engage HEI 2012
"It is vital for our future economic growth that business and universities work closely together." David Willetts, Minister of State for Universities and Science
Key Note Speakers
Will Hutton
Executive Vice Chair,
The Work Foundation
Will Hutton is executive vice chair of The Work Foundation, the most influential voice on work, employment and organisation issues in the UK. Regularly called on to advise senior political and business figures and comment in the national and international media, Will is today one of the pre-eminent economics commentators in the country.
He began his career in the city, as a stockbroker and investment analyst before moving to the BBC, where he worked both on radio, as a producer and reporter, and on TV as economics correspondent for Newsnight. Prior to joining The Work Foundation, Will spent four years as editor-in-chief of The Observer, for which he continues to write a weekly column. He also regularly contributes to The Guardian and the Financial Times.
Will’s best-known book is probably The State We’re In, which was seen at the time as setting the scene for the Blair revolution. Since then he has published The State to Come, The Stakeholding Society, On The Edge (with Anthony Giddens), a groundbreaking analysis of globalisation and The Writing on the Wall: China and the West in the 21st Century. His latest book, Them and Us:Changing Britain – Why we need a fair society, has just been published by Little, Brown.
The biography was borrowed from: http://www.theworkfoundation.com
David Sweeney
Director (Research, Innovation and Skills)
David Sweeney has been Director (Research, Innovation and Skills) since 2008. In this role he is responsible for developing policy on Research (including the Research Assessment Exercise and Research Excellence Framework), Business & Community and Skills Policy. He is also responsible for the London and East regional teams and for the Strategic Development Fund.
A statistician, David worked at two BBSRC research institutes, developing mathematical models of plant growth then moving into senior management in the IT area, becoming Director of Information Services at Royal Holloway, University of London and serving in a national role as Chair of the Universities and Colleges Information Systems Association.
He became Vice-Principal (Communications, Enterprise and Research) in 2004, responsible for research strategy, the 2008 RAE submission and for developing Royal Holloway's research-led commercial and consultancy activities, knowledge transfer and development programme.
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