A world class university needs to focus on both publication and industrial link.
Publication in good journal will ensure the status of the university that can produce world class knowledge
Industrial link will ensure industrial relevant of university’s research.
Publication in world class journal can be divided into five different level.
Level 1 other publications* One star rating
Level 2 non-CIJ** Two star rating
Level 3 CIJ*** Three star rating
Level 4 ISI Thompson Four star rating
Level 5 Top journal Five star rating
*other publication: chapters in books, conference papers, proceedings, etc.
**non-CIJ: non-citation index journal or non-peer-reviewed journal
***CIJ – Citation Index Journal or peer-reviewed journal
Industrial-link is to ensure university research is relevant to the industrial practices. If the research is not industrially relevant, then the university will is producing knowledge which is useless. This knowledge is only good for circulation within the close-loop academic world. And no one from the industries will read or even understand the output of the university research.
Apart from industrial relevant, world class university should produce knowledge that can increase the competitiveness of the industries. It should produce knowledge that can increase the competitiveness of the industries and businesses by enhancing their management capability in producing value-added products and services in today’s global market.
Industrialists and companies who work closely with a world class university should benefit through enlarging their networking capability, interacting with academic and research communities from local and overseas, keeping track with the latest development in new management philosophy and technology, knowing the latest development in management research enhancing knowledge in system, human and workplace interfaces, through a range of activities organised.
The level of Industrial link in world class university can also be divided into five:
Level 1 forum* One star
Level 2 knowledge transfer** Two star
Level 3 collaboration *** Three star
Level 4 joint research Four star
Level 5 knowledge dissemination Five star
*forum includes all activities to make friends and having conversations together with the people from the industries, such as lunch, dinner, social interaction, formal or informal meeting, press conferences, signing MoU without useful outputs, presentation, site visits, talk, seminar, etc.
**knowledge transfer can happen at two level:
-at level 2,
knowledge transfer (from industries to universities)
The knowledge is transferred from industries to the universities. This is a relatively lower level of activities because the universities’ research is currently has not reached the standard used in the industries, and thus they need to learn from the industries. This is usually happen when the researchers are young or inexperience. Or sometimes even though they are experienced researchers but their research is fundamental or basic, and they have not investigated the practicality of their research output. At this level, the university may send their faculty members or students to be attached to the industries to learn something from them, such as internship. The university will gain some benefits through these activities but not the industries.
-at level 5(the highest level),
knowledge dissemination (from universities to industries)
, the knowledge is transferred from universities to the industries (this is at the highest level in the list because the universities’ research have reached the highest standard, and thus the industries need to learn from them. This is usually happen when the researchers are very experience. Their research produces more advanced knowledge than the industries currently having. The knowledge produced can be used by the industries to improve the performance or profit. At this level, the university will normally disseminate their research output to the industries. In other words, the knowledge produced by the university is helpful/useful to the industries, or community in general. In this sense, the university is sitting at the forefront of the industries. They are leading the industries and driving industrialists to the future.
***collaboration or joint research between the industries and the universities are encouraged.
Level 3 collaboration (industries help universities) Three star
Level 4 joint research (universities help industries) Four star
At this stage, the university and the industries must initiate some joint research projects. Both parties are working together towards the achievement of the research objectives. This is the current trend. The same concept of knowledge transfer can be applied here. If the industries help the universities, that mean the industries’ standard is higher, and vice versa.
A typology for world class university
Combining the level of publication and the level of industrial link, a typology can be built for world class university (see fig. 1).
As refer to fig. 1, the x-axis represents the level of publication, and y-axis represents the level of industrial link. The different focus reflects a different characteristic of a university. For example, some universities may fall under the coordinate (1, 1) in the typology, and some may fall in the (5, 5). The different coordinate reflect a different player (see fig. 2 for detail)
(1,1) local players (local king / domestic king)
(1,5) research dominant players
(5,1) practice dominant players
(3,3) middleman players
(5,5) world class players
Different players within the typology could have different behavior. These behaviors can be described using different objects or living creatures such as below (see fig 3):
(1,1) Monkey
(1,5) Frog
(5,1) Bear
(3,3) Puma
(5,5) Lion
Each creature reflects a different behavior of its own.
MONKEY – they are neither good nor strong in both aspects. They just like to act. They are very ‘action’. In other words, they are not good in both aspects, but they are good in pretending to be good.
FROG – their body are small, but their voices are loud. In other words, they can talk very well, but they cannot do whatever they have said they want to do. Their slogan in life is “Talk only, no action”.
BEAR – their body are big, and thus they are strong and can do a lot of things. However, they have no brain!
PUMA – they are the average achiever in both aspects. They need to put in more time and effort to improve both aspects.
LION – they are the real king of the jungle, they are good in both aspects.
World class universities like lions are the leading research institutions in the world. Their research and publication as well as industrial-link are usually more advance than others. If you are frogs, you may consider improving the industrial relevant of your research. If you are bears, you may consider improving your publications. If you are puma, you have the potential to improve yourself. If you are monkey, you can continue to pretend!
