“Humans are not special because of their big brains. That’s not the reason we can build rocket ships – no individual can. We have rockets because 10,000 individuals cooperate in producing the information.”

Kim Hayes, Professor of Anthropology at Arizona State University

This quote opens the ‘State of the Relationship Report 2014’ from the National Centre for Universities & Business (NCUB).  A year ago the Council for Industry and Higher Education renamed to the NCUB and is funded by higher education funding bodies, the UK’s research councils, the Technology Strategy Board, major corporates and universities.

The report offers a range of information in relation to collaborative processes interspersed with a number of case studies which demonstrate good practice in relationships between business and universities. It also points to the work of intermediary bodies in Scotland and Northern Ireland assisting in bringing together business and universities.  No similar intermediary is referred to for England, however HEART can act as such a service for the West Yorkshire universities and colleges offering higher education.

Although our primary concern is the higher level skills needs for Leeds City Region based businesses we can of course help in all matters of interest such as research collaborations, knowledge transfer and so on.  We have known, ever since we commenced, that finding the right people to talk to can be problematic and this is certainly picked up in the NCUB report.

HEART can assist in finding the right people for you to talk to and work with!

Examples of how we have assisted in opening up links for business include:

• A searchable short course database offering links to partner offers.
• A searchable database of credit transfer from Institute of Leadership and Management and Chartered Management Institute awards aiding progression to higher education qualifications.
• Information on internships and student placements with accompanying case studies.
• Easy links to information on how your personnel can access part-time student loans.
• The business case for investing in higher level skills.