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China's rapid economic growth and movement toward a knowledge-based workforce have led to an increasing need for skilled labor at all levels. The last ten years has seen the number of corporate universities grow rapidly in China. The purpose of this study is to investigate the current status of corporate universities in China, explore their processes and practices, and discover the issues and challenges involved in building and running a corporate university in China. Specifically, the research questions are:
- How are the corporate universities in China organized, managed and operated?
- What are the major issues and challenges faced by corporate universities in China?
- How are local Chinese companies different from foreign investment companies in running corporate universities?
- Compared with world-class corporate universities, what have we done well and what needs further improvement?
This article begins with a brief review of current literature on corporate universities, and will then present key findings from in-depth interviews with heads of 11 corporate universities. It will conclude with implications for practitioners in workplace learning and future research issues.
Literature review
Definition of a corporate university
[7] Li and Alagaraja (2006) revealed 17 definitions for the term corporate university. While many scholars view a corporate university as an educational entity, department or facility ([1] Allen, 2002; [4] Blass, 2000; [9] Meister, 1994; [11] Prince and Beaver, 2001), some researchers tend to define corporate university as a process instead. Following a benchmarking study done by the American Productivity and Quality Center (APQC) in 2000, the corporate university is defined in this paper as "a process - not necessarily a place - by which all levels of employees (and sometimes customers and suppliers) participate in learning experiences necessary to improve job performance and enhance business impact" ([3] APQC, 2000, p. 6). [10] Meister (1998, p. 19) supported this view by saying that "today the corporate university consists of a process rather than a physical place".
Best practices and trends
Corporate University Xchange, Inc. conducts an annual survey of 100 corporate universities known as Corporate University Future Directions, to explore best practices and identify key elements in the design, launch, and management of a corporate university ([10] Meister, 1998). The findings of this annual survey usually point to the...