Our business-facing vision
As the leading business-facing university in the UK, the University of Hertfordshire is focused on developing new and creative approaches to learning, teaching and research with a commitment to adding value to employers, enterprise and regional, national and international economies.
The premise of a business-facing university is that universities and business need to work on an integrated and collaborative basis if the United Kingdom is to retain global competitiveness in the 21st century.
Input from employers
In practice this means, for example, that every course at the university is developed with input from employers, while research is designed and conducted with the aim of solving business problems and generating new and innovative applications for existing knowledge.
The university encourages a constant interchange between businesses, academics and students. Many university staff members spend a proportion of their time working in industry, running their own businesses, keeping their knowledge up to date and help to develop students’ business skills.
Our extensive services to business
At the University of Hertfordshire we have a wide range of facilities, services and skills available for industry. And our proven expertise and commitment means that, whatever they are looking for, employers know we will deliver.
We are the only university to have acquired its local business support agency, Exemplas. Exemplas is the primary mechanism for identifying and tapping into latent demand for our products and services, and works to provide personnel and skills solutions to business. We have a wide range of specialist facilities that businesses can use to test and develop their products.
Our services include:
- high level skills
- applied research
- short courses
- continuing professional development
- consultancy
- and much more.
A new kind of university
Universities play a key role in sustaining the economic prosperity of the United Kingdom. There is a growing recognition amongst key decision makers, in the UK Government and beyond, that we need a new generation of universities, of business-facing universities, to step up to the economic challenges faced by the UK in increasingly global markets.
Alongside the world-class research that goes on in many universities future national prosperity depends on our ability to innovate, to translate that research into commercial success. That is where business facing universities can really add value and Hertfordshire is proud to be at the vanguard of this new generation.
The University of Hertfordshire is one of its region’s largest employers with over 2,700 staff and a turnover of £181m. With a student community of 23,000, including more than 2,000 international students from over 85 countries, the university has a global network of over 160,000 alumni.