Northumbria-led global research and innovation project secures new European funding

A global research and innovation project led by Northumbria University since 2017 has secured a further four years of EU funding worth in excess of €1.5m.

Global and Entrepreneurial Talent Management 3 (GETM3) was an international consortium of higher education institutions and businesses undertaking research and staff exchange projects to explore why employers across the world can struggle to recruit and retain younger generation employees. In particular, the research investigated why many young people experience instability in their career, despite being highly educated and entrepreneurial – and at the same time why employers often report a skills mismatch and difficulties in recruiting and managing young talent.

Based on its success, GETM3 has now been replaced by GETM4 to continue and expand the international research and staff exchange work for another four years. Led again by Northumbria, GETM4 has secured €1.5m from the EU’s key research and innovation funding programme Horizon Europe, plus an additional €130,000 from the Korean Research Foundation, who are long-standing partners on the project.

As well as updating and expanding its aims, GETM4 has also extended the original European and Korean consortium into Africa (Kenya), South America, (Chile) Northern and Southern Europe (Estonia and North Macedonia), creating a global team of high-quality universities and industry partners.

GETM4 project objectives

GETM4 is a community of educators and researchers who have been working with students, graduates, businesses, NGOs, social enterprises and others. It will explore how universities can help ensure a better alignment between the expectations of employers and of new employees by capitalising on the latent entrepreneurial talents seen in graduates across the globe.

Researchers are also considering the role of academia in supporting the development of creative confidence with entrepreneurial agency for “responsible and respectful innovation” in areas such as health and wellbeing; social innovation; environmental sustainability, digital resilience, etc. Recognising that the world has been greatly disrupted since the inception of GETM3, the future focus will consider the significant impact of the shift towards digital work, study and collaboration.

Professor Alison Pearce, Principal Investigator and Project Lead for Northumbria University at Newcastle Business School, said: “GETM3 was a highly successful project, despite being severely disrupted by geopolitics and pandemic lockdowns. We are delighted not only to maintain but to expand our successful research and innovation consortium into new countries and continents and to be asked to lead this endeavour once again. GETM4 is an ambitious extension of a 15-year collaboration between European and Asian universities and I’m delighted to be working with Northumbria colleagues Professor Mark Bailey in the Design School, Dr. Alan Godfrey in Computer Science and Alejandra Vicencio in Graduate Futures. We will be able to deepen existing partnerships while developing new ones, creating opportunities to internationalise our research on a truly global scale with even greater funding from Horizon Europe”.

Professor Louise Bracken, Pro Vice-Chancellor for Research and Knowledge Exchange at Northumbria, added: “We are thrilled that GETM4 will continue the excellent work and outcomes delivered through GETM3. It is exciting to be able to continue our support for staff mobility to enable them to develop their research capacity across institutions, disciplines and themes, and to promote interdisciplinarity and external impact by working with non-academic partners. The programme supports individuals and provides benefits at all scales to those individuals involved, their institutions and the non-academic partners they work with. We are pleased that Horizon Europe continues to value this initiative and has extended their funding”.

Support from the European Commission, UKRI and the association of the UK with Horizon programmes, has also been pivotal to the success of the research. Aleksandra Schoetz-Sobczak, Project Officer, European Research Executive Agency, and support office for the project commented:” GETM3 was very successful in various aspects. This includes among others: outstanding implementation of the project, mastering challenges with positive results and a fantastic team spirit. I am delighted to be working with this consortium again on GETM4”.

GETM4 held a kick-off online meeting with the Steering Committee on Friday 24 November 2023 including all partners and the European Commission’s project officer. The first ‘sandpit’ collaboration event will be hosted by the Technical University of Dublin, one of the longstanding members of the consortium, from 22-26 January 2024. This sandpit will welcome the new member universities and will set the scene for the next four years of work.

GETM3 outstanding performance

The GETM3 project was highly successful, despite multiple geopolitical challenges during its lifetime, and the consortium was invited by a member of the EU Commission’s Research Executive Agency to apply for a follow-on project. The project delivered 27 research deliverables, 54 internationally authored publications, 250+ month-long secondments in 5 countries for 167 participants of 22 nationalities. 53% of the secondees were women and 15 international innovation ‘sandpit’ networking events were hosted in the participating countries.

For more information on GETM4 and how to become involved in the research please contact Prof. Alison Pearce, Northumbria University lead for GETM4.