Vision Statement

Definition
A Vision Statement is used to communicate the End Goal for the programme and consists of some form of statement outlining the End Goal and NOT the actual journey, it also includes a description of any new or changed capabilities along with the desired service improvements and performance measures.

Vision Statement
The vision for City International is documented in the City University Internationalisation Strategy as follows:

To be celebrated as London’s premier internationalist University for research in business and the professions, dedicated to preparing students for careers, working with global practitioners, in partnership with research and teaching institutions.

In addition, the University Research Strategy states that research at City will be distinctive and innovative, seeking to meet the University’s objectives to maintain and increase high quality research that influences strategy, policy and practice.

To realise this vision, City will strengthen the research-teaching nexus and advance its regional, national and international visibility and reputation for high quality and inter-disciplinary research that leverages City’s profile and relevance to business and the professions. Key to achieving this, is the generation of income and commercialisation of research through the strengthening of partnerships and knowledge exchange with business and the communities.

In support of these strategies, a new unit will be provided to bring together expertise relating to Entrepreneurship and Knowledge Transfer, Research Grants and Contracts, and Consultancy. These will be supported by the professional skills and technologies required to maintain first class service delivery, administration and management reporting capability.

Description of New or Changed Capabilities
Provide technologies to enable the following capabilities to be delivered, in particular:


 * Provide a physical presence offering multi-channel (face to face, telephone, webforms and email) access to customer facing activities, such as applications for research funding, consultancy agreements, costing and pricing of projects, and commercialisation of research;
 * Provide a virtual presence complementing existing services and promoting links to businesses and third party organisations;
 * Establish processes and technologies to provide an integrated service for staff, students and external organisations;
 * Maintain a streamlined process to raise awareness for national and international funding and exploitation opportunities;
 * Provide real-time information about expenditure and transparent management of research and commercial projects;
 * Provide tracking and data retention for the life-cycle of all projects concerning staff, equipment, commercial activities, publications and intellectual property;
 * Provide management information to support research administration and links between schools and the central unit with the aim of facilitating and promoting inter-disciplinary research;
 * Establish the data management processes and technologies required to enable City to meet the statutory reporting requirements for HESA, HEFCE, RAE and equivalent future arrangements;
 * Establish the processes to enable benchmarking of City University research, knowledge transfer and commercialisation outputs required for monitoring performance both nationally and internationally;
 * Establish improved processes and technologies to support the administration and monitoring of research student progress during registration and post award;
 * Establish an “expertise database” for the purposes of integrating consultancy, knowledge transfer, research and commercialisation opportunities with City staff expertise;
 * Establish a database of additional staff skills profiles, including supervisory and research management skills;
 * Establish technologies to support administration, delivery and measuring the effectiveness of professional development training for business and the communities.

Service Level (Draft)
The following service levels are predicted when the programme is fully implemented:


 * General customer service activities
 * Enquiry request
 * Enquiry acknowledged
 * Enquiry assigned
 * Communications to enquirer
 * Application for Research Funding
 * Request for Assistance with Application
 * Application Review and Authorisation
 * Contract Negotiation
 * Award Confirmation to Sponsor
 * SAP Cost Centre Setup


 * Transparent Management of Research Projects
 * Progress and Expenditure Reports


 * Document Management and Archiving
 * Requests to access archive


 * Virtual Team Working and Collaboration
 * Requests for virtual environment setup


 * Management Information
 * Requests for standard reports
 * Requests for ad hoc reports
 * Statutory reports
 * Research Funding Benchmarking


 * Administration of Research Students
 * Enquiry handling
 * Process application forms
 * Process offers
 * registration
 * fee payment
 * assessment process
 * awards (delivery of pass lists to registry)


 * Experts Database
 * request for registering subject expertise
 * request for subject expert

Key Performance Indicators (Draft)
The Research and Collaboration Programme will directly and indirectly contribute to the following key performance indicators and will be tracked against these baseline forecasts as the programme progresses.


 * Number of Applications and Awards for Research Funding
 * Research Income
 * Student Research Numbers
 * Number of International Collaborative Research and Teaching Partnerships
 * The Times and Shanghai International Higher Education Ranking

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