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Partnerships between academia and
industry
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It is my strong feeling
that training and consulting need to have a strong research basis, and
that research should be heavily guided by the challenges that managers
face in their companies. In short, academics need to pay attention to
what managers say; and companies and consultants need to validate their
training and recommendations.
I am an active researcher and as such, I search for sites to conduct
research investigations on critical management issues, such as
negotiations, leadership, creative thinking, and teamwork. This is often
challenging when the primary site for research is a university setting.
Ideally, academics need access to real companies and corporations. I
regard partnerships between academia and industry to be a win-win for
the researcher, the company, and employees.
Current partnerships
My colleagues, Dedre
Gentner, Jeff Loewenstein,
and myself established a partnership with Citigroup
in 1999. The purpose of our partnership is to: (1) help managers learn
to use their experiences so as to improve their ability to create value
in negotiations, as well as to claim value; and (2) to provide
customized training for Citigroup managers and executives on negotiation
skills. To date, we have offered customized negotiation training to over
500 Citigroup managers and executives in Chicago, Atlanta, and Denver.
Partnership Advantages
There are several advantages for the company and the researcher to
establishing a research-training partnership.
Company benefits:
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| A first-mover advantage in terms of being the first informed about
breakthroughs in management strategies and effective negotiation,
leadership, and decision-making skills.
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| High-quality training on important topics for large numbers of
employees
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| Customized programming
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| Highly-discounted rates for training
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Researcher benefits:
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| Production of new knowledge
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| Corporate setting to conduct research
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Fit & Eligibility
Large corporations and companies are ideally suited for partnerships,
as the production of new management knowledge and research requires the
analysis of often several hundred participants, in order to be
statistically reliable. For this reason, large numbers of people (e.g.,
200 or more) are needed to conduct a thorough research investigation.
Large companies in the greater Chicago area are particularly well
suited. However, I invite large companies in other cities to explore
partnership possibilities as well.
Format of training
As the trainer, we provide all training materials, simulations,
feedback forms, and learning tools. We ask the company to provide the
site (e.g., a conference room, seating, etc.) and arrange for
participants to be notified and invited. Our training sessions are
typically 3-4 hours in length and are suited for 50-75 people at a given
session. Typically, the first 30 minutes of the training is focused on
setting expectations, preparation for an in vivo exercise, followed by a
30-minute period wherein participants complete questionnaires. The next
hour or so consists of interactive simulation, case study, and/or
role-playing in a realistic business scenario. The final hour is devoted
to providing participants with individualized feedback, analysis, and
skills for improving their own performance. In many cases, a
"follow-up" is done with employee participants via web-survey
questionnaire to examine the long-term benefits of training.
If you are interested
Please contact me and let me know how many employees you can invite
to participate, your preferred time frame, and topic of interest.
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