Audit of the University of Oulu

Societal engagement and impact derive from the strategy

The strategy of the University of Oulu (UO) outlines the objectives for societal engagement and impact. The UO is committed to promoting the UN’s goals of sustainable development with research and education. Societal impact is included in the strategic development programmes and in the faculty strategies to ensure full societal impact of research and education. The strategic development programmes have key roles in developing societal engagement and impact.

Management of societal engagement and impact

The management of societal engagement and impact is built into the UO organisation and management system. There have been remarkable organisational updates after the last audit, e.g., the Vice Rector for Co-Operation, the University Innovation Centre, the Career Centre, and Key Account Manager activities are all new to the UO.

The rectorate has the main responsibility for directing the operational societal activities while the University Board steers the strategic level. The Vice Rector for Co-operation oversees the relationships with companies, other universities, and research institutions, both nationally and internationally. Key responsibilities also include strengthening research-based innovation activities, promotion of international partnerships and EU influencing.

The Cooperation Management Group led by the Vice Rector for Co-Operation supports the rectorate in managing societal impact. All the Faculty Deans are represented together with directors of appropriate service units. The Cooperation Management Group regularly discusses and guides the UO’s activities on company and stakeholder collaboration, key account management, and innovation activities. Each Dean also reports the collaboration activities within their faculties. The Council for External Relations is also under the responsibility of the Vice Rector for Cooperation. The Council for External Relations consists of five working groups, one for every focus area of the UO strategy. Each working group has several members from external organisations. The Council promotes the UO’s innovation activities, research, and company cooperation, working life relevance of education, alumni relations, and fundraising.

At the operative level, the University Innovation Centre (UIC) coordinates company collaboration according to the Operational Model for Business and Stakeholder Collaboration. The model offers guidelines also to researchers about collaboration with companies and other organisations. The UIC acts as an interface between stakeholder needs and university solutions focusing on research needs whereas directing other requests to appropriate internal units. The UIC also coordinates Key Account Manager (KAM) activities of the university. There are several full-time KAMs in the UIC and Extension School, and each faculty has part-time KAMs taking care of the most important customers of the university. Altogether twenty employees are closely involved in key customer and sales activities. The actions of the UIC and KAMs make sure that customer companies and stakeholders know the service portfolio and can find wanted solutions. The systematic approach has gained a rise in business activities of the university.

The UO has several ICT tools to manage relationships and societal impact. The UO has a CRM team and uses Microsoft Dynamics as a CRM tool. The CRM is used to store information regarding collaborations between the UO and its partners and will act as organisation’s shared memory once in university-wide use. Strategic goals and actions including activities for societal impact are tracked frequently by the management. Power BI visualises information from the accounting and shows how external relations provide additional funding and which research units conduct such collaboration. The UO uses the Overton tool to follow impact on public authorities, e.g. how research results are adapted by the authorities. Additionally, the UO monitors the visibility of research, the number of open access and self-archived publications and the openness of research infrastructures and metadata of the datasets.

Monitoring the operational environment

The UO has defined a set of strategic indicators to monitor the progression of societal engagement and impact. The state of strategic development programmes is reported to the University Board in accordance with the Board’s annual plan. The university administration contains outside members in the Board and Faculty Boards, and in the Council for External Relations. External members help understand the relevance of societal trends in education and research. Specific environmental scanning and foresight work is carried out in profile areas, focus institutes and Separate university units.

The inter-sectoral collaboration in research includes largely EU and Business Finland funding in addition to Research Council of Finland funded flagships and strategic research projects. The research agenda arises from the need to solve global challenges, from EU funding strategies but also from the needs of industries due to their changing operational environment. The UO facilitates interdisciplinary research collaboration aiming to establish consortia with complementary skills to solve societal challenges and create innovations. UIC and KAM persons also analyse operational environment when proposing research collaboration for companies. Daily societal monitoring is done by employees being in constant interaction with society.

In education, the career monitoring surveys for bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate graduates are the most important feedback channels for alumni. The information on graduate employment is analysed for insights into how the UO is responding to demands concerning working-life competences. The results are presented to Faculty Educational Development Committees and used to enhance their courses to be in line with career and professional needs. As an essential part of JOY (Jatkuvan Oppimisen Yliopisto – University of Continuous Learning), the Open University of the UO also collects the feedback on its activities twice a year and the analysed feedback is used to develop continuous learning offerings and studying experience.

The Unit for Strategy and Science Policy produces information and visions to support the university’s decision-making and operations management. The unit is responsible for knowledge-based management and information production, operations management, assessment of responsible science, internationalisation and sustainable development policies. Though there are several service functions to foster and monitor societal impact, more emphasis should be placed on encouraging the creation of impact in the faculties considering the full range of societal impact. Impact is not yet seen as a common goal.