Top 10 tips for Higher Education to engage better with industry

Constructing Excellence

Our Chief Executive, Don Ward, has put together a list of ways in which Higher Education can work better with industry.  Do you agree? Do you have any additions to add?  Please let us know using the comments below.

  1. Guest lectures
    Invite industry leaders and local businesses to give guest lectures.
  1. Support senior boards
    Talk to the leading built environment business in your area and perhaps offer to attend a board meeting to lead a discussion about sector trends and innovation.
  1. Seek secondments
    Perhaps part-time, for key member(s) of faculty to a leading industry firm for six months or longer to aid mutual sharing of ideas and thinking.
  1. Signpost CE and G4C
    Create a hotlink from your departmental website to Constructing Excellence – to encourage both students and faculty to tap into this resource. And signpost G4C, the early careers nationwide young persons network of Constructing Excellence, as a pathway for continued engagement with leading edge thinking in the sector.
  1. Join the local CE Club or region
    Offer to host its meetings and present from time to time – join its committee, or the board of Constructing Excellence in your region.
  1. Impact case studies
    Capture your best examples of value added with industry, using examples from your REF submissions or elsewhere, and make sure they are available in plain English for industry firms to read and be inspired.
  1. Industry events
    Work with the local, regional and national CE networks to design an annual showcase event to bring together your latest research and education offerings with key industry leaders in the region and beyond – or to get their participation in your annual careers fair.
  1. Join CEHE
    Participate in this national theme group which brings together academics and members of Constructing Excellence for mutual benefit around research, education, careers and enterprise.
  1. Dissertation topics
    Tap into CEHE’s list of suggestions sourced from national members and theme groups to help students focus on industry-relevant themes.
  1. Constructionarium
    Find out about this and consider how to integrate the learning experience into your curriculum.
  1. Review CE’s top tips for industry
    Review our sister document to this one, encouraging engagement of industry with HE, see if you can improve the ideas, and more importantly use them to reach out to firms who may want to respond.