DUBLIN CITY University has set up an Enterprise Advisory Board to look at ways in which the university and enterprise can collaborate in areas such as the development of degree programmes and preparing graduates for the workplace.
The board is “a listening device”, according to Prof Brian MacCraith, who took over as university president in July last year.
As part of his plan to make DCU a “university of enterprise”, Prof MacCraith has assembled a group of corporate and other leaders who will be asked to comment on the university’s activities, including the portfolio of degree programmes, the attributes they would like to see in graduates and the university’s ethos of entrepreneurship.
DCU has already identified five or six key attributes that it wants to instil in graduates, such as ethical behaviour, leadership and adaptability. These have been “mapped” on to 2,500 modules in its degree programme.
“So we can say any graduate entering next September will emerge, not only with an excellent degree, but with broader skills as well to help them cope better with society and the place of work,” MacCraith says.
Tony Donohoe, Ibec’s head of education and research, says the employers group’s interest in the initiative goes deeper than simply making sure the State gets a better return in terms of graduates who have the applied skills that industry and business need, Donohoe says.
“It is not so much about what is being taught but how it’s being taught. Sometimes the subject is the proxy for other learning – soft skills, the employability factor.”
These soft skills can be as valuable in wider society as business, a factor which led to RTÉ Radio managing director Clare Duignan joining the board.
The challenge of marrying entrepreneurship with areas of employment and contribution beyond the predictable business disciplines interests her. The goal is to produce “graduates who will genuinely be contributors to society”.
The sort of top-down and deterministic approach to moulding graduates adopted by DCU is a long way from the more traditional model of how a university should work, but it is not out of kilter with the mood among prospective undergraduates, she says. “People are nervous. That sense that the world is my oyster has gone.”
Paula Neary, a partner with Accenture consulting group, says: “It is important to work with universities to round out graduates, to give them the professional skills such as leadership, which will help them stand out.”
MacCraith stresses that the initiative is about producing more rounded graduates, not worker bees. “Employers are getting thousands of CVs and are looking for that differentiator and that is really what we are talking about.”
Listen to a podcast of John McManus’s interview with DCU’s Enterprise Advisory Board members at irishtimes.com/business/ podcast
Board Members
Prof Brian MacCraith, president DCU; Craig Barrett, former chief executive Intel Corporation; Mike Kamarck, president Merck BioVentures; Cyril Maybury, former partner Ernst Young; Margaret Sweeney, CEO Postbank; Declan Ryan, MD Irelandia Investments; Liavan Mallin, CEO Zalco Investments; Mark Kellett, CEO Magnet Networks ;Tony Donohoe, education and research Ibec; Barry O’Sullivan, senior vice president Cisco; Regina Moran, CEO Fujitsu Ireland; Paula Neary, partner Accenture; Clare Duignan, managing director RTÉ Radio, and Joyce Loughnan, CEO Focus Ireland
