Three perspectives on intersectoral collaboration : the teacher the doctoral student and the experienced researcher

Industrial Doctoral School, IDS encourage all kinds of intersectoral collaboration in order to strengthen knowledge transfer and understanding for the common research ground. Intersectoral collaboration within IDS, at Umeå University is of utmost importance for the ongoing success for educators, supervisors and doctoral candidates. These activities are also of huge importance to participating partners, as knowledge is transferred on different levels and between the collaborators. Therefore our doctoral school includes a three month period for collaboration between the doctoral candidate and the external partner. This period can be used for projects and work tasks that run parallel to the regular doctoral project. This will give the candidate a deeper and broader understanding for the external partner’s culture, business and challenges.. For the external partner it will add new knowledge that is of importance to daily work. At Umeå University, intersectoral collaboration and mobility is considered so important that it is highlighted in the strategic plan Vision 2020 as one of the sub goals. In this presentation we will give three different perspectives on intersectoral collaboration. The first perspective is that of the educator. Through collaboration with an external partner and using the skills taught to the students, she/he will experience how knowledge taught is utilized. The aim is to increase the quality of the education. The second perspective is that of the doctoral candidate. Through participating in actual cases and projects the candidate will be trained in how to applicate theoretical knowledge, but also gain understanding for problems that is common in daily work for the partner. Here the main goal is to broaden the views and background knowledge in order increase the quality of the research and thesis. The third perspective is focusing on the research process. Through intersectoral collaboration, the researcher has come across new and outstanding opportunities to find new research partners, current research issues and real-life scientific data leading to novel findings and research results. Industrial Doctoral School, IDS, is a doctoral education in collaboration with an external partner. Supervisors and external partners are focusing on a joint research question of importance and validity to both parties. IDS has since 2008 accepted 50 doctoral candidates, involving more than 30 external partners and supervisors in projects with huge importance and impact to both the research area and the economic development