“The whole is more than the sum of its parts.”
– Aristotle.
Photo: Alina Grubnyak, Unsplash.
Utilising The University Imperative framework, each university can create a perfect harmony of concepts that interplay relentlessly in the production and reproduction of organisational direction and organisational character. In developing its own ecosystem, each university can stare down the barrel of unprecedented, apparently insurmountable complexity, and navigate a way forward to deliver even better outcomes that benefit our societies.
Let’s recap a little on concepts briefly introduced in The University Imperative and previous blogs.
First, every university can peer through the white noise of uncertain and dynamic environments, and consistently pare back to basics to establish ‘intent’ through setting direction and generating purpose. The changing natures of workforces, the rise of innovation and entrepreneurship, and addressing societal needs are key 'north stars' for universities when setting direction. Delivering profound socio-economic benefits from academic impact through collaborative impact is the purpose of universities.
Second, with intent firmly established, all universities can maintain 'focus' by consistently combining an understanding of the knowledge-capital value chain with the discernment of an opportunity spectrum. An understanding of the nature of resources, market segments, paths-to-markets and delivery mechanisms helps establish a core strategy. Discerning an opportunity spectrum helps to competitively position offerings, prioritise them and effectively allocate resources to them.
Intent and focus help universities decide what to do and are two concepts at the framework’s conceptual core. They have a predominantly strategic orientation and put universities into position to take pro-active approaches to the identification of ‘priority opportunities’.
Third, based on how socio-economic benefits consistently manifest from universities (the ‘spheres-of-impact’), three other concepts – ‘curate’, ‘shape’ and ‘deliver’ – emerge. These are the critical proficiencies which all universities must master to deliver those benefits. They have a predominantly tactical orientation, shifting priority opportunities to ‘tangible opportunities’ (the process of curation), then to ‘active partnerships’ (the process of shaping), and then, together with their partners, to the delivery of great socio-economic benefits (the process of delivering).
Fourth, the process works in sync with a combination of well structured engagement, operating and implementation models. Engagement must be purposeful, requiring the objective and purpose of engaging to be understood, so that effective internal and external engagement activities operate in tandem. An operating model shaped around critical proficiencies provides alignment of key actions required to deliver great societal impact, with enabling programs to support those actions, and an ability to draw the right resources from the various organisational functions. An implementation model that recognises the impact of the operating landscape (internal and external environments) on strategic and implementation decision-making, that is anchored by intent, critical proficiencies and operating model, and that utilises five key system-based activities (sensing, sourcing, marshalling, serving and harmonising), delivers the desired outcomes.
Fifth, and most importantly, the process of identification of a set of priority opportunities, and moving to tangible opportunities, then to active partnerships then to the delivery of socio-economic benefits is a relentless, but consistent, one. And, over time, complexity, richness and efficiency can be incrementally incorporated in the process, drawing on new and different parts of university expertise, and generating the possibility of multiple, customised and targeted societal benefits.
Crucially, the fundamentals of the framework remain the same at all times, irrespective of the stage of development. Furthermore, the functionality of the framework to derive impact can be applied consistently across the depth and span of organisation, regardless of strategic or tactical orientation. The framework can be applied at an executive level, and within discrete groups, faculties, schools, and research institutes, and across several of those elements. This consistency arises because the framework identifies the fundamental matters that require attention, and which remain constant regardless of the dynamism of environments.
It is the application of the various components of the engagement, operating and implementation models that vary, depending upon the different operating contexts that universities face due to this dynamism. This is why establishing the right organisational character, but with an unflinching eye on the overarching framework, is a major contributor to success.
My book The University Imperative – Delivering Socio-economic Benefits for our World provides this powerful framework, and explains the interplay of organisational character to bring the delivery of tremendous socio-economic benefits to life, as environments ebb and flow, sometimes calmly, sometimes turbulently. There are some really insightful concepts and examples detailed throughout.
I hope the book will help you. A lot!
In the next blog I’ll share something I commenced writing for The University Imperative – Delivering Socio-economic Benefits for our World that didn’t make the final edit. Not because it wasn’t worthy, it just wasn’t meant for this book (but it will be in the next).
The University Imperative can help university leaders and management teams, business leaders, entrepreneurs, government and policy makers, social impact creators and investors, as well as leaders and employees in SME’s, global enterprises and government.
So, I started writing about the multifaceted partnership models on offer to, and being utilised by, universities (and other organisations alike) to deliver great socio-economic benefits. There is a lot to canvass here! So with the first book I decided to predominantly focus on the conceptual framework that all universities (and organsiations) must apply to deliver great socio-economic benefits.
The next book will provide an explanation of the nature of the exchanges that occur between universities and their partners, collaborators and stakeholders. An understanding is crucial to the ability to establish the value propositions required to be successful – there are three. The book will also delve into the partnering process, from all aspects of an exchange. And, will drill down into concrete examples of partnership models which can deliver great socio-economic benefits.
In the meanwhile, make sure you visit the website: www.nicholasmathiou.com. There’s more useful stuff there as well.
I look forward to our continued journey.
Nick & The University Imperative team.
“What was happening could be described as a great ship being turned and blunted and shoved about and pulled around by many small tugs. Once turned by tide and tugs, it must set a new course and start its engines turning. On the bridge which is the planning centre, the question must be asked: All right, I know now where I want to go. How do I get there, and where are the lurking rocks and what will the weather be?”
– John Steinbeck, The Winter of our Discontent, Pan Books, 1961, p. 98
Ever since their establishment as institutions of higher education and research, universities have been different. Their evolution across the past ten centuries has seen them infused with an enduring ethos to benefit society. Irrespective of individual institutional personalities and their manifold geographical coordinates, this remains a distinguishing characteristic of any university. A university is still a community of teachers and scholars. It, therefore, remains a veritable epicentre of ideas, a concept factory, the rightful birthplace of innovations and products that make the world a better place in which to live. It is a think-tank for the betterment of society, an environment where the very practice of education is an exercise in social enrichment.
Certainly, that remains the intent.
However, we live today in a world of constant change, uncertainty and unprecedented challenges, a social situation accentuated by the global events of 2020 and 2021. We find ourselves in profoundly difficult territory.
While universities, on the face of it, continue to operate according to their broad traditional ethos, they are increasingly required to question whether they have the societal cut-through expected of institutions of higher education and research. Are the graduates emerging from universities today scholars in the truest sense of the word? Are they the thought leaders and change managers who are capable of not just meeting the demands of an uncertain environment but able and determined to transform it for the greater good? Are the products at the end of the university assembly line utilised in the delivery of social benefit?
Achieving that cut-through and hitting those societal targets is no longer a matter of course. The digital revolution has seen to this. Technologies have changed the ways we think and interact forever, not least in terms of information and know-how and how these are acquired and shared. A new currency is at play in the business of knowledge, and the modern value of higher education and research has come under pressure. The academic foundations and research rigour that once positioned the university on a higher plane are now under siege from easily accessed information (frequently camouflaged as expert knowledge). Multi-national tech companies have provided global platforms for the convenient proliferation of opinion in the absence of verified facts, and these often run counter to university endeavours and principles.
What of society-serving universities and the platforms they provide for scholars and researchers and the products of their academic enterprise? It is a prescient question which has risen ominously as the university funding model has been depleted and dented and ultimately damaged by a turbulent economic landscape, competition and the loss of traditional market-share, and ever tightening public funding available to support university activities.
Yet the need for universities to play their more than noble part in addressing societal issues has never been so clear. The onset of a global pandemic and its implications for health and governance into the future has amplified this need. Unless the role of the university is reinvigorated in proficient fashion, further challenges of profound import lie waiting for the people of this planet. There can be no doubt that the university – the institution of higher education and research, the community of teachers and scholars – is the entity best placed to meet these challenges. Society needs universities to stay relevant and provide benefit for all their stakeholders.
But staying relevant in a world of change requires change. And while a new or renewed way forward must be forged, it is incumbent on any university not only to do the right things, but to do them right. Staying relevant requires intent, focus, proficiencies, and organisational character. It means shaking off moribund shackles of intellectual isolation, and re-engineering the university mechanisms to harness the knowledge and energies of educators and researchers determined to flourish in the face of exponential change and challenges.
At the same time, the benefits of the educator’s and researcher’s work must accrue to the largest social cohort; otherwise a university will not achieve its mission and its relevance wanes. Educators and researchers must be provided with the platforms to nurture their sense of opportunity so it reaches tangibly beyond campus boundaries and seeks out collaborations that can optimise the impact of their work on a broad and meaningful scale.
The aim of The University Imperative is to present universities of all shapes and sizes around the world with a sense of what is required in this climate. It constructs a framework with which they can confidently calibrate their operations. The enduring goal of the university has not changed; delivering a beneficial impact for society remains the order of the day. What has changed is the emergent need for business disciplines in the delivery of social benefits.
Across ten chapters The University Imperative constructs a conceptual scaffold which considers the university’s bearings in this hectic social space while also keeping a measured eye on the resources at a university’s disposal. Any inclination to plot a way forward using rankings and recruitment like GPS coordinates must be resisted. Rather, the abiding importance of tertiary education and research must be reasserted, perhaps recalibrated, so that these staples of university can deliver the graduate and research outcomes that make our new world of perpetual flux a better place for all.
A university is an epicentre of ideas, a concept factory, the rightful birthplace of innovations and products that make the world a better place in which to live. It is a think-tank for the betterment of society an social enrichment.<br>
Yet universities find themselves in profoundly difficult territory, damaged by turbulent economic landscapes, intense competition and strained funding models. Unless the role of the university is reinvigorated in a proficient way, the ability to achieve its mission will be impaired.<br>
And with its mission impaired, relevance declines.
The University Imperative is a book that helps university leadership and management teams navigate today’s dynamic environments. It provides a framework for universities’ decision-makers to confidently attune their operations through identifying steadfast factors that, regardless of rapidly changing and complex environments, they must consider and master to deliver great socio-economic benefits