on, and new incentves created. The top management is aware of the need
for change, but is uncertain on how to prioritze potental areas of acton. The university organizatons are
CIEL is an alliance between the University of Copenhagen, the Technical University of Denmark and
Copenhagen Business School. Together, these universites have more than 60,000 students.
This vignete describes how hundreds of researchers, teachers and students have become involved in
collaboratve entrepreneurship initatves and describes the challenges of creatng a culture that will
support the entrepreneurship eco-system.
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generally lacking entrepreneurial leadership, long-term funding, rewards, coordinaton and integraton across
management and facultes.
Most of the university staf involved work in isolaton of each other, whereas the students are more
organised – although they are not aware of their newly gained power.
11.3 Specifc objectves and intended outcomes
The project will seek to connect the dots – the vast number of internal and external champions – those great
resources that can create the entrepreneurial tpping point through the creaton of a collaboratve movement.
The aim is to create momentum for substantal organisatonal change. Initally, a number of meetngs among
opinion leaders, champion staf and change agents will be organized to identfy required actons, including the
elaboraton of a joint manifesto and publicity in a natonal newspaper.
Simultaneously, the university management will undertake a process of identfying their current situaton and
potental areas of acton, based on the EU/OECD Guiding Framework for Entrepreneurial Universites. A new
self-assessment guideline will be used, created with support from NCEE, to assist universites to determine
their own strengths, weaknesses and fnd ways forward.
11.4 Obstacles and opportunites
The process of insttutonal and cultural change does not happen overnight. The pace of change and the nature
of the current incremental change in universites are major obstacles, in partcular, for the large traditonal
research university. It is a great opportunity to speed up the change process through collaboraton, where
a mutual sense of directon and alertness is created. It seems possible to create awareness and substantal
change of norms through a collaboratve movement, whereas, a substantal change of the core organisatonal
culture also involves a large porton of contnuous entrepreneurial leadership and management commitment.
Strong leadership and good governance is crucial in order to develop an entrepreneurial culture. The CIEL
programs have proved very efcient in creatng novel and viable entrepreneurial actvites, embedded at
departmental level and with a high degree of ownership.
Further atenton needs to be given to strengthen the core university leadership and governance, in
partcular, at faculty and middle management level. It seems that the Guiding Framework ofer a sound startng
point for such a working process. In additon, new governance structures of the entrepreneurial actvites will
seek to strengthen the leadership commitment among faculty and middle management.
11.5 Transformatonal impact
It is stll too early to describe the long-term transformatonal impacts. It is, however, quite evident that
collaboraton among insttutons and stakeholders, and the creaton of critcal mass, is a very efcient tool in
fostering a more entrepreneurial mindset in the organisatons. It also seems reasonable to assume that the
broad awareness about the importance of entrepreneurial culture and behaviour will eventually change the
core structures of the university.
Last but not least, we should not forget the main collaboratve impact in the feld of entrepreneurial educaton;
the cross-disciplinary approach is highly motvatng for both students and researchers and produces new and
ofen surprising solutons for industry and society at large.
“The process of insttutonal and cultural change does not happen overnight. The
pace of change and the nature of incremental change in universites are major
obstacles….It is a great opportunity to speed up the change process through
collaboraton, where a mutual sense of directon and alertness is created.”
Mikkel Trym, Director, Copenhagen Innovaton and Entrepreneurship Lab (CIEL)
Natonal Centre for Entrepreneurship in Educaton (NCEE)
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APPENDICES
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Appendix A: The University Entrepreneurial Scorecard
(Exploring the Entrepreneurial Potental of a University)
The Scorecard on the following pages embraces all of the issues associated with a strategic leadership
approach to embedding enterprise and entrepreneurship in the university. It can be used for a
comprehensive analysis of the university or for a more focused review of a number of key areas of interest
to readers and exploraton of areas of potental synergy (see fgure below).
A version of this scorecard has been used by entrepreneurship educators in development programmes
to test their knowledge of entrepreneurship actvity in the university in order to form a basis for their
‘embedding strategies’ and/or to provide an impressionistc view of the ‘state of play’ based upon existng
personal knowledge.
It has also been used, not as a formal scorecard, but as an informal checklist for discussions with staf
and students across the university in an exploraton of areas of potental synergy. ‘Scoring’ is therefore
optonal. As the diagram below demonstrates, the main focus is upon how key over-riding objectves
of the university may be enhanced by the harmonising of personal and insttutonal enterprise and
entrepreneurship actvity.
If the Likert scale is used, then the points can be connected up to give a visual display of areas of strength
and weakness.
Exploring Synergies in Entrepreneurial University Development The Potental Contributon to Key
Strategic Goals
Mission, Governance and Strategy
Mission and Strategy
Governance
Organisaton Design
Knowledge Organisaton
Measuring Excellence and Public Value
Leveraging Public Finance
Stakeholder Engagement
Regional and Local
Partnerships
Business Partnerships
Engaging Entrepreneurs
Alumni Engagement
Social Enterprise
Student Ownership
Entrepreneurship Educaton
Exploring the Potental
Linking to University Goals
Organising and Locatng the
Efort
Pedagogy and Staf
Development
Cross Campus Initatves
Supportng Students Initatves
IMPACT UPON:
Higher Innovaton
Research Excellence
Research Relevance
Compettveness
Diverse Revenue Flow
Student Employability
Teaching Quality
Learning Organisaton
Stakeholder Orientaton
Knowledge Transfer,
Exchange and Support
Knowledge Transfer
IP Policies
Spin ofs
Incubators
Science Park Engagement
Loan and Equity Finance
Academic Entrepreneurship
Internatonalisaton
Sharing Culture
Staf and Student Mobility
Partnership and Network Building
Overseas Campus
Development
Organising to Build Commitment
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The University Entrepreneurial Scorecard
(Exploring the Entrepreneurial Capacity of a University)
Strength of: 1 2 3 4 5
CONCEPT, VISION, MISSION AND STRATEGY
1. Strategic commitment in the university’s vision statement to the
‘imaginatve use of knowledge and development from research
2. Strategic commitment to achievement of university status via wide
stakeholder credibility
3. Clarity of recogniton of the scholarship of relevance and integraton
in the strategy
4. Clarity of shared concept of enterprise and entrepreneurship across
the university
5. Degree to which Enterprise and Entrepreneurship are seen as central
in University strategy
6. Degree to which innovaton in the broadest sense is seen as central
to all university work
7. Strategic commitment to knowledge exchange
8. Strategic commitment to local and regional development
9. Strategic commitment to business development and partnerships
10. Strategic commitment to leveraging public and fee income
11. Strength of university strategic and practcal focus upon the
problems and opportunites of society
12. Commitment to a broad stakeholder view of university excellence
(as per the public value concept)
GOVERNANCE
13. Understanding of, and support from, the VC/Principal and executve
team for the entrepreneurship/enterprise concept
14. Level of understanding of the relevance of the entrepreneurial
agenda by the Council or Board
15. Level of understanding of the relevance and agenda (and actve
engagement) of the Chairman of the Board or Council in this
16. Strength of entrepreneur membership of Board or Council
17. Level of actve engagement of entrepreneur members of Board or
Council with the university
18. Actve engagement of university staf in local/regional economic,
social and cultural development
19. Level of trust and actve relatonships between professional staf
charged with external links and the academic staf
20. Existng working relatonships and synergies between those engaged
in employability, business development, knowledge exchange and
regional and local development
21. Level of commitment of faculty heads and departments to the
entrepreneurial agenda as above
22. Overall actve leadership of the enterprise and entrepreneurial
agenda in the university
Low High
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Strength of: 1 2 3 4 5
ORGANISATION DESIGN
23. Organisaton design to facilitate and support botom-up
entrepreneurial and innovatve behaviour
24. Decentralizaton in decision making
25. Devolvement of responsibility for the employability, knowledge
exchange, local and regional interface and business and organizaton
development agendas to departments
26. Degree to which botom-up risk taking behavior is rewarded and
protected in general
27. Reward systems for wider forms of innovaton in the university
TRANSDISCIPLINARITY
28. Levels of actve co-operaton between facultes and departments in
teaching and research
29. Numbers of multdisciplinary degrees
30. Numbers of transdisciplinary research and/or teaching centres
focused upon societal issues
31. Number of departments engaged in vocatonal/professional
development areas
32. Level of commitment across the university to creatng opportunites
for students to explore the relevance of their knowledge
33. Levels of intellectualism (as opposed to scholastcism) in the
university
FINANCIAL LEVERAGE
34. University commitment and capacity to raising revenue from
non-fee and traditonal public sources
35. Existng rato of private to fee and public funding
36. Delegaton of revenue raising actvity to departments (with targets)
37. Proactvity of deans and faculty heads in fund and revenue raising
PUBLIC VALUE & STAKEHOLDER ENGAGEMENT
38. Focus across the university on areas of societal and cultural concern
39. Degree to which university assesses its value on the basis of wide
legitmacy with stakeholders
40. Actve partnerships with key regional stakeholders across the
university
41. University actve engagement with individual SMEs
42. University actve partnerships with SME associatons
43. Level of actve engagement of arts and humanites departments in
regional culture initatves
44. Level of consultancy actvity (and revenue from) across the
university
45. Relatve scale of R&D funded work with business
46. Strengths of students interface (across facultes) with local business
and civic organisatons
Low High
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Strength of: 1 2 3 4 5
47. Numbers of degrees with actve business and professional
engagement
48. Strength of university extra mural training partnerships with external
organisatons excluding business school
49. Engagement of the business school in SME and local enterprise
development
50. Actve partnerships with local vocatonal colleges
51. Level of actve engagement with local entrepreneurs in teaching and
research
52. Status given to local entrepreneurs through ‘associateships’,
‘fellowships’, professorships or teachers of practce
53. Engagement across the university in Social Enterprise
54. The university as a learning organizaton (porous to actve learning
from a wide range of sources)
ALUMNI
55. Alumni ofce and its related actvity across the university
56. Ability of alumni department to identfy and build relatonships with
entrepreneurs locally, natonally and internatonally
57. Actve engagement of alumni in the university
KNOWLEDGE EXCHANGE AND INCUBATION
58. University technology transfer and knowledge exchange actvity
59. Degree to which knowledge transfer and exchange is embedded in
departments
60. Level of actve student and staf engagement with science park
companies
61. Openness of IP policy for staf and students
62. Support ofce for IP and licensing
63. Numbers of patents and licenses and revenues received
64. Student engagement in knowledge transfer actvity
65. University rewards for knowledge transfer performance
66. Doctoral student exposure to the relevance of their research to the
‘real world’
67. Staf numbers with business ownership stakes or stakes in social
enterprise organisatons
68. Numbers of spin-ofs recorded
69. Support for spin-of actvity
70. Incubator support physical and/or virtual
71. Clarity in incubator targetng
72. Clarity in performance indicators
73. Incubator mentoring and service support
74. Joint venture funding partnership arrangements – angel connectons
75. Links to and/or provision of, special loan arrangements for graduate/
staf enterprise
76. University engagement in public/private seed capital actvity
Low High
Natonal Centre for Entrepreneurship in Educaton (NCEE)
Page 57
Strength of: 1 2 3 4 5
INTERNATIONALISATION
77. University focus upon internatonalisaton
78. Level of actvity
79. Levels of internatonal staf
80. Internatonal research and development links
81. Engagement with local players in internatonal actvity
82. University support system for internatonal actvity
83. Impact of internatonalism on the curriculum of the university
84. Revenue from internatonal actvity
85. Numbers of joint ventures with overseas universites
86. Overseas licenses and joint degrees
87. Internatonal campus initatves
88. Overseas alumni relatons
89. Student exchanges
90. Internatonal distance educaton
91. Internatonal business partnerships
ENTERPRISE AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP EDUCATION
92. Entrepreneurial skills agenda accepted across the university
93. Each department with entrepreneurial curriculum champion
94. Entrepreneurship educaton embedded in each department
curriculum
95. Entrepreneur self-efcacy training embedded across the university
96. Start up new venture training availability for all staf and students
97. Enterprise educator training opportunity for all staf
98. Student entrepreneurship society
99. Actve student engagement and leadership in the entrepreneurship
feld
100. University personal development contract and related actvity with
students in general
101. Central support unit actvity for entrepreneurship and enterprise
educaton
102. Placement actvity in SMEs and small organisatons across the
university
103. Careers services engagement with SMEs and entrepreneurship
training
104. Employability agenda addressing the self-employment and
entrepreneurship opton
105. Use of external partnerships in enterprise training
106. Wide use of enterprising pedagogies across the university
(embedded in teaching and learning strategy?)
107. Capacity for entrepreneurship educaton beyond the business school
108. The university as an entrepreneurial organisaton
Low High
Natonal Centre for Entrepreneurship in Educaton (NCEE)
Page 58
Appendix B: Background Readings
Crow, M. M. (2008) ‘Building an Entrepreneurial University’ in ‘The Future of the Research University. Meetng the
Challenges of the Global C21st University’. Paper to 2008 Kaufman-Planck Summit on Entrepreneurship Research
and Policy , June 8-11, Bavaria, Germany. Pgs 31-41
Etzkowitz, H. (2008) ‘The Triple Helix. University- Industry- Government, Innovaton in Acton’. Routledge.
Gibb, A.A. (2005) ‘Towards the Entrepreneurial University. Entrepreneurship educaton as a lever for change’.
Natonal Council for Graduate Entrepreneurship (NCGE) Policy Paper. – see NCEE website
Gibb, A.A., Haskins, G., Hannon, P., and Robertson, I. (2012) ‘Leading the Entrepreneurial University. Meetng the
Entrepreneurial Development Needs of Higher Educaton Insttutons’. A Natonal Council for Entrepreneurship in
Educaton (NCEE) Policy (Updated) Paper – see NCEE website
Gibb, A. A. (2012) ‘Exploring the synergistc potental in entrepreneurial university development: towards the
building of a strategic framework’. Annals of Innovaton & Entrepreneurship 2012, 3: pgs 1-24 - see NCEE website
Gibb, A.A. and Haskins, G. (2013) ‘The University of the Future. An Entrepreneurial Stakeholder Learning
Organisaton’, in Fayolle A.and Redford D. Edts. ‘Handbook on the Entrepreneurial University’, Edward Elgar
Publishing (forthcoming, January 2014) – see NCEE website
Heseltne, M. Rt. Hon., (2012) ‘No Stone Unturned. In Pursuit of Growth’ UK Department of Business Innovaton
and Skills; Crown Copyright. October.
Moore, M. H. (1995) ‘Creatng Public Value: Strategic Management in Government’. Harvard University Press
Newman, J. H. (1852) ‘ Knowledge, Learning and Professional Skill’ in Alden, R.M. (edt) (1917) ‘Readings in English
Prose of the 19th Century’. Cambridge Press. Mass. USA pgs: 418-439
Nowotny, H., Scot, P., Gibbons, M. (2003) ‘Mode 2’ Revisited: The New Producton of Knowledge’. Minerva 41:
pgs:. 179–194
Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Educaton (QAA) (2012) ‘Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Educaton.
Guidance for UK Enterprise Educaton Providers’. UK Department of Business Innovaton and Skills (2011) ‘Higher
Educaton. Students at the Heart of the System’. Command 8122 June
UK Higher Educaton Internatonal Unit. (2011). Internatonal Pricing Study: A snapshot of UK and Key compettor
country internatonal student fees. Research Series 9.
Universites UK (2012) ‘Futures for Higher Educaton: analyzing trends’
Universites UK (2012) ‘Universites enabling social enterprise: delivering benefts for all’.
Universites UK (2013) ‘Massive open online courses: Higher educaton’s digital moment?
Watson, D., Hollister, R.M., Stroud, S.E. and Babcock, E. (2011) ‘The Engaged University. Internatonal Perspectves
on Civic Engagement’. Routledge.
Wilkins, S. & Huisman J. (2012) The Internatonal Branch Campus as transnatonal strategy in higher educaton. Higher
Educaton 64(5): 627-645
Wilson, T. (2012) ‘A Review of Business-University Collaboraton’. Department of Business and Skills UK
Wity, Sir Andrew (2013) ‘Independent Review of Universites in their Local Communites: Enabling Economic
Growth’.
World Educatonal Services (2012) ‘Not all internatonal students are the same’ & ‘Beyond more of the same’
Research Report 02 and 03
World Educatonal Services (2013) ‘Internatonal student mobility trends 2013’. Research Report 04.
Young, Lord, (2013) ‘Growing Your Business. A Report on Growing Micro Business’.
www.natonalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence
Natonal Centre for Entrepreneurship in Educaton (NCEE)
Page 59
THE ENTREPRENEURIAL UNIVERSITY LEADERS PROGRAMME
Other papers in the EULP series available from NCEE
The papers listed below illustrate some of the progressive thinking behind the Entrepreneurial University
Leaders Programme. They can be downloaded from htp://eulp.co.uk/publicatons/
1. (2005) ‘Towards the Entrepreneurial University. Entrepreneurship educaton as a lever for
change’.
This paper demonstrates a broad model of entrepreneurship and its relatonship to personal
enterprise. It defnes these concepts and their links to innovatons of all kinds. It also sets out a
range of associated personal competencies for development and describes three models of an
entrepreneurial university.
2. (2009) updated (2012) ‘Leading the Entrepreneurial University. Meetng the entrepreneurial
development needs of higher educaton insttutons’.
By way of a substantal review of the literature, this paper sets out the major challenges to, and
opportunites for, leadership of universites arising from changes in the global environment and
the implicatons for the entrepreneurial design of the higher educaton sector. The focus is upon
the impact of a growing complex and uncertain environment on key areas of university actvity and
the specifc leadership challenges involved.
3. (2012) ‘Exploring the synergistc potental in entrepreneurial university development: towards
the building of a strategic framework’.
This paper develops a strong basic framework for reviewing the entrepreneurial development
capacity of a university by exploraton of existng and potental enterprising and entrepreneurial
actvity in fve key areas of: Strategy, Governance, Organisaton and Leadership; Knowledge
Exchange; Stakeholder Relatonship Development and Partnership (local, regional. natonal and
internatonal); Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Educaton; and Internatonalisaton. It describes
the potental benefts of bringing the various actvites together and introduces a comprehensive
scorecard.
4. (2013) ‘The University of the Future. An Entrepreneurial Stakeholder Learning Organisaton’.
This paper explores in some detail the ‘specifcs’ of turbulence in the Higher Educaton ‘task
environment’ in the UK and England in partcular and the immediate challenges and opportunites
these pose. It describes the responses and demonstrates how universites are adoptng a wider
entrepreneurial stakeholder model of development.
NCEE
The Innovaton Centre, Coventry University Technology Park, Puma Way, Coventry, CV1 2TT
+44 (0)2476 158125 www.ncee.org.uk
Registraton Number: 5011518
NCEE is the trading name of the Natonal Council for Graduate Entrepreneurship
www.eulp.co.uk
doc_695434895.pdf