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The Escalate employer engagement programme (Winter 08/09)

Responding to Leitch: The Escalate Employer Engagement Programme at University of Bradford

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Summary

In this article, Celia Moran, Director of Escalate Programme, introduces the Escalate programme at the University of Bradford. The programme aims to redefine and renegotiate relationship with employers refocusing onto the higher level skills and continuing professional development needs of the future workforce. This also includes a focus upon organisational culture change throughout the University involving among other things, shifting the academic framework of the University so that it becomes more focused on part-time provision.

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Introduction

In the Winter 07/08 edition of Graduate Market Trends, Stephen McNair, discussed the implications of the Leitch Review, and particularly those associated with its implementation and the move towards a so-called ‘demand-led’ higher education system. In this article, Celia Moran outlines the Escalate Programme at the University of Bradford and how, as one of the implementation initiatives designed to respond to Leitch, it plans to engage with and deliver courses to employers in Bradford and further afield.

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The Leitch review of skills

In 2004 Lord Leitch was tasked, ’to consider what the UK’s long term ambition should be for developing skills in order to maximise economic prosperity, productivity and to improve social justice’ (2006, p6). Set in the context of a macro-economic policy based upon gaining competitive advantage through high skill, high value-added and high technology, the report clearly demonstrated the importance of ‘world class’ skills in an increasingly competitive global economy. Although both optimistic and ambitious, the scale of the challenge was made crystal clear. ‘…despite substantial investment and reform plans already in place, by 2020 we will have managed only to ’run to stand still’’ (2006, p7). The major advances in the skills levels required need a step-change in approach by the Government and providers and a significant shift in the attitude of both employers and individuals.

Lord Leitch’s 2020 ambition for more than 40 per cent of all adults to have a higher education qualification (at level 4 and above), up from 29 per cent in 2005, combined with the fact that more than 70% of the 2020 workforce have already completed their compulsory education, throws down the gauntlet for universities and other HE providers: in order to address the Leitch challenge, they will need to shift their focus away from the education of 18 and 19 year old school leavers and much more towards adults already in work. Both Leitch and the DIUS response (DIUS, 2007) also emphasised the need for a national culture change in relation to learning and skills, and for employers and individuals to accept greater responsibility, and by implication to bear a greater proportion of the costs of improving skills.

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University of Bradford: ‘making knowledge work’

The University of Bradford is a medium-sized research-active University which has a long-standing reputation for engaging with employers, particularly in relation to graduate employment. The Escalate Programme builds upon its core values of ‘making knowledge work’ and aims to refocus the University’s relationship with employers onto the higher level skills and continuing professional development needs of the future workforce. By redefining and renegotiating its employer partnerships, the University plans to position itself as a key influencing and change agent in the District of Bradford and beyond.

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Escalate rationale and objectives

In developing the Escalate Programme, the University has been mindful of the many and complex practical issues associated with the shift to an employer-led approach, some of which were identified by McNair. Importantly, the programme acknowledges and seeks to address these issues from both internal and external perspectives, by establishing Escalate as a demonstrator project aiming to deliver both internal cultural change and the higher level skills needed by employers to be globally competitive.

The objectives of Escalate are therefore:

  • To achieve significant strategic and culture change within the Institution, whilst at the same time allowing for the development and testing of models of delivery which will further inform HEFCE’s and the University’s employer engagement agenda.
  • To work in partnership with HEFCE and other strategic partners in this area to support actions outlined in the Leitch report and delivery plan, and disseminate the experience to inform the wider HE sector.
  • To contribute to the wider economic benefits of the City of Bradford, the District and the Region, through more effective delivery of HE programmes, which are developed and tested in partnership with key employers.
  • To shift the academic framework of the University so that it becomes more focused on part-time provision; reflecting the principles of negotiations over pace, length, curriculum content, delivery models, and learner support.
  • To establish an effective partnership between key employers and the University as a means of contributing to the up-skilling of the workforce for the challenges today and in the future.

The Programme is being delivered through the establishment of a central unit working in partnership with the University’s Schools, its ‘Ecoversity’ project, and the Careers Service. The intention is that for an initial period of three years, it will develop, test and deliver through pilot initiatives the framework necessary to achieve and embed meaningful employer engagement across the University. This focus upon organisational culture change, and the aim of ‘embedding’ employer engagement throughout the University, is one of the distinctive and most challenging features of the Escalate programme. As new curriculum and delivery models emerge, these will be used to test and inform the modification of quality assurance processes, academic regulations, and other aspects of the academic and support infrastructure. Academic Champions, based in each of the University’s Schools will act as ambassadors for the Escalate Programme and co-ordinate and drive activity at local level, thereby ensuring that the University is moving towards the delivery of the higher skills agenda across all of its areas of expertise.

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Meeting employer and employee needs

The project will initially focus on the needs within the Bradford Metropolitan District and the sub-region of West Yorkshire before being rolled out into the private sector, further afield and into the SME networks. The initial planned phases have been developed with a range of predominantly local employers, and are further informed by national and regional economic analysis in addition to University assessments of partner need.

Within this context of employer-led higher education, it is vital to remember the needs and requirements of individual learners, and the significance of the relationship between the university and its students. The days of a student graduating and then securing a career with limited continuing professional development, and no major directional changes or skills gaps, have generally gone. For non-graduates, the need for skill and knowledge development, and to have this recognised in a qualification, is at the forefront of the need to secure a competitive advantage, both organisationally and individually. Escalate therefore plans to develop a framework that engages, involves and empowers employees to understand their own skills needs, plan their own development and achieve academic awards on the basis of flexible programmes of study.

The first phase of this approach will be with the large public sector bodies given the mix in Bradford’s economy. This is in order to meet the immediate needs of the District, provide early success demonstrators and to prepare the ground for roll-out of the model to the private sector, SMEs and on a more national basis. This roll-out will be managed by the Escalate Partnership Board which will oversee the initiative, and during the course of the initiative will be strengthened further by private sector participation.

This initial phase will focus on the public sector bodies that reflect a workforce in:

  • Education
  • Housing and Environmental Services
  • Health and Social Care
  • Public Sector Administration
  • Emergency Services

The relevant employers are all relatively large organisations that have commitments to developing the workforce as a means of securing efficiency, effectiveness and enhanced service. This leads to a range of specific workforce needs that are evident across the Bradford and West Yorkshire areas, most notably:

  • Leadership and Management
  • Project Planning
  • Diversity
  • Social Cohesion
  • Sustainability
  • Enterprise
  • Applied Information Technology

These areas will therefore provide an early focus for curriculum development, either as stand alone units, or embedded within larger scale employee development programmes.

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Partnership approach

A recent CIHE report, (Connor and Hirsh, 2008) concluded that the employer-HE relationship is not based upon a simple customer-supplier model but on active collaboration based upon ‘fit’, a focus upon strengths and mutual benefits, and long-term commitment and deployment of resources. This requires a more holistic approach to HE engagement and is akin to the partnership approach being developed by Escalate.

The nature of the Escalate partnership with employers will be one which is predicated on the philosophy of establishing partners as ‘learning and developing organisations’. This will effectively mean that the partner organisation needs to be committed in a way that seeks to enhance both the effectiveness of the workforce and, as highlighted above, individual progression.

This philosophy of the ‘learning and developing organisation’ will therefore focus the direction of the partnership, and be characterised by:

  • embedding of a learning culture in the organisation, e.g. professional development plans and their annual review;
  • the ability to align training and development with organisational need;
  • ability to measure outcomes;
  • using learning and development as a tool for strategic planning;
  • using personal development as a vehicle to motivate staff, particularly through the achievement of academic credit;

and with the following contributions from partners:

  • support and assist the Skills Needs Analysis;
  • assist in planning the programme of study;
  • identify the learners;
  • support programme for learners;
  • contribute to review and evaluation;
  • ensure that the programme contributes to the partner as a “Learning Organisation”.

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Conclusion

The University is aiming to deliver ambitious targets in relation to employer partnerships, new programmes of study, additional students, accreditation of in-company training, and the accreditation of prior experiential learning (APEL) as part of Escalate, as well as a high-quality state-of-the-art learner facility that will be made available for use by local businesses. Perhaps more importantly, it is expected that the following outcomes will have been achieved by the end of the project:

  • a more flexible curriculum and academic regulatory model
  • an institutional culture change towards part-time and flexible learners
  • an environment which more fully recognises the needs of learning in the workplace
  • establishment of partners as learning and developing organisations
  • enhanced organisation skill levels and competitiveness
  • a distinctive dissemination process
  • and perhaps most significantly an embedded approach across the University

It is these outcomes that will, in the long term, equip the University to make the most effective response to Leitch and secure the long term relevance and sustainability of its higher education.

References

Connor, H and Hirsh, W (2008) Influence through collaboration: Employer Demand for Higher Learning and Engagement with Higher Education, CIEH, London.

DIUS, (2007) World Class Skills: Implementation of the Leitch Review in England, HMSO, London.

Leitch (2006) Leitch Review of Skills: Prosperity for all in the global economy - world class skills, HMSO, London.

McNair, S (2007) Higher education, careers and the skills agenda after Leitch in Graduate Market Trends, Winter 2007/08.

University of Bradford (2007), Escalate Employer Engagement Business Plan.