Retooling Academic Corporate Relations

Executive Director Daryl Weinert and Senior Director Susan Shields chat with MEDC President and CEO Mike Finney and his wife Gina at the NACRO Conference

The 200 members who attended this year’s annual Network of Academic Corporate Relations Officers (NACRO) conference at the University of Michigan may have been a bit surprised to see entrepreneur Ari Weinzweig, co-founder of Zingerman’s Delicatessen, step up to the speaker’s podium.

Weinzweig and his ZingTrain consulting crew weren’t there to serve up the creatively named sandwiches, such as the “Who’s Greenberg Anyway,” “D-$’s Cuban Conundrum,” and “J.V.W.’s Detroit St. BBQ,” that have made their Ann Arbor-based restaurants so popular. Rather, their purpose was to share the Zingerman’s Family of Companies’ theory of exceptional customer service and to offer ideas that attendees drawn from 85 different research universities could implement in an academic - corporate relations setting.

NACRO is a nationwide organization that provides professional development opportunities and disseminates best practices to help its members establish and advance comprehensive, mutually beneficial relationships with industry. The series of panel discussions and workshops presented at this year’s three-day conference, hosted by the U-M Business Engagement Center from Aug. 1-3, reflected NACRO’s heightened interest in cultivating new avenues of interaction between industry and academia and fostering greater collaboration.

“In today’s challenging economy, we realize that corporate resources are tightening up and companies are looking for a return on their investments in universities,” said NACRO Co-President Dorothy Kittner. “As corporate-relations officers, we want to be able to identify the changing needs of our corporate partners and provide access to research, project support, creative talent, technological advancements, and other resources that can add value to their companies while also benefiting our universities.”

During the conference, representatives from traditional bread-and-butter manufacturing industries, such as Deere and Company, Toyota Motor Corp., and Boeing Co., shared their insights on oil prices, regulatory matters, global competition, and future demand. Spokespersons from Google, Cisco Systems, Intel, Facebook, LinkedIn, and other high-tech and social-networking companies also discussed the challenges and opportunities facing their respective sectors.

"The NACRO conference proved to be a valuable international platform to learn about different models for company and university professionals to work together,” said Edward Sawicki, associate director of global business development at the Procter & Gamble Co. “P&G has found that university corporate-relations offices, such as the U-M Business Engagement Center, are very effective for navigating complex universities, as part of our Connect+Develop open innovation work. With the help of the BEC, we’ve been able to access resources to meet a variety of P&G needs, ranging from recruiting to student project assistance and research opportunities.”

Conference-goers, such as Coleen Burrus, director of corporate relations at Northwestern University, also benefited for their interaction with leading industries.

"The 2011 NACRO conference was a valuable experience for me, in that it helped me appreciate the changing landscape of our work in corporate relations,” she said. “Additionally, the U-M BEC is seen as a leader nationally in changing the way research universities interact with industry, and has been a great partner to NU as we reshape our approach to industry engagement.”

More information: Contact Nell Dority, director of the U-M Business Engagement Center, at ndority@umich.edu or 734-647-1000 or visit www.bec.umich.edu.