Vote of confidence for Teesside’s help for business

A major vote of confidence has been announced for our work in helping businesses and individuals through the recession.

We have won a £420,000 slice of the £27.5m Economic Challenge Investment Fund launched by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (Hefce). This will be matched by One North East and the University’s business partners to focus over £900,000 over the next 18 months on this vital area.

The Fund was set up at the start of this year to encourage universities to support businesses and employees through the economic downturn.

Vice-Chancellor, Professor Graham Henderson said: 'I am delighted that we have been successful in this bid to the Economic Challenge Investment Fund. We are already focusing a great deal of effort on helping both businesses and individuals during the recession and the funding associated with this announcement will be pivotal in enabling even more people to access the opportunities, support and expertise available through the University and our partner colleges.'

16 point action plan to help business Last month we announced a 16 point action plan to provide real help to struggling firms with a series of measures – from paying invoices faster to meeting a demand from industry for future management masterclasses to help business leaders manage their way through these tough times.

Responsive service to businesses Laura Woods, Director of Academic Enterprise at Teesside University, said: 'We will be offering a responsive, demand-led service to businesses and individuals through our new ‘OneDoor’ initiative which provides a single access route to companies and people to the full range of support available – not just in the University, but also in the Further Education colleges across the Tees Valley.

'We’ve already got a good example that this is the right approach after going out and asking 300 local businesses how we could help with the re-training and re-skilling of their workforces: 47% told us they would welcome specific programmes on managing through the recession and that’s what we have been providing with the North East Chamber of Commerce,' explained Laura, who led Teesside’s bid to the Economic Challenge Investment Fund.

'We want to make sure we are aligned to the key economic needs of the region and that we provide the type of tangible support that businesses and individuals need rather than simply offering more off-the-shelf courses and general activities.

'The OneDoor approach will make it a lot easier for us to talk to businesses and ensure we are providing what people really need. This could be more programmes such as the Business School masterclasses and subsidised consultancy, but it could also mean expanding our highly-rated Knowledge Transfer activities which can help companies with real-life problems that are holding them back.'

Teesside has won an Outstanding A grade from the Technology Strategy Board for one of its recent Knowledge Transfer Partnerships with The Stockton Casting Company which helped the firm increase sales during a single year by over 300%. Read Outstanding verdict for Knowledge Transfer Partnership 'This kind of support provides a real incentive for industry to engage with the University and get real benefit from the expertise of its academic staff and graduates,' said Laura Woods.

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