The Importance of Industry-Academia Collaborations for MBA Students

Industry and academia are like two sides of a coin and need to coexist for the growth and development of any nation. The education system is designed to prepare students for their future careers and also collaborate closely with the industry to understand the needs of the industry so that students can be prepared accordingly with a dynamic curriculum and pedagogy.

If there is no collaboration between industry and academia, then the students who graduate will be unemployable because they will lack the important skills that are required by industry and the workplace.

Employers think that the majority of graduates from colleges cannot be employed because they are not skilled enough or job-ready for jobs in the industry and workplace. In addition, the research and development that takes place when industry and academia come together can lead to the actualization of industry needs, which can be further fulfilled by academia.

Why is Industry-Academia Collaboration Important?

When we talk about MBA students in particular who are being prepared to enter the corporate world and expect to start working from day one of joining, industry and academia collaboration helps to ensure that the students are familiar with corporate and industry expectations and requirements and have prepared themselves accordingly.

Industry and academic collaboration have become important because they support students’ transition from educational institutions to the corporate world. It comes with many benefits and goes way beyond just placements. Let’s look at the benefits of industry and academic collaboration:

Skill and Knowledge Development: When considering academics, industry, and academia, partnerships offer a platform for students to understand and develop capabilities to address challenges and issues with practical alternative solutions and options.

It helps the students be more aware of the practical aspects of research while developing new skills, data, and strategies. With industry and academia collaboration, most companies and organisations can improve their business performance by having access to many new ideas and thoughts from young minds while also extending their capabilities and expertise.

New Synergies: The industry-academia partnership also enhances the discovery of new synergies and models for companies. This is a collaboration that offers access to expertise and innovation, an extension of resources, and a sharpening of competitive benefits to companies. The academic faculty and students apply their brains to issues and challenges posed by the Industry and come up with a variety of solution options to try.

This partnership also leads the companies to hire students that match their requirements while making their businesses grow, which is beneficial both for the students and the companies because it short-circuits the selection and match-making cycle of recruitment.

Better Research: The industry-academia partnership also promotes advancing research and the formation of a skilled workforce. With this partnership, work-ready talent can gain specialist knowledge and practical training.

Moreover, universities also get the benefit of having opportunities to work on the latest technologies, challenges, and issues. This partnership helps reduce the cost of investment in research for any one partner. With joint efforts, each partner brings its core expertise and resources already in place.

Better Access to Resources: The partnership with industries helps universities get more access to study resources for funding research and also diversifies into other research areas.

The universities can offer better education to MBA students when they get more opportunities to fund their research and innovation piloting from the industry. As a result, students can gain the best practical and theoretical knowledge.

Industry Jobs: The partnership between industry and academia also offers a much better platform for colleges to offer real-time jobs to students in the form of internships and on-the-job training programs.

The industry jobs and learning opportunities enable students to get involved in incubator projects and new initiatives of the company, making them learn intensely with length and breadth of exposure.

Full-time Employment: Students can get full-time employment as a long-term benefit of industry and academia partnerships. With partnership and collaboration between Industry and academia, trust and knowledge of each other are enhanced. This makes the partnership an effective tool for most colleges and universities.

When the university focuses on educating its students while keeping industry and academia’s collaboration at the centre, the result is high employability and job-ready students. This leads to less investment by the companies in fresher training to make them job-ready and better placement by academia for their students, which is a win-win model. This can be used to attract prospective students and corporate partners.

Pursue an MBA at Chitkara University for a well-structured Industry-Academia curriculum and a proactive partnership and collaboration environment. Chitkara University is one of the top institutions to offer MBA programs in India. From HR, Finance, Banking, Supply Chain, Marketing, Business Analytics, Healthcare Management, and more, Chitkara University offers MBAs in many specialisations. The MBA programs offered at Chitkara allow students to gain the best theoretical and practical exposure during the study period. The university has a well-designed system that helps students with internships all over India and matching placements.

Students can pursue an MBA in a wide range of fields at Chitkara University. The options include:

  • MBA in Marketing
  • MBA in Finance with super specialisations in:
    • Investment Banking, Corporate Finance and Wealth Management
    • Financial Technologies
    • Risk Management and Audit Assurance
    • Financial Analysis
    • Banking Operations Management
    • Global Financial Market Operations
    • Actuarial Science
  • MBA in Hospital Management | Digital Healthcare Management
  • MBA in Logistics and Supply Chain Management
  • MBA in Business Analytics
  • MBA in Human Resource Management

All the above specialisations and super specialisations are co-created by Industry Experts in collaboration with Chitkara University. A few of our trusted partners are Ernst & Young, KPMG, Grant Thornton, Insurance Institute of India, CISI, Aerotech, Fortis Healthcare, PATH-USA, Tata Memorial Hospital, Kalam Institute of Health Technology, Access Health International, IMARTICUS, IIDE, Reliance, American Society for Quality, Aakash Healthcare Pvt. Ltd., and many more. Our Industry partners and their senior staff not only co-create the curriculum as Board of Studies members but are also invited to teach applied modules in the classroom.

The industry-academia partnership should be the fundamental framework of all academic institutions, which makes Chitkara University one of the best universities for pursuing an MBA. The main motive for pursuing an education is to enter the world of work, where the responsibility is to offer stakeholders value and ensure the growth and development of any organisation.

The collaboration between industry and academia encourages open-mindedness, where students are motivated to share and publish discoveries, improve themselves to optimum capabilities, and be market-ready and job-ready faster and with more self-confidence.

Topics

Further reading