Putting study into practice

　　In 2006, fashion graduate Emmeline Child won a Business Leader of Tomorrow Award from the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) for her fashion collection made out of recycled clothing. The ‘Emmeline 4 Re’ collection was being sold in high-street fashion giant Topshop’s flagship store in Oxford Circus and all proceeds from sales were going to The Salvation Army.

　　Child’s venture was made possible thanks to a Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) between The Salvation Army’s trading company, Kettering Textiles, and the University of Northampton. But the success of KTP projects isn’t unique to fashion. For any printer wanting to get ahead of the competition, a KTP is a good way of injecting drive and academic experience into a developing business, by allowing a firm to use the knowledge of a research institute and a recent graduate of the highest calibre, to improve productivity.

　　Founded in 1975 as the Teaching Companies Scheme (TCS), before becoming KTP in 2003, the programme now has more than 1,078 partnerships across the UK and is led by the DTI. A KTP is essentially when a company and an academic institution (knowledge base) partner-up to solve a particular problem or opportunity facing a company. These challenges could range from new product development through to just wanting to improve productivity. Each partnership then employs a graduate (associate) to work on the project, for a period of from one to three years.

　　Analysing the marketplace

　　One print company that wanted to take advantage of a KTP and analyse its position in the print management marketplace, to identify areas for corporate development and investment, and to integrate these into its IT systems, was Webmart. It entered into a KTP with Oxford Brookes University, employing BA in marketing management and MA in international business graduate Nick Virtsonis in August 2005. Due to be completed this September, the result of the KTP is a comprehensive survey of print prices and buying patterns in the UK. (This is data that the firm intends to share with the BPIF.) The research is based on the £3bn plus of ‘real life’ quotes the firm has handled in the past eight years, which Virtsonis has analysed to predict what direction pricing levels are likely to take in the future.

　　Following on from its success, Webmart now intends to enter into a Business Plus project – a less rigorous KTP, which can last from three months to a year. “We want to develop a graphical user interface and internet-based profiling and analyse the use of technology,” explains Webmart managing director Simon Biltcliffe.

　　In a similarly forward-thinking manner, the Printers Chari­table Corporation (PCC) wanted to look towards the future of the charity and the demographic it would have to cater for. Its graduate researcher is Chun Yi Yu, who has a background in graphics and book retailing. She is conducting research on the demographic make-up of the UK print industry.

　　The director and secretary of the PCC is Stephen Gilbert. He explains: “The print industry has changed and people are living longer. We want to find out what we should be doing, how we can help and, by the end of the project, we hope to have a good idea of this.

　　“We wanted to take best practice from companies like BP, and Vodafone, that have research departments. KTP means that we can use the resources of the Cass Business School and we have a member of staff through the scheme who will carry out research for us,” he adds.

　　But while a KTP has many advantages – on average, the business can expect an increase in profit of over £290,000 – it is not to everybody’s taste. “It requires a lot of management and can be very time-consuming. It is not a quick fix,” warns BPIF head of training Ruth Exelby. The organisation was due to enter into a KTP with Thames Valley University, but had to pull out when it ran out of money. Planning the proposal, finding the right academic institution and the right graduate can take up to two years, not forgetting the time spent on facilitating the student and cost of the project.

　　And finances are crucial, because for each graduate that is engaged for two years on a programme, the company can expect to get a maximum government grant of £60,000 per annum, no matter what the size of the company. SME companies with fewer than 250 employees can expect to contribute a third of the project costs, while larger companies with more than 250 employees would expect to pay half of the project costs. This is towards the cost incurred by the institution and the cost of employing the graduate. The company would also need to cover the full overhead costs of their own participation in the programme, such as the management and additional equipment costs.

　　Even the application form can be daunting, according to Biltcliffe. “Luckily, we have a lady in marketing who handled that side of it. You have to keep commercial benefits in mind because [the universities] go off on academic tangents. You have to get an equilibrium going within the relationship. The pace that academics work at is very different from the day-to-day speed of your business,” adds Biltcliffe.

　　Success story

　　However, Webmart’s story is one of success as it plans to employ Virtsonis full-time after the project ends, in September, as head of the firm’s strategic marketing. Webmart predicts the company’s profit has grown by 40%, partly because of the insight gained through its KTP research – it paid around £30,000 towards the cost of the project.

　　“He gets a higher degree qualification and experience. He enjoys the industry and he has a great future ahead of him. It’s a matter of working out how we can maximise his ability within our framework,” says Biltcliffe.

　　“The great thing is you’re independent. You have ownership of the project. You have two bosses but it’s your call what to do, similar to a consultancy project,” Virtsonis adds.

　　Possibly the biggest advantage of a KTP is that it is a way of recruiting high-calibre graduates into the print industry. With the average age of the industry at around 48, and a poor level of graduates within the sector, KTPs represent an excellent way to attract the best of the best and secure the industry’s long-term future.