Stock Take Summary 2009 a Review of Progress Against the Manchester 2015 Strategic Plan Introduction

Stock Take Summary 2009 A Review of Progress Against the Manchester 2015 Strategic Plan Introduction The annual Stock Take Report provides a factual account of the extent to which The University of Manchester succeeded, during the period under review, in meeting its planning targets across the nine Goals that define the Manchester 2015 Agenda. The purpose of the exercise is to provide the University community and its external stakeholders, via the Board of Governors, with realistic and, where possible, quantitative measures of the University’s performance over the previous 12 months. In relation to accountability, each Stock Take Report gives senior management and the Board the opportunity to ask whether the University has the right management and governance structures and arrangements in place to oversee its current development and strategic progress. To facilitate planning, each Stock Take Report is accompanied by an analysis reflecting on the external and internal strategic environment of the University, and identifying the major opportunities, risks and priorities that the University is facing. The University's performance in 2008 set out in the Stock Take 2009 Report confirms that Manchester is well placed to face the future from The University’s external funding and operating doggedly and consistently strategic, opting - a position of strength. But we should be environment has been relatively benign since year-in-year out, decision-by-decision - for quality businesslike rather than euphoric in assessing our 2004, but during much of the next decade the solutions over easy answers, always embracing progress since 2004, not just because the balance Manchester 2015 Agenda is likely to be excellence, never settling for mediocrity. We will of our 2015 Agenda still lies before us, but also dominated by externalities associated with the also have to remain a high morale institution, because the external environment in which the aftermath of the 2008 global credit crisis and the confident of our ability to capitalize on a Agenda will be pursued is likely to become persistence of major public sector debt. challenging external environment. increasingly challenging. Such an external environment can create If we operate with institutional discipline The following achievements in 2008 were pessimism, but we should, instead, feel and focus, the probable scenarios facing UK particularly salient in the context of the optimistic about the future of The University of higher education over the next few years Manchester 2015 Agenda: Manchester. For it is in difficult times that represent a potentially decisive strategic strategically focused institutions find prime opportunity for Manchester. • 2008 RAE placed Manchester along with opportunities to differentiate themselves Oxford, Cambridge and University College positively from competitors. London and Imperial College as one of the UK’s five premier research universities, with As I write in May 2009, it is with confidence that Manchester ahead of Imperial and neck- and- The University of Manchester has the neck with UCL. These results not only vindicate strategically-focused institutional culture and the the University's investment in research operational effectiveness and efficiency to excellence over the past four years, but provide achieve its 2015 Goals, even in very difficult Professor Alan Gilbert us with a valuable, detailed analysis of our circumstances. To succeed we will have to be President and Vice-Chancellor research strengths and weaknesses; • In continuing to implement the Undergraduate Education Review, the University made progress in the "root-and-branch" transformation of the quality of the Manchester student experience required to achieve the 2015 vision. • A unique £32 million late-seed venture fund The 2009 Stock Take Report provides a detailed appraisal of progress against the nine was launched to boost investment in Strategic Goals and 24 Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) identified in the University’s intellectual property generated by research at Strategic Plan, Towards Manchester 2015. The KPIs are designed to focus attention on the University, placing Manchester at the the most salient measures of institutional performance and the clearest possible picture forefront of the technology transfer agenda. of progress against Plan at the institutional level. • Manchester’s position in the Shanghai Jiao Tong A reappraisal of the 2015 Agenda is currently taking place and with major KPIs Ranking of International Research Universities indicating that the Agenda is credible, the University is now beginning to look beyond improved from 48th in 2007 to 40th in 2008, a 2015 to the challenges of building on the achievements of the first decade and significant step forward in what has been a maintaining strategic momentum over the longer term. process of year-on-year improvement since 2004. More broadly, the reappraisal process provides an opportunity to prepare for major changes in the external economic environment within which all higher education • The Manchester Leadership Programme institutions will be operating over the next decade. continued to expand, growing from 75 students in 2005-06 to a 600 in 2008-09. 1 Goal One High International Standing KPI 1.1: Clear evidence of improvement in KPI 1.2: The presence on staff of at least five To establish The University of the University’s international and domestic Nobel Laureates (or equivalent) by 2015, at Manchester by 2015 as a world standing as measured by reputable least two of whom have full-time renowned centre of scholarship and international higher education rankings. appointments, with three such appointments being secured by December 2007. research, able to match the leading It is very pleasing to report that The University of universities in the world in Manchester has risen significantly in the With the appointment of Nobel Laureate John attracting and retaining teachers, “Academic Ranking of World Universities”* – Sulston FRS, the interim milestone of appointing researchers and “critical mass” which the University recognises as its preferred three Nobel Laureates (or their equivalent) by research teams of the highest measure of international standing. December 2007 has been met. quality, and as a higher education The University has moved up eight places over The impact of these iconic appointments1 has brand synonymous with the finest the past year and is now ranked 40th in the been immense. They attract significant attention international standards of academic world, 6th in Europe and 5th within the UK. among the media, higher education policy excellence, and with pioneering, makers, major external stakeholders and No other institution has risen as quickly in this politicians interested in higher education. influential and exciting research ranking as The University of Manchester has and scholarship. since 2004. Even more encouraging is the fact More importantly, there is strong evidence that the 2008 table still reflects performance that the presence of “iconic” appointees from 2002-2007, and does not yet fully reflect attracts high quality researchers and scholars at the impact of post-merger initiatives. all levels of career development, including, critically, outstanding post-doctoral fellows and On the other hand, differences in performance PhD students. between universities become progressively more pronounced towards the top of the The fact that part-time “iconic” appointees have ranking. Progress accordingly becomes brought with them high level links with the increasingly challenging. leading institutions also employing them has been much more important for the international The Academic Ranking of World Universities has positioning of the University than many of us also produced some subject specific rankings. In originally anticipated. Indeed, partnership has the Engineering and Technology subject ranking, emerged as the preferred option for some for example, The University of Manchester is “iconic” recruitment initiatives. ranked 35th in the world, 4th in Europe and 3rd in the UK. A number of academics received recognition in the form of awards, prizes, honours and * The “Academic Ranking of World Universities” appointments during 2007-08. These included is carried out annually by the Institute of Higher Professor Val Wass who was awarded a Education at Shanghai Jiao Tong University National Teaching Fellowship by the Higher Education Academy. In the 2008 New Year Honours List, Lou Kushnik, Dinah Crystal, Dr Robert Barr and Professor Philip Dyer received the OBE and Professors Bill Shaw and Stephen Furber the CBE, whilst in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List, awards were made to Professor Brian Robson (OBE) and Professor Peter Noyce (CBE). In April 2008, Professors Philip Baker and Ashley Woodcock were elected Fellows of the Academy of Medical Sciences. 1Professor Joesph Stiglitz, Professor Robert Putnam, Professor John Sulston and Professor Martin Amis 2 Goal Two World Class Research KPI 2.1: Annual increase in the University’s KPI 2.3: Annual increases in total audited To establish The University of share of the world’s high impact research research expenditure (TARE) consistent with Manchester by 2015 among the 25 publications. the trebling of such expenditure by 2015. strongest research universities in As in previous years, the University has Total audited research expenditure is the best the world on commonly accepted commissioned an annual report on its citation available surrogate measure

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