Academic partnerships are key for companies to stay competitive and relevant

Faisal Kazi is the president and chief executive officer for Siemens Canada.

Industry’s blueprint for innovation and growth is most powerful when it enables partnerships between businesses and academia. When these two groups work together, each one stands to benefit significantly and society has much to gain as well.

Most companies today already recognize the value of education and how it can contribute to the success of their business. That’s why many employers look for workers with certain academic credentials.

But we need to do more. In today’s era of unprecedented technological transformation and speed of change, organizations that want to stay competitive and relevant need to work with educational institutions to develop talent and innovative solutions that address the biggest challenges facing their business and society.

These industry-academic collaborations need to go beyond scholarships and research grants. They need to enable a two-way transfer of knowledge between businesses and schools, and they need to empower the next generation to continue innovating long after they’ve earned their academic degrees.

These partnerships can take many forms. For example, Siemens Canada recently forged an agreement with the University of Toronto that brings together both parties’ expertise and cutting-edge research in power grid modernization. Through this partnership, we’re supporting learning and innovation that can advance Canada’s climate goals while adding to our technology portfolio at Siemens.

This wasn’t our first academic collaboration focused on power grids. We’ve also partnered with Humber Polytechnic in Toronto to develop a Sustainable Microgrid and Renewable Technology Lab, or SMART Lab for short, where students and industry professionals can get hands-on training in the use of microgrids – localized energy systems that can operate with or without the main power grid through renewable energy.

We installed one of these microgrids to create a net-zero classroom at Bishop James Mahoney High School in Saskatoon. The Smartflower system features a flower-like solar array system that opens its “petals” and rotates to follow the trajectory of the sun and maximize the amount of energy generated. In addition to setting up this Instagram-worthy microgrid, we provided curriculum developed by educators to encourage interest in green energy technology.

Then there’s our mechatronics program, which addresses a critical skills gap by offering university and college students a holistic approach to learning mechanical engineering, electronics and computing systems in an industrial lab setting. These laboratories are not abstract academic exercises, but real-world simulations using leading-edge tools that prepare emerging professionals for the intricate complexities of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

Alongside the work we do with educational institutions, we run several in-house programs that provide training for postsecondary school students and graduates. These include co-ops, internships, new graduate hiring and our Siemens Certified Education and Talent Academy. The latter – geared toward third-year university or college students – lets participants learn, work and earn and provides a tuition allowance.

As was the case with most companies in Canada, our ability to extend these learn-and-work opportunities was severely restricted during the COVID-19 pandemic. But even as thousands of university and college graduates across the country had their job offers rescinded or deferred, we decided to continue running our graduate hiring program – which we call “Experience@Siemens” – albeit with shorter work assignments.

Our thinking was, if we gave as many graduates as possible a chance to gain work experience in our organization, even for just a few weeks or months, then we would be helping them get a head start in their careers during one of the most uncertain times in modern history.

I’m proud to report that we later hired more than 40 per cent of the approximately 120 graduates who joined that program. Many of those not placed at our organization got work elsewhere, in large part because of the training we provided.

What I’ve concluded from the many academic partnerships we’ve built at Siemens Canada is that these strategic collaborations are not optional. They are essential. Globally we dedicate close to $9-billion annually and approximately 50,000 employees to research and development. Of the 5,000 to 6,000 inventions we generate every year, quite a few of these groundbreaking innovations have been the product of collaborations between our organization and educational institutions.

These results make a big difference for our business, and for the schools we partner with. When we engage in innovation partnerships with colleges and universities, we get access to some of the brightest minds in the country and to bodies of research that have often taken decades to build. For our academic partners, the benefits include access to our considerable resources, as well as opportunities to apply and test novel ideas in real-world settings.

Our partnerships with schools also create positive impact beyond industry and academia; the resulting innovations contribute directly to safer workplaces, stronger supply chains and lower-carbon buildings and transportation systems.

As technological landscapes continue to shift with unprecedented speed, industry’s alliances with academia must also keep evolving beyond. Our ability to innovate, today and in the future, depends on it.

This column is part of Globe Careers’ Leadership Lab series, where executives and experts share their views and advice about the world of work.