Latest news

I used my skills at Camp Bastion

Our Executive MBA alumnus, Colonel Peter Mahoney OBE, talks to The Times about the management skills he used in the British Army.

Finding time to study in between stints in Iraq and Afghanistan wasn't easy, he says, but although his Nottingham EMBA "tour of duty" was a little longer than average, it was worth it.

He says that the Executive MBA was attractive because the School allowed him to take modules between deployments. Also, he did projects related to his work. He says, "During an aid agency tour in 2005, following the tsunami in the Indian Ocean, I did a project on issues associated with long-range supply chains in disaster areas."

Peter says that "looking after our injured is the best part of my role and the MBA skills help me deliver this."

Peter is now Defence Professor of Anaesthetics and Critical Care for the UK Armed Forces at the Royal Centre for Defence Medicine, Birmingham.

Article by Steve Coomber in The Times

Nottingham's MBA Director, Dr John Colley, talks to the FT about the pressures of a weak economy, changes to UK visa regulations, and less funding for MBA programmes that are all affecting enrolment to the UK's top MBA programmes.

Numbers crunch for MBA's

Nottingham MBA Scholarships Available

Nottingham University Business School is offering up to four half-fee scholarships for our full-time MBA programmes for 2012.

We are also offering generous scholarships and bursaries for our Executive (part-time) MBA and Corporate Social Responsibility MBA programmes.

http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/business/mba/Scholarships.html

Nottingham University Business School has been ranked in the latest international league table of full-time Master of Business Administration programmes.

In rankings just published by The Economist, Nottingham University Business School has been placed in the top 100 – against tough competition from the USA, Europe, Asia and Australia.

The School appears on the list with some of the world’s most prestigious institutions, including Dartmouth College, Harvard, Stanford and INSEAD business schools.

The Economist 2011 Top 100 MBA ranking rates business schools against each other in terms of:

• Opening new career opportunities and/or furthering current career of graduates

• Personal development

• Increasing salary

• Offering the potential to network

Professor Martin Binks, Dean of Nottingham University Business School, said:

“We are delighted that our MBA programme has been ranked in the top 100 by The Economist, given the enormous level of global competition in this ranking. We believe it reflects the quality of our general MBA as well as the specialist MBAs we offer in Finance, Entrepreneurship, and Corporate Social Responsibility. Our MBA programme can also be taken in a very flexible, part-time Executive format, which includes many delegates from major businesses and organisations across the region.”

“This ranking surveys our full-time MBAs while they are at the Business School, so it is gratifying to see the benefits of our ongoing efforts to improve the overall experience we offer our MBA students. We continue to focus on the quality of the MBA programme, which is already endorsed by our AMBA and EQUIS accreditations.”

The Economist ranking is distinctive for being the most "student-centric" of all the MBA rankings because it claims to measure the way business schools meet the demands that students have of an MBA programme.

To qualify for inclusion in The Economist ranking, the schools with full-time MBA programmes that responded to the survey had to meet various thresholds of data provision, as well as attaining a minimum number of responses to a survey gauging the opinion of current MBA students and alumni who graduated within the last three years. These were set as a proportion of the annual intake of students to the programme.

The findings are based on detailed questionnaires completed by business schools and around 20,000 current MBA students and graduates around the world.

The Economist Which MBA 2011 Ranking

More information is available from Dr Sophia Taylor, External Relations Manager, Nottingham University Business School, on +44 (0)115 846 6974, S.taylor@nottingham.ac.uk

In an opinion piece on the recent EU green paper on corporate governance, Professor Alistair Bruce comments that the EU Corporate Governance Framework, which sets out the key governance challenges facing corporate Europe, raises few new questions.

He warns that its aspirations will prove extraordinarily difficult to realise, as policymakers seldom get the outcomes they want. Alistair Bruce is Professor of Decision and Risk Analysis at Nottingham University Business School. Read more...

 

A study of Chinese companies challenges Western arguments that full privatization is the panacea.

Economic instability caused by the financial crisis in Western economies raises concerns for policymakers in developing countries. In particular, there is concern about the free market development model proposed by the Washington consensus. Policymakers in developing countries are therefore beginning to see China as a role model with respect to economic development.

The free market model calls for the liberalization of markets with less regulation and state interference. This creates an economic environment where business success is financially rewarded and financial reward motivates business decision-making. Full privatization is a key feature of the state reducing its role in the economy. China, however, has stubbornly followed its own, different path to economic development, with both full and partial privatization being a feature. Given China's status as a role model, it is well worth reflecting on its privatization program.

A Nottingham University Business School student has landed a management trainee position at a nationwide company, after being named as one of the top ten Management students in the UK.

Sebastian Pigge entered the Undergraduate of the Year Awards to see how he compared to other management students and help his CV stand out when applying for jobs.

The awards are designed to find the outstanding pre-final year Management undergraduates, with winners chosen based on their personal skills, career motivation and academic record.

Although he missed out on the top prize, bosses at Enterprise Rent-A-Car were so impressed with Sebastian’s team-working and motivational skills, they offered him a 12 month management trainee position.

After accepting the offer, Sebastian will take up the position after he graduates in July 2012. Starting by washing cars, he will encounter each department in the business, after which he hopes to become a branch manager.

Following the competition, Sebastian said he had been proud to represent The University of Nottingham at the awards.

He continued: “I would encourage everyone to take part. Not only does it look great on your CV, but it gives you amazing networking opportunities. I’ve become friends with many other students who are said to be the best of their kind.”

More information about the awards can be found at: http://undergraduateoftheyear.com/management

One of the first in-depth “insider” studies of the financial crisis has blamed “human” failings for the meltdown and called for urgent reforms to prevent a repeat.

A report by the influential Financial Services Research Forum reveals industry figures place little emphasis on economic and market factors when asked to explain the collapse.

Instead they believe a dangerous risk culture – brought about by regulatory and management weaknesses and poor communication – was at the heart of the turmoil. more...

Professor Nigel Waite is the founding director of the Financial Services Research Forum and a special professor at Nottingham University Business School

In a consumer environment sullied by global monetary meltdown, the credit crunch and the ongoing furore over bankers’ bonuses, the news that the average customer does not trust financial institutions might not come as a jaw-dropping surprise.

Read more at FT Investment Adviser

A new language of business

Top executives facing the toughest business climate of their careers are being offered new ways of thinking and a toolkit of valuable skills to tackle challenges forged by the global financial meltdown.

Nottingham University Business School is leveraging its knowledge of international markets and business trends to approach a range of topical – and controversial – issues by applying a combination of global expertise, world-leading research and direct industry experience to devise practical, informed solutions.

In launching its new Executive Education Short Course Programme, Nottingham University Business School will address topics including how to award bonuses in the post-banking-crisis era, delivering quality and performance improvements in public services as Government cuts begin to bite, and developing a unique and authentic style for a future generation of leaders.

Professor Martin Binks, Dean of Nottingham University Business School, said: “At Nottingham, we believe in applying the latest thinking to real-world business challenges and creating new opportunities for UK and global organisations.

“By identifying practical solutions to some of the most complex dilemmas facing organisations in today’s corporate environment, we believe we are uniquely placed to offer a lifeline to senior managers who are facing challenges never before encountered in their careers.”

Director of Executive Education at Nottingham Tim Wray said: “We already run very successful custom executive education programmes for a number of blue chip companies. However, we quickly recognised that this tailored approach to tackling key issues in a world which has been transformed by the downturn in the global economy could have far wider potential.”

Among the course highlights are:

• The New Language of Leadership – The Nottingham approach to leadership takes the best principles of management education good practice, relevant and effective psychology, experienced insights into business cultures in China and Asia, and scenario-planning to forge a unique, authentic leadership style.

• Executive Remuneration – As bonuses and pay packages for senior managers come under intense public scrutiny how can CEOs, financial directors and human resources professionals offer incentives for strong performance whilst demonstrating robust pay-performance linkage and transparency in salary agreements?

• Design and Innovation in the Public Services – With Government plans for the most radical shake-up in the history of the NHS and local authorities facing funding cuts of up to almost 10 per cent from central government funding from this year, public sector senior managers face extremely difficult choices. This course offers a practical education in the re-design of services and guidance on how to do more with less.

• Embracing the Cloud – A look at cloud computing, where software applications, computer processing power, artificial intelligence and other digital resources are accessed via the internet. Managers will learn how cloud software including Google Docs, Zoho and Adobe ConnectNow can be used immediately for no – or low – cost by anybody with a web connection to slash outlay on IT and make their businesses more competitive, sustainable and innovative.

Most sessions for this new programme of Executive Education courses will run at the Learning and Conference Centre of the National College for Leadership in Schools on The University of Nottingham’s award-winning Jubilee Campus.

The Executive Remuneration course, robust and research-informed, aimed at those responsible for remuneration policy such as non-executive directors and human resources advisors, will be delivered at a venue in central London.

The courses run for an average of two days with many providing a follow-up day several months down the line to evaluate the effectiveness of each delegate incorporating course outcomes into his or her day-to-day business practice.

A full programme and portfolio for the Nottingham University Business School Executive Education Short Course Programmes 2011 is available online at www.nottingham.ac.uk/executive

More information is available from Tim Wray, Director of Executive Education, on +44 (0)115 846 7741, tim.wray@nottingham.ac.uk

The University of Nottingham has won substantial awards from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) to establish one of only 21 accredited Doctoral Training Centres in the UK.

Over the next five years, the new training centre will support the next generation of social scientists through fully funded ESRC Studentships, including Business and Management.

The Business School's deadline for applications is 21st March 2011.

If you are interested in applying for one of these prestigious ESRC DTC Scholarships, please contact either Heidi.Winklhofer@nottingham.ac.uk or Amanda.Shacklock@nottingham.ac.uk well in advance of this deadline.

If you want to find out more, the University’s Faculty of Social Sciences is also holding a 'Drop In' event on Wednesday 16th March 2011.

Further details at research studentships dropin event

Nottingham University Business School offers a rich environment for doctoral study at one of the UK’s top ten research universities.

• The Business School’s success in the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) places us among the UK’s top ten for world-leading research.

• PhD students at Nottingham are among the most successful in the country, according to the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE). Nottingham ranks joint second in England on a measure of PhD completion rates.

• We specialise in entrepreneurship and innovation, corporate social responsibility, risk and insurance, operations management and supply chain, finance and financial services, strategy, and corporate governance, so if you want to concentrate in these areas we offer innovative and authoritative approaches to theory and practice.

Our aim is to provide the opportunity for you to develop your full potential by conducting your studies within a world-class research institution. You will receive research training and supervision from internationally recognised scholars across a wide range of disciplines.

Consumer trust in the UK’s finance institutions is struggling to recover in the wake of the financial crisis, with banks the least trusted of all, a new study has revealed.

According to a major report by academics, a significant number of customers have faith in their financial providers only because they feel they have no choice.

Some organisations are also effectively surviving on their reputations amid a lack of consumer trust in the people who run them, says the research.

The findings emerged in the latest Trust Index from the influential Financial Services Research Forum, based at Nottingham University Business School.

The study drew on data collected by YouGov from the responses of more than 2,000 consumers who were questioned in an online survey.
Institutions received index scores out of 100, with those above 50 indicating increasing trust, those below 50 reflecting increasing lack of trust and 50 neutral.

Asked how strongly they trusted their own financial providers, respondents ranked brokers/advisers comfortably in first place.

Yet even this figure fell significantly over the course of a year – from above 75 in the final quarter of 2009 to below 65 in the third quarter of 2010.
Banks, building societies, general insurance companies, life insurance companies, investment companies and credit card companies fared even worse.

None of them came close to the score for brokers/advisers, with banks bringing up the rear and struggling to rise above 55 throughout the 12 months.

For the industry as a whole, brokers/advisers again generally earned the best ratings – though they finished the survey year slightly behind building societies.

The banking sector dropped to an index of 35 and was once again in last place. The only sectors to score above 50 by the end of the third quarter of 2010 were brokers/advisers and building societies.

Forum director Professor Nigel Waite said the report highlighted the scale of the challenge the industry faces if it is to win public trust in the aftermath of the crisis.

He said: “The overall conclusion has to be that consumers are moderately trusting of their own financial institutions but tend not to trust financial institutions in general.

“As has usually been the case since we first developed the Trust Index in 2003, the brokers/advisers category continues to stand out as the most trusted.

“This perhaps reflects that consumers recognise the greater and more explicit responsibility such institutions have to work in their clients’ best interests.

“That said, in the current round of data collection even brokers/advisers have earned lower scores. This shows there is work to be done in every category.”

Additional questioning allowed researchers to identify potential explanations behind respondents’ attitudes towards trusting financial institutions.
For instance, many gave far lower ratings to senior managers than to the institutions themselves – suggesting institutional reputation is crucial to retaining custom.

In addition, a “significant” number of those surveyed felt that, having placed business with them, they had no option but to trust their financial providers.

Research author Christine Ennew, a Professor of Marketing at Nottingham University Business School, said: “There is clear evidence of ‘forced trust’ for many consumers.

“They feel that, because it is essential to have bank accounts and many other financial products, they have no choice but to trust these institutions.

“But an equally significant number of consumers experience ‘active trust’ based on good reasons, including past experience. So there are two distinct camps.”

The industry can at least take comfort from a finding that it is generally more trusted than supermarkets and mobile phone providers – but not the NHS or the BBC.

The Forum is an independent, not-for-profit organisation that has been hosted by Nottingham University Business School for more than a decade.

It is supported by government departments, regulators, charities and consumer bodies, as well as leading financial services providers.
The aim is to bring together all UK financial services stakeholder groups to inform policymakers in the public, private and voluntary sectors.
Professor Waite said: “The power of our research is that it allows individual providers to pinpoint customer perceptions that demand specific action.

“We would urge product providers to work with us in determining how well they are performing and where change is needed.”

Notes
The Financial Services Research Forum for further information contact Nigel Waite

A special professor who describes himself as a serial entrepreneur has been asked to join a team of advisors on the Government’s new Entrepreneur’s Forum.

Bruce Savage, a special professor at Nottingham University Business School, has set up a number of successful university spin-out companies in the biosciences sector.
 
Vince Cable, Secretary of State for Business Innovation and Skills, has invited Bruce Savage to advise him on new business and enterprise policies.

Employers have a growing need for new ways of thinking, finds
Steve Coomber, The Times

Nottingham may be famous for Robin Hood, Boots the chemist and lace-making, but if the new dean at the university's business school has anything to do with it, the city increasingly will become renowned for producing some of the best postgraduates in business.

More...

A new study is to look at how British business schools could boost their success by using sustainability to underpin their teaching, research and organisational behaviour.

The one-year joint project by the Nottingham University Business School and the University of Bath School of Management will survey business schools that have already demonstrated a commitment to sustainability.

The researchers will use the results to produce best practice case studies that will guide other schools looking to reap the financial benefits and contribute to a greener future by putting sustainability at the heart of their activities.

more...

A team of business students from The University of Nottingham Ningbo, China scooped second place at the SIFE (Students in Free Enterprise) World Cup in Los Angeles this week.

Thirty one students from the 114 strong team were in Los Angeles to pit their entrepreneurial skills against some of the world’s brightest young business minds.

They were beaten into second place by French University in Egypt (UFE), whose victory saw them become SIFE world champions for the second year running.

The University of Nottingham Ningbo, China (UNNC) team had the honour of representing China after winning the national finals in June. They beat three regional finalists out of an original entry of 131 university teams from across China.

The students presented two of their nine social enterprise projects to the World Cup judges. Beevelop is a venture which promotes honey sales for farmers. It has equipped beekeepers with the skills to raise wild bees – which are close to extinction. The Ant River Ginseng project was established to help extremely poor farmers in the North East of China, where the world’s best Ginseng is grown.

Beevelop has introduced new bee husbandry through initiatives involving better design and location of beehives, disease protection, financial literacy training and business partnership with a local wholesale honey company. The project also protects the endangered Chinese wild bee.

The Ginseng project received international accreditation for the quality product, fresh ginseng. The team introduced a new technology using mushrooms which, when planted next to the ginseng root, promote growth and productivity as well as an extra income for the farmers. The most innovative aspect of this project was the initiation of a micro-finance fund providing an interest free loan to the neediest farmers.

Dean of the Nottingham University Business School, Professor Martin Binks said: “This is a fantastic achievement which has been made even more remarkable by the fact that full time and exchange students from our Business School in Ningbo are representing China.

“Their community projects have transformed the lives of hundreds of Chinese people. No matter who wins the team’s commitment and support for these sustainable businesses will continue long after the excitement of competing for the SIFE World Cup.

The SIFE World Cup showcases the impact that SIFE teams are achieving around the world. The competition brings together more than 1500 students, academic and business leaders from more than 40 different countries.

More information about their work and the projects they have established can be found at www.sifeunnc.org or www.sife.org

Congratulations to Business School alumnus Chris Skilton, (Finance, Accounting and Management 2008), a former President of Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE) Nottingham, winner of the alumni laureate award 2010.

See the highlights on Youtube

Britain’s beer drinkers can serve as role models for the nation as it struggles to emerge from recession, according to an academic study.

The country’s real ale fans represent the perfect example of how greater consumer awareness can revitalise a struggling industry, say economists.

Equally, the ever-growing number of microbreweries satisfying their demanding palates offers hope for the UK’s small businesses.

Experts at the prestigious Nottingham University Business School came up with the findings after examining the history of brewing in England. They believe the industry’s rebirth in the wake of the Campaign for Real Ale’s founding in 1971 has implications for much of the UK economy.

Professor Peter Swann, the study’s author, said: “The fact is that the business world can learn an enormous amount from our beer buffs.

“The range of products and the number of centres of production in brewing in England declined dramatically between 1900 and 1970.

“As is widely accepted, that process began to reverse with the formation of CAMRA and its fight against bland, mass-produced beers.

“This has led us to the position we’re in now, with hundreds of small breweries spread all over the country and making thousands of different beers.

“In technical terms, this represents horizontal product differentiation and a reduction in the importance of the economies of scale.

“That’s basically a clever way of saying variety is the spice of life and that more discerning tastes can be good for the economy.”

At the start of the 20th century even many villages had breweries, but their number and geographical spread went on to shrink alarmingly. Falling transport costs and technological advances gave big brewers a huge advantage over their rivals, forcing the latter out of business.

By 1970 the number of breweries in England was just 141 – compared to 1,324 in 1900 – with most located in a few cities and towns.

The trend for bland, big-name products became so dominant that Ind Coope advertised its Long Life brand with the slogan “It never varies!”.

But CAMRA’s arrival and the group’s campaign for variety and quality raised consumer awareness and gradually ushered in a new era. The result was the ongoing boom in microbreweries, which specialise in small production runs that make no economic sense for big breweries.

By 2004 the number of breweries in England stood at 480 – approximately the same as in 1939 – many of them again in small communities. If the trend continues the situation here could one day rival that in beer-mad Bavaria, where almost every village has at least one brewery.

Professor Swann, a Professor of Industrial Economics, said: “We’re often told small businesses will be key to the UK’s financial recovery.

“The fall and rise of the local brew offers us a perfect example of ‘small is beautiful’, so it’s vital to see what lessons we can learn from it.

“One of the most important is that a demand for the predictable can lead to the greater geographical concentration of an industry.

“By contrast, a demand for diversity can lead to greater geographic dispersion – which is the excellent position brewing finds itself in now.

“CAMRA and the microbreweries should serve as an economic inspiration – and I say that as a man who doesn’t even like beer.”

Peter Swann
Peter Swann joined Nottingham University Business School in 2004 as a Professor of Industrial Economics. His research interests centre on innovation, demand and wealth creation and innovation and sustainability. He has held several advisory positions with government, including specialist adviser to the House of Lords Committee on Science and Technology.

An innovative micro-credit project offering small business loans to some of the poorest communities in rural Ghana has been set up by a group of enterprising students at The University of Nottingham.

The groundbreaking new initiative is already helping hundreds of people in Ghana to capitalise on their business potential and expand their profit margin — giving them a stable financial income and enabling them to work themselves out of poverty.

Dubbed CEDIS — which is Ghana’s national currency — the scheme is the brainchild of Chris Skilton, a graduate of Nottingham University Business School. He visited Ghana back in 2008 as president of the University’s Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE) team, which was setting up a cooperative for beekeepers to ensure they got a fair price for their produce.

During his visit he talked to many local business people — but the story was always the same — while successful in their own right, they were being held back from further expansion by a lack of capital funding and limited access to financial support. He learned that loan interest rates in the country are prohibitively high — mainstream banks offer annual rates of around 35 per cent, while private finance companies’ rates can be anything up to an astronomical 50 per cent a year.

The CEDIS scheme encourages Ghanaian entrepreneurs to draw up a business plan and uses capital from charitable fundraising to offer them loans of just two per cent per month over a six month period. Since its launch in October last year it has already helped more than 250 individuals and currently boasts a 100 per cent repayment rate.

Chris Skilton said: “There are literally millions of Ghanaians without access to legitimate financial services. With the support of the University and the SIFE team we have already been able to reach out to several hundred entrepreneurs. In the coming years we hope to offer thousands of individuals the same opportunities to develop their businesses and support their families.”

Chris has enlisted the help of the current University of Nottingham SIFE team to get the scheme up-and-running. Their role has involved assisting in the development of a social impact assessment scale to determine where the loans are most needed and the creation of a fully computerised database for managing the scheme.

Members of the team recently visited Northern Ghana to see the impact that CEDIS is already having on the lives of people living in one of the poorest regions in the world, with high levels of unemployment, an infant mortality rate of 25 per cent and a life expectancy of just 45 years.

They got the chance to meet people like Amma Yahaya Nabila, who runs a rice processing business and has had a loan of 100 Ghana CEDIS (around £50) and has used the return on her investment to give her children an education.
 
Speaking about CEDIS, she said: “To be honest, it has helped me a lot and I cannot thank them enough for their help. I am thanking them a lot as now my children are able to go back to school, within these recent days. It is from this profit margin that I got the help to support them to go to school.”

Vice-President of the University of Nottingham SIFE team Aaron Salamon, who has recently completely the first year of an economics degree at the University, was on the trip.

He said: “Every single day we met a different set of entrepreneurs. They were all living in very poor communities but they worked hard and were successful business people in their own right.

“These are very proud people — they are not interested in taking handouts or charity, they simply want the means to help themselves and just require a little extra help to allow them to reach their full potential.”

The scheme has benefitted from a £17,500 grant from the University’s annual development fund — £7,500 covered the cost of the trip to Ghana, while the students will use the remaining £10,000 to develop business ventures in the UK and Ghana. These businesses will allow CEDIS to expand its capital base and become more sustainable over time.

CEDIS has also joined forces with the organisation DEKI which through its website www.deki.org.uk offers people the chance to directly fund loans to specific borrowers in the developing world.

Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE) is a global non-profit initiative and competition which encourages students to demonstrate their business acumen while creating economic opportunity for others. The University of Nottingham SIFE team has a long history of success, having lifted the UK title four years in a row from 2005 to 2008.

Chris Mahon, Director of the MBA in Entrepreneurship at the Nottingham University Business School and Faculty Advisor for SIFE Nottingham, said: “The CEDIS programme is a great example of what SIFE is all about. Our students have worked very hard to develop and grow this important initiative in Ghana, and they have used the skills they developed here at Nottingham to help other people transform their lives.”

More information is available from Chris Skilton on +44 (0) 7876 243680, chris@skilton.co.uk; Aaron Salamon on +44 (0)7970217556, aaronsalamon@hotmail.co.uk or Dr Sophia Taylor, External Relations Manager, Nottingham University Business School,  +44 (0)115 8466974, s.taylor@nottingham.ac.uk

The value of buy-outs completed by private equity groups in the UK jumped in the first six months of the year, as firms reduced their cash piles by investing in larger deals.

Research from Barclays Private Equity and The Centre for Management Buy-Out Research shows that 87 private equity backed buy-outs – with a combined value of £7.9bn ($11.9bn) – were arranged in the first half of 2010.

This represents an improvement of more than the 50 per cent on the £4.7bn value of the 120 private equity buy-outs conducted in 2009. Indeed, in the first quarter of 2010, private equity buy-outs accounted for the largest slice of UK takeover activity, representing almost half – 47 per cent – of all transactions by volume.

The combined worth of all UK buy-outs, meanwhile, rose to £8.1bn in the first half of 2010, up from £5.6bn in 2009.
In the first six months of 2010, the average size of private-equity backed buy-outs more than doubled to £91.2m from £39.5m in the previous year.

However, the pace of activity slowed during the second quarter where 40 deals worth £2.7bn were a long way short of the £5.2bn of transactions coming off 47 buy-outs during the three months to April.

Christiian Marriott, a director with Barclays Private Equity, said: “After a strong start to the year driven by a surge in large secondary buy-outs, there has been a slowdown in momentum, although 2010 will still show the market recovering from the lows of 2009.”
The study also showed that private equity-backed initial public offerings have been as rare this year as they were in 2009.
“A number of large flotations were anticipated in 2010 but renewed stock market turbulence has held back the IPO market, with only two private equity-backed IPOs taking place so far,” added Marriott.

However, Marriott expects the number of private equity backed IPOs will rise before the year’s end.
“We may see a gradual increase of sizeable flotations in the second half of 2010, particularly where firms are willing to reduce debt levels before or after IPO, with some potentially well-received listings in the pipeline.”

Published in the Financial Times, 28/06/10
For more information contact Rod Ball, Research Fellow at the Centre for Management Buy-Out Research - The Centre for Private Equity Research, Nottingham University Business School.

Nottingham University Business School is joining an elite global group of EQUIS-accredited business schools in management education. Extensive visits earlier in the year by an international EQUIS peer review team assessed Nottingham’s operations in the UK and overseas.

EQUIS, which stands for European Quality Improvement System, is an accreditation scheme for leading institutions in business education. It is granted and run by EFMD, the European Foundation for Management Development, in Brussels.

Uniquely, this EQUIS accreditation will apply to all of the Business School’s international operations, including campuses in the UK, China and Malaysia.  Both the Nottingham and China campuses were visited separately for the EQUIS evaluation. Nottingham University Business School will be accredited for a period of three years before it is reassessed.

It takes several years to prepare for the rigorous process of accreditation. EQUIS assesses institutions as a whole. Not only all degree programmes but also all activities and sub-units of the institution, including teaching, research, e-learning units, executive education provision and community outreach, are considered. Institutions must be primarily devoted to management education.

Responding to the news, Professor Leigh Drake, Director of the Business School, said: “Nottingham University Business School is delighted to join a select international group of the world’s top business schools – just 128 out of more than 7,000 worldwide in 34 countries have EQUIS accreditation – so this is an excellent and significant achievement.

“To be awarded EQUIS accreditation for Nottingham University Business School in the UK, China, and Malaysia endorses and enhances our ambitious, multi-campus strategy and confirms the quality of our staff, students, programmes and facilities. EQUIS sets very high standards and we are extremely proud to join this elite group as a truly international business school.

“EQUIS focus strongly on corporate links, internationalisation and contribution to the community, which are increasingly important attributes of leading business schools, and we are very grateful for the involvement and support of our alumni and corporate friends and associates in contributing to this success.”

EQUIS is a mission based accreditation with an international focus and covers the entire School and all its activities – staff, students, programmes, research, contribution to the community, resources and administration, internationalisation, corporate connections. It is among the most prestigious of the accrediting bodies.

Since 1993, Nottingham University Business School has also held accreditation from AMBA, the Association of MBAs, for the quality of its MBA courses. The School recently went through a successful assessment from the AMBA team and was awarded a further five years of accreditation.

Scott Goddard, Director of International Relations and Chair of the School’s Accreditation Committee, commented that: “EQUIS is one of the most stringent of the international business school accreditation bodies.

“The Business School has introduced significant improvements as a result of the rigorous self-assessment and peer review process of the accreditation. We are now progressing in our aim to be a top 50 school worldwide. Our ambition is now to add AACSB (the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business) accreditation to complete the ‘triple crown’.”

Nottingham University Business School also recently gained accreditation from professional bodies for other individual programmes.

The MSc Tourism Management & Marketing now has the TedQual kite mark, which means it is certified by the United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) as a recognised tourism education programme. The MSc in Marketing has received accreditation from CIM, the Chartered Institute of Marketing, while the Executive MSc in Global Supply Chain Management recently gained accreditation from CIPS (Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply) and CILT (Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport).

The first Midlands MBA Career Fair is being held on June 4th at Aston Villa conference centre. It is a collaborative event, organised by four of the UK’s leading Business Schools all based in this region, Aston, Birmingham, Nottingham & Warwick.

This new initiative is designed to increase employment opportunities for our MBA students and build stronger relationships with regional, national & international employers. The event will also act as a showcase for a highly skilled, adaptable workforce capable of supporting growth in the UK economy.

With over 300 students in attendance the event will prove a great opportunity for employers to identify new talent. All have been subjected to a demanding selection process, have attained at least one first degree, bring with them an average of six years work experience and are looking for their next employment opportunity.

Throughout their MBA studies they have expanded their management knowledge through first rate academic teaching, practical project work and also benefitting from the wide range of skills from within their MBA group. Coming from over 30 different countries spanning the UK, EMEA, Americas, Oceania and Asia, these are the people who will become the business leaders of tomorrow.

Professor Leigh Drake, Director, Nottingham University Business School commented. “As a founder member of the Midlands Business School Careers Group, we are delighted to collaborate in this first regional event to present our MBA talent to leading employers. The Nottingham MBA was the first in the UK to integrate education in business ethics and sustainability, while our programme also emphasises skills in innovation and entrepreneurship—all areas that are much in demand by employers. We offer our MBA in Nottingham, Malaysia, and Singapore and students have opportunities to take part of their MBA overseas, giving them exposure to new ideas and cultures that is especially valuable for anyone wanting to work in multinational businesses”.

Further information.

The CBI's Stronger Together (http://highereducation.cbi.org.uk/reports/00246/ ) report recognises the need for businesses and universities to work together to secure each other's success and competitiveness. When universities and businesses do support each other the impact on the regional, national and global economy can be significant.

Julie Blant
Postgraduate Careers Service Manager
Tel +44 (0) 115 8466478
Email: Julie.Blant@nottingham.ac.uk

Professor Ken Starkey, Professor of Management and Organisational Learning at Nottingham University Business School, is to become a member of the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) Evaluation Committee from September 2010.

Professor Starkey will serve a minimum of two years on the committee, which is responsible for advising the council on the successful achievement of its corporate strategy through a combination of policy, centre, programme, and project-level evaluations.

Professor Starkey is an authority on management and organisational learning and his research is currently focused on the role and future of business schools.
His acclaimed 2007 book (with Nick Tiratsoo) The Business School and the Bottom Line (Cambridge University Press), was the first of its kind based on rigorous, empirical research.

He was appointed as one of the first Fellows of the National School of Government’s Sunningdale Institute, an academy of leading thinkers from the UK, Europe, and North America with expertise in management, organisation, and governance relevant to public service.

more...

How to inspire innovation and creativity from your people, by Martin Binks at the Institute for Enterprise and Innovation (UNIEI), Nottingham University Business School.

Achieving higher levels of output from the same or fewer resources has been one of the motive forces driving invention and innovation throughout history. In today’s troubled economic climate, innovation and effective decision making is even more of an imperative.

Just as leaders are called upon to set standards for ethical behaviour, they should also be responsible for enhancing the willingness of people in organisations to embrace innovation. What is often overlooked is that this does not only refer to the acceptance and innovation of new products, processes, organisational structures or communication strategies, but to their quality.

During tough times, the need for short-term firefighting means thinking differently and identifying new opportunities are least likely to happen. Yet it is in these times when innovative thinking is most needed, not least because it is at this time that businesses are most at risk from disruptive innovation from competitors.

Study suggests there are two types of innovation. The first builds on gradual improvements to established methods of operation. The second leads to radical change. The first improves, the second transforms.

Incremental innovation is the sort of activity that maintains or increases market share, often in response to market research and customer feedback. Radical innovation involves considering key aspects of a business from non-obvious, even seemingly perverse perspectives to reveal opportunities that were previously unrecognised. Radical innovation leads to what Kuhn described as ‘paradigm shifts’ in that the prevailing rules no longer apply. By definition, we find it difficult to perceive or reach an invention with the potential for radical innovation from where we are now.

Crucially, for management these innovations are not just restricted to products, services and processes, but can also transform organisational behaviour, structure and culture – all areas that fall within the domain of HR.

While it may be important for organisations to refresh their offerings in order to remain competitive within existing markets and technologies, it is also important they undertake more wide-ranging and free-thinking reviews of all the other aspects of their operations to ensure previously unrecognised opportunities are not missed. In understanding this there should be an imperative to access rather than thwart the innate talents of their human resources, because if they don’t, they can be sure their competitors will.

Innovation is far more than having a ‘eureka’ moment and is rarely the action of one individual. Innovation is a process that starts with the identification of a problem or opportunity and extends all the way through to the new innovation being implemented.

The belief that there should be no restrictions or barriers around innovation is a mistaken one as it is important to exclude suboptimal, poor quality ideas and concepts. For innovation to be effective, it requires both ‘pre-concept’ preparations and ‘post-concept’ implementation strategies. Pre-concept activities can improve the quality of solutions while post-concept actions determine the efficiency of their innovation.

In a perfect world, innovation would be broken down into a simple but rigorous procedure:

• a definition phase that strips the problem down to its root causes so they can be dealt with one at a time;
• a discovery phase that comprehensively explores this root cause and uses divergent thinking and storming to generate multiple   solutions; and
• a determination phase that sifts these ideas and comes up with a small number of viable alternatives.

In practice, though, pressure to seek a solution as quickly as possible means we tend to neglect this crucial ‘pre-concept’ focus and look instead to the nearest emerging from previous experience or deployed by others. That’s why the flow of new ideas and concepts into organisations is so often suboptimal.

Pre-concept innovation analysis also saves money because it helps to filter out unworkable concepts at an early stage when the sunk cost involved is quite low. Insufficient focus on problem definition, idea generation and concept selection often allows significant costs to be incurred before fundamental weaknesses that could have been detected much earlier are fully recognised.

Another problem organisations face is that rapid decision-making under pressure without sufficient advice or reflection is sometimes mistaken for effective leadership. It’s not. It simply means there is virtually no pre-concept focus and the existing reservoir of experience and ability present in the rest of the organisation is ignored.

The key thing about creativity and the generation of innovative ideas is that they are not the jurisdiction of a select few; they are open to everyone. We often tend to be self-limiting in the extent to which we share ideas for fear of humiliation, criticism or simply due to a lack of trust in how these may be used or recognised.
But open innovation and the sharing of ideas requires structure and trust and may best be established through collaborative pre-concept working across the organisation. Approaches and systems that are created by those expected to apply them may be less susceptible to rejection and therefore more long lasting.

What we at UNIEI have been doing over the past few years is to try to encourage behaviours in that ‘perfect world’ where pre-concept thinking is paramount in the real world and constraints of time and resources militate against innovation
So even though the prevailing trading conditions in many markets are difficult and now may not seem to be the best time to encourage people to stop, think and reflect, this could actually be exactly what’s needed to kick-start innovation efforts. The outcomes may be impossible to predict but their impact could be enormous.

The organisational culture also needs to encourage debate and the ability to challenge. If a company has a strategy for developing staff across the piece that implies a significant step in devolving responsibility to the whole organisation – taking a more organic view of sources of innovation to sit alongside top down strategic views.

People at every level ought to be involved in strategic innovation and development. ‘Ownership’ of innovation is crucial: change management is much more effective if the people involved have taken part in the strategy and the solution – they will be far more likely to buy into it.

A culture of enquiry is essential and again this is something that everyone within the organisation can become involved in. An open attitude to innovation can become part of the organisation’s brand. Companies such as 3M, Google Inc and John Lewis are prime examples of companies synonymous with such an atmosphere of innovation and change and a continuous aspiration to anticipate the next wave. Companies like these not only encourage innovative ideas and people within; they also act as magnets for ideas and people from without, including their competitors.

HR needs to be more ambitious and rise above the role of guardian best practice to a more strategic level when it comes to fostering creative talents. In order to create highly innovative brands, systems and processes are needed to acknowledge and reward the generation of innovative ideas and inventions. The most creative people are not necessarily those with the loudest voices: they may need to be sought out.

Published in Talent Management Review Spring 2010 Organisation development
Further reading
Kirkham P, Mosey SP, Binks MR. Ingenuity in Practice – a guide to clear thinking.
Available at www.amazon.co.uk. ISBN: 0-9563453-0-1.
 

Private equity groups have returned to the dealmaking fray, completing £5bn of buy-outs in the UK in the first quarter, more than they managed in the whole of last year, according to research published today.

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Public service managers facing hefty budget cuts must find ways of keeping their staff on side if they are to stand any chance of maintaining levels of service, Dr Peter Samuel of Nottingham University Business School warns.

Read more...

The government's decision to replace paper files with electronic records in social care was arbitrary and ill-informed, according to David Wastell, Professor of Information Systems at Nottingham University Business School.

 

He also believes that the integrated children's system has failed to make best use of information technology, leaving social workers struggling to build up chronological histories of families,


In an article for Community Care, Prof.Wastell says the "profound technological" shift in policy towards electronic case records was "seemingly driven by an article of faith, the conviction that 'electronic is best'".

 
The actual evidence used to justify the switch was scant, he adds.

"No specific evidence is brought forward at any point to prove the case for electronic recording, and negative feedback has consistently been reinterpreted, dismissed or ignored throughout the ill-starred history of the integrated children's system"


Read more here

In an article in the Telegraph Peter Swann, Professor of Industrial Economics at the Business School, has warned that the 'relentless pressure' to upgrade to a new computer is creating a mountain of electronic waste, that threatens to become an environmental time bomb.


He believes that around 2.5 billion perfectly usable PCs will be needlessly scrapped by 2013. and blames 'lazy' software developers for cutting corners, and creating programs that use more processing power than strictly necessary, forcing computer users to upgrade to a machine with more memory to handle modern computing demands.

"The principal solution to the problem of PC e-waste is for developers and marketers to stop using strategies that contribute to bloat and enforced upgrading," said Professor Swann.

Read the full article here

Business owners, managers, aspiring entrepreneurs and all those interested in enterprise and investment are invited to hear the latest high-profile speaker in Nottingham University Business School's Business Leaders Series this Wednesday evening, 3 March.

 

Michael Queen, Group Chief Executive of 3i, the UK’s largest private equity firm, will speak about private equity investment, management buyouts, growth capital and infrastructure at the University's Jubilee Campus from 5.30pm.

 

A Nottingham University Business School graduate with a BA (Hons) degree in Industrial Economics, Michael was Chairman of the British Venture Capital Association from 2002-2003. He is also a Member of the CBI's Financial Services Council and a qualified Chartered Accountant. He joined 3i as an investment professional in 1987.

 

Private equity investments remain at their lowest level in the UK for over 25 years according to research from Nottingham's Centre for Management Buyout Research (CMBOR) published in the Financial Times in October last year. Only 31 private equity backed buyouts were completed in Q3 2009. In January this year, the UK market saw the lowest buyout value since 1995. However there are now signs confidence is beginning to return.


Mr Queen, 48, became CEO of 3i one year ago. His 22-year career there included eight years as Finance Director between 1997 and , followed by his appointment as Global Head of Growth Capital, before becoming Managing Partner of the Infrastructure business, overseeing 3i's investments in essential services like water, energy, schools, and hospitals.

 

Steering 3i through upheavals in the marketplace during the recession has been a tremendous challenge; but Michael Queen has already made significant progress. His experience as Finance Director during the downturn of 2000 to 2003 has been valuable in reducing the Group's net debt by 50 per cent during his first six months in charge, prompting its credit rating to improve along with investor confidence.

 

Professor Mike Wright, Director of CMBOR and Professor of Financial Studies at the Business School, said:

 

"CMBOR has been producing data on UK buy-outs for almost 25 years and last year was probably the worst ever experienced by the market. Nevertheless, the final period of last year was more encouraging and although private equity will face tough challenges in 2010 and beyond the industry will remain crucial in its role of restructuring and innovating corporate UK.

 

Among various roles during his time at 3i, in 1994 Michael was seconded to HM Treasury to help to develop the potential for the Private Finance Initiative in the NHS.

 

Founded by the Bank of England as the Industrial and Commercial Finance Corporation (ICFC) in 1945, 3i was originally a state-owned vehicle designed to encourage investment in small and medium-sized firms after the Second World War. It was renamed Investors In Industry in 1983 and became known as 3i, before it was privatised to become 3i Group PLC in 1987. It floated on the London Stock Exchange in 1994.

 

This event will take place at The Sir Colin Campbell Building at Jubilee Campus on Triumph Road in Nottingham.

 

It begins at 5.30pm for 6pm. Please feel free to bring colleagues, and confirm your attendance to: kerry.millward@nottingham.ac.uk.

 

The talk will be followed by a drinks and networking reception.

For more information about Nottingham University Business School's Centre for Management Buyout Research (CMBOR) contact Professor Mike Wright

Mike.Wright@nottingham.ac.uk

As the fall-out of the recession continues to impact on the UK’s SME population, a report by the Centre for Risk and Insurance Studies at Nottingham University Business School, commissioned by Premierline Direct, reveals the greatest threats facing the future of the UK’s SME population and how business insurance may need to adapt to a changing business landscape.

The study reveals more than half (52%) of SMEs believe reduced demand for their goods and services is the biggest risk to their business with late payments in second place (41%), closely followed by concern about increased competition (32%).

The risk of financial issues continues with lack of cash flow to develop the business seen as a threat by nearly a third (29%) of SMEs and with financial institutions having restricted their lines of credit, lack of accessible funds was considered a risk by 15% of respondents.

As new rules and regulations regularly affect businesses, 39% of SMEs were concerned by increased legislation, and with a general election looming, and the possibility of a change in government, the uncertainty is greater than ever.

As well as SMEs having a realistic view of the risks they face, with 54% saying their main objective over the next five years is to survive the recession, their forward-looking nature was apparent. Nearly two thirds (61%) will be focusing on increasing sales, 28% will be looking to introduce new products and/or services and 23% are keen to diversify into new markets.

However, financial risks and SMEs’ pragmatic approach has impacted on their objectives with more than a third (39%) looking to improve their cash flow, 18% want to lower operational costs and 17% said they want to reduce their company debt.

With financial concerns front of mind, the study reveals a business insurance ‘wish list’ for the SMEs questioned. Nearly half (43%) said they would like their insurance to cover bad debts, one in five (21%) wished for more comprehensive protection of intellectual property and 16% wanted to insure against costs to sue suppliers for failing to deliver.

Christopher O’Brien, director at the Business School's Centre for Risk and Insurance Studies comments: “Business insurance policies cannot cover everything that can go wrong for a small business, however, with SMEs having a ‘wish list’ for what they would like to be covered for, the report raises some important points about what business owners view as being most important. The recession may have led to small businesses viewing risks differently, being particularly concerned about financial risks and looking for greater protection against issues that threaten their position in increasingly competitive markets. In addition, there may be circumstances beyond the business owner’s control that they are not insured against, but could cripple the business. So there are areas where insurers may wish to consider expanding the protection they provide to help businesses protect their cashflow and reduce damage caused by loss of revenue.”

The report examined how business insurance may evolve in the future to cover the highlighted risks. These include financial risks such as credit insurance for bad debts and defaulted payments, which are considered in 49% of SMEs’ risk assessments.

Another area for protection includes extending business interruption cover to include technology issues such as hardware or software breakdowns, infections from viruses, or loss of personal or business data, which are considered in 36% of SMEs’ risk assessments. The report suggests that insurers may wish to set minimum standards for compliance on business owners, in a similar way to security measures, requiring the business installs adequate anti-virus systems and having back up systems in place to comply with the terms of the policy.

In addition, there is scope to expand the level of cover where new regulations impose additional obligations on businesses. Sustainability issues are considered in 43% of SMEs’ risk assessments. So, the report suggests insurers could extend the level of cover provided by commercial legal protection to cover the cost of disputes when defending the company’s actions to meet environmental directives and obligations.

However, the study also indentified that many SMEs do not recognise that some risks can already be covered under business insurance policies. More than a quarter (28%) want to cover the cost of stolen goods, 22% of SMEs wished to cover loss of income as result of electricity, gas or water supply failing, 15% want cover for environmental damage and 10% were looking for compensation if a supply chain collapses. These are risks that many policies already cover suggesting SMEs do not fully recognise the value of existing insurance.

Chris Little, managing director of Premierline Direct adds: “Insurance is invaluable in protecting businesses against potentially crippling costs, and some areas of cover are compulsory such as employer’s liability. The findings of the report highlight that clearly businesses are aware of the potential risks they face in the future and we, as an insurance provider must certainly consider what role we can play to help SMEs manage these new risks. However, with the report also showing that firms have difficulty understanding what cover their existing business insurance policy offers, we are currently looking at how we can eliminate the amount of jargon we use in our communication to existing and potential customers.”

The Centre for Risk and Insurance Studies is one of the world's leading specialist centres for risk and insurance. The Centre maintains close links with the insurance industry and others working in risk and insurance and others working in risk management. The Centre's research reflects public policy priorities as well as those of the insurance industry, and covers not only traditional insurance activities but also risk management. Examples of recent work include the economic value of general insurance, perceptions of mortality risk, corporate governance in mutual life insurers, risk in banking, litigation and insurance, and risk measurement.

The Centre organises several conferences, including the annual Conference of UK Economists, now in its 31st year. It holds an annual seminar of its research in London.

Premierline Direct is part of the Global Allianz Group and provides cover to a wide range of industries from shops and offices to hotels and manufacturing, tailoring its insurance packages to meet the diverse needs to each business.

Does Dragons’ Den, Alan Sugar, Richard Branson and the way other celebrity entrepreneurs are depicted by the media show what it’s really like to start up and run businesses?

The answer’s no, according to most respondents in the two latest in-depth surveys of small business owners and business advisers from Nottingham University Business School.

For the Q4 2009 editions of the UK Business Barometer (UKBB) and UK Business Advisers Barometer (UKBAB) surveys, three questions about the media’s portrayal of enterprise and entrepreneurs were added and the results reveal some frustration from people running small businesses that media portrayals don’t match their experiences and the challenges they face.

When asked to what extent media reporting reflects their experiences, out of all participants in the UK Business Barometer, only 11 per cent thought media reporting reflected their experiences. Of the business advisers responding to the UKBAB, only 20 per cent were able to say that media reporting reflects their experiences highly or reasonably highly, while 35 per cent said that it does not reflect their experience at all, or not much.

Participants were also asked whether they thought that the media’s portrayal of ‘celebrity entrepreneurs’ distorted the public perception of entrepreneurs in general. A total of 81 per cent of UKBB respondents and 75 per cent from the UKBAB panel thought this was the case to a high or reasonably high extent while only four per cent thought this didn’t happen at all, or not much.

Over 70 per cent of respondents said that they thought it would be highly worthwhile or reasonably worthwhile for some business advisers to work directly with media to improve the quality and coverage of smaller businesses.

Not everyone felt celebrity entrepreneurs in the media have a negative effect. One business adviser said “I work with schools, raising awareness of business enterprise to students under the age of 16 and I believe the ‘celebrity entrepreneur’ has had a positive impact with this group.”

These unique quarterly surveys comparing responses from business people and business advisers are managed by The University of Nottingham Institute for Enterprise and Innovation (UNIEI).

The Director of UNIEI, Professor Martin Binks, said: “If these views are representative of the general picture then they raise important questions as to where people can find accurate information on which to base decisions about being an entrepreneur. At a time when so much emphasis is placed on the crucial importance of entrepreneurship, this perception may have significant implications for informed decision making.”

Other parts of the Barometer surveys addressed what business people and advisers feel about the health of the economy and recovery from recession.

Official statistics declare that the longest and deepest post-war UK recession is now over, but figures from the Office of National Statistics showed that — at 0.1 per cent growth — this halt in economic decline was by the narrowest of margins.

The balance of growth among UKBB respondents over the last quarter changed from negative four per cent in the UKBB survey, commencing July 2009, to positive 10 per cent in the survey which opened for responses in October — the first positive balance since July 2008.

Some 36 per cent of respondents reported their business as having expended in the period July to October: 15 per cent of respondents expanding by more than five per cent, while 14 per cent declined by more than five per cent.

For expected next quarter growth, the balance is even more strongly positive than in July, with 51 per cent expecting to expand while 12 per cent expect to decline. The balance is a positive 39 per cent, compared to +23 per cent in July.

When asked if the recession had found them seeking professional advice more often, 67 per cent of participants said not, 19 per cent do not use professional business advice anyway and only 14 per cent have relied on professional business advice more heavily during this period.

The next UK Business Barometer and UK Business Adviser Barometer surveys for Q1 2010 are now underway. The UNIEI team is always keen to welcome owners or managing directors of businesses with fewer than 250 employees to join the UKBB survey panel. Business advisers wishing to contribute as panelists on the UKBAB project are also encouraged to sign up. Those interested should visit the appropriate Business Barometer website to register.

More information, including results and analyses, can be found on the web at www.ukbb.ac and www.ukbab.ac. Businesses and advisers wishing to contribute as panellists on the project should visit the appropriate Business Barometer website to register.

Three distinguished international accolades have been awarded to Professor Mike Wright — Director of the Centre for Management Buy-out Research and Professor of Financial Studies at Nottingham University Business School — for his exceptional contributions to the study of entrepreneurship.

The Academy of Management’s Entrepreneurship Division named him this year’s recipient of its Mentor Award, which recognises, supports, encourages and honours exceptional mentoring activities at all educational levels in the field of entrepreneurship. It also named him ‘Best Editorial Board Reviewer’ in its Education and Learning Division.

Next, Professor Wright was invited to become the only non US-based ‘21st Century Entrepreneurial Fellow’, joining a group of just 12 scholars created by the Global Consortium of Entrepreneurship Centers (GCEC) in 2001 to advance the global cause of entrepreneurship research throughout the scholarly community.


A visiting professor at ERASMUS, the University of Ghent, and EMLYON business schools and a former editor of the journal Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, Mike was identified as an author of more published research — between 1995 and 2006 — than any other scholar in the field of entrepreneurship.

His interests include entrepreneurial finance (the Institute of Chartered Accountants commissioned him, with colleague John Gilligan, to write an influential guide, Private Equity Demystified); academic entrepreneurship and technology transfer; international entrepreneurship, investigating entrepreneurs who return to their countries; and serial entrepreneurs.

Professor Wright’s awards come at a time when the world is reeling from the effects of deep recession; when public and business confidence in banking and finance has fallen, and entrepreneurship is gaining the recognition it deserves as an engine of sustained economic growth and social cohesion. In the United States, since 1980, all net increases in jobs have come from businesses which are less than five years old.

The potential contributions universities and graduates can make to innovation, new business start-ups, academic entrepreneurship and a deeper understanding of enterprise development are being recognised by governments and business. Universities like Nottingham have developed highly entrepreneurial identities.


Business Secretary Lord Mandelson, whose Department is also responsible for universities, said recently in a speech to the CBI: “Over the last decade or so our expectations of the HE system in delivering economic impact have risen sharply — and rightly. Universities have responded to that willingly and actively.”

In the new strategy paper released this month by the UK’s Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS), Higher Ambitions — The future of universities in a knowledge economy, entrepreneurship is identified as an essential quality of graduate employability. One of the strategy’s six sections is devoted to the importance of university research, innovation and knowledge exchange.

“Over my entire career I have sought to produce rigorous academic work that is also policy-relevant,” said Professor Wright. “It is wonderful symmetry that I should be nominated for these awards in the year this University celebrated being name the first Times Higher Education ‘Entrepreneurial University of the Year’.”

“The University of Nottingham has become very entrepreneurial over the last couple of decades through its Business School and the University of Nottingham Institute for Enterprise and Innovation (UNIEI). Many other Schools and research centres have had great success transferring knowledge to create new enterprises.”

Ronald K. Mitchell, Immediate Past Chair of the Academy of Management’s Entrepreneurship Division and Professor of Entrepreneurship at Rawls College of Business, Texas Tech University commented on Professor Wright’s success in winning the Academy of Management Entrepreneurship Division Mentor Award. “Mike Wright has, throughout his career, exemplified the qualities of a true mentor.

“He has been especially capable in the area of helping to identify promising doctoral students and post-doctoral candidates, encouraging their interest in the field of entrepreneurship research, nurturing their development in research and professional roles, and in providing moral, social, and intellectual support to new entrants to the field in the early stages of their careers.

“He is highly deserving of this most-prestigious award,” said Professor Mitchell.


Professor Wright was nominated by existing scholars in the 21st Century Entrepreneurial Fellows group who ‘advocated’ for his membership based on his research record and leadership in the field of entrepreneurship.

This is a relatively new group and Professor Wright has been invited to help formulate how they will encourage academic research in entrepreneurship. “It’s good to be in a position to formulate policy and direction at an early stage in the group’s existence,” said Professor Wright.

“Interest in entrepreneurship is increasing at undergraduate and masters level, but also among academic entrepreneurs not only in science but across The University of Nottingham,” he added. “A lot of work I’ve been doing has been looking at how one can make universities more entrepreneurial, injecting some realism to moderate the early optimism of some members of the academic community, especially with regard to access to finance.”

The official induction dinner for this open-ended appointment will take place during the 2010 Academy of Management Conference in Montréal, Canada, next summer.

But, he cautions, 'As the economy recovers, business schools can and should ask whether the substance of the problems behind the crisis has been tackled adequately. This is the spirit that ought to infuse the MBA of the future.'


http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/management/mba/article6859014.ece

Chris O’Brien, Director of the Centre for Risk and Insurance Studies, said: “These companies are important for people’s savings, the assets of the funds totalling £319 billion at the end of 2008. They have been able to survive in the crisis with the help of improved risk management.”


Using the ‘realistic balance sheets’ that life insurers produce in accordance with the rules of the Financial Services Authority (FSA), the survey calculates the average surplus assets ratio fell from 7.8 per cent in 2007 to 5.3 per cent in 2008. However, three firms were able to increase their ratio, while in two firms the ratio more than halved.


The full survey can be read at: http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/business/cris/With-profits.html

Taking information from companies’ annual returns to the FSA, the Centre for Risk and Insurance Studies surveyed the top 20 with-profits life insurers, using the ‘realistic balance sheets’ they produce in accordance with the rules of the Financial Services Authority (FSA). The figures as at the end of 2008 were compared with those companies’ data at the end of 2007.


Chris O’Brien said: “Banks have been in the spotlight in the global economic crisis. We do not expect life insurers to suffer in the same way as they have a different business model.


“However, they are exposed to financial conditions that have included low interest rates, a fall in share prices and widening spreads on corporate bonds. The financial position of life insurers is therefore of particular interest.”

How does the spoken and written word in the contemporary business environment help or hinder its performance? That’s just one of the questions to be explored by a new generation of entrepreneurs at The University of Nottingham.

In a unique partnership between the University’s School of English Studies and the award-winning Nottingham University Business School, a new postgraduate MSc is being launched in Communication and Entrepreneurship. It’s the first of its kind in the world and the latest in a series of pioneering courses offered jointly by the Business School and other Schools within the University. They aim to give graduates in a range of academic core subjects a chance for further study with an emphasis on building business skills and entrepreneurship in their field of expertise.

The new MSc is the seventh in the University’s expanding portfolio of Joint Masters programmes with an Entrepreneurship theme. It aims to forge closer links between the world of business and the study of its global language ... English, by offering students the exciting opportunity to investigate communication in the context of entrepreneurship, business and the workplace.                                    more....
 

 

A special event is being held in Mumbai on Monday 19th January with the aim of establishing one or more Nottingham alumni associations in India.

The informal gathering, now being held on Monday 19th January, had to be rescheduled due to the tragic events in Mumbai in December last year. / ......more

CMBOR, founded by the Business School and sponsored by Barclays Private Equity (BARC.L), said total buy-out value for 2008 fell to 19.1 billion pounds from a record tally of 45.9 billion in 2007.

“Last year started off in good shape with the strongest quarter one on record. Subsequent quarters however all witnessed marked falls in buy-out activity as the market squeeze has tightened,” Christiian Marriott, director at Barclays Private Equity, said in a statement.

He added the analysis showed that deals in the business and support services sector increased to 33.4 percent of total value for the year from 16 percent in 2007. Meanwhile, deals in the embattled retail sector fell to just 3.2 percent of total value from 31.2 percent the previous year.

The data showed that deals worth more than 500 million pounds fell most deeply in 2008, down 68 percent to 8.7 billion pounds. Deals in the 100-million to 500-million pound range halved, while deals worth between 10 million and 100 million pounds fell 34 percent.

A Business School alumnus has proved that there’s more to be gained from time at university than academic qualifications alone.

Chris Skilton was named Socially Responsible Student of the Year in the Real World Awards — an annual competition that recognises the work of talented students across the UK.

read more...

We are delighted to announce our 2008/09 Business Leaders Series events for 2008/09 to be held on Jubilee Campus.

Monday, 20th October 2008, at 5.00 pm in the South Building.

Gerry Pennell, CIO, London Organising Committee for the Olympic Games.

Gerry's talk is entitled "IT Enabled Innovation: The Organisational Challenges"

Simon Cox, Strategy Director, Coors Brewers Ltd.

Monday February 2nd, 2009.

Dr Peter Homa CBE. Chief Executive, Nottingham University Hospital NHS Trust.

Wednesday February 25th 2009. 6.00pm.

Steve Holliday, Chief Executive of the National Grid.
Wednesday, 4th March 2009, at 6.00pm in the B52 Lecture Theatre in the South Building.

AMBA Events

John Lees, John Lees Associates

LT1, Exchange Building, Jubilee Campus, Wednesday October 8th, 2008.

Dr David Johnson, Venture to Think Ltd.

If you would like to attend either of these events, please email our Communications Administrator

Britain's tallest, free-standing, work of public art was installed on Jubilee Campus on the 23rd June 2008.

Rising 60 metres into the Nottingham skyline Aspire will stand three times taller than the 20 metre Angel of the North and over eight metres higher than the 51.6 metre Nelson's Column.  The new landmark for the City of Nottingham was commissioned by the University as part of the institution's 60th anniversary celebrations of the granting of its Royal Charter.

Aspire is the centrepiece of the Jubilee Campus which is breathing new life into a former industrial site in inner Nottingham.

 The towering sculpture has been funded through the great generosity of a philanthropist who prefers to remain anonymous — but who wished to create an emblem which will make people think about their ambitions and where they aim to go in life. 

 Designed by Ken Shuttleworth's world-renowned Make Architects, Aspire has been approached as a natural extension of Make's work on the new buildings and landscaping which are currently under construction on the site.

The sculpture takes the form of a slender tubular steel lattice that springs from a concrete column at the base and increases in size from a diameter of 2.19m at the base to 4.85m at the apex. The tapered form allows the structure to sit lightly in the landscape and leads the eye upwards as it unfurls, while the latticework effect enhances the vertical emphasis and lends an appropriate lightness and transparency to the massive sculpture.

 The delicate structure has been engineered for maximum strength and resilience, and is formed from hollow section steel tubes measuring 140mm in diameter. The lattice design efficiently transfers the considerable loads down to the ground while the aperture at the top is angled at 60 degrees to the north in order to minimise wind loads.

To harmonise with the terracotta-tiled cladding of the newly constructed Amenities Building and International House on Jubilee Campus Aspire has been painted red, subtly changing and lightening in tone as the structure rises.

Aspire, which will be lit during the hours of darkness, was described in it's early stages by the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Sir Colin Campbell, as having strength, elegance and real purpose.

Sir Colin Campbell said: “The generosity of an anonymous benefactor has given The University of Nottingham and the City of Nottingham an iconic and inspirational landmark.

"Aspire symbolises a vital aspect of the University. It sends a message to everyone that no matter where they come from, they can achieve great things. It celebrates our efforts to make the world a better place."

The cost of design, manufacture and installation of Aspire amounting to £800,000 has been paid for by the anonymous donation. The sculpture was named following a competition amongst The University of Nottingham's 6,500 staff and 36,000 students.

Ken Shuttleworth said: “Creating a sculptural form on this scale and for this setting has been a fascinating design challenge. We're also particularly pleased that it is the University's students and staff who have been responsible for actually naming the sculpture. These are the people who will experience the sculpture as part of their daily environment, and we hope that they will feel a real sense of ownership and pride in this striking new addition to the campus."

Se more images at http://aspire.nottingham.ac.uk/Default.aspx

"Training the brain to find new ideas"

The Sunday Times says that courses on creative thinking can help staff to become more innovative, to the benefit of their employers. Nottingham MBA alumnus Jan Sissons explains how the School's Creative Problem Solving module unleashes new ideas and helped him join the senior management team at Siemens.

For the full story go to:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/career_and_jobs/article4137999.ece