Corporate Gifts

Robinson College is fortunate to be supported by a range of companies, including, Bloomsbury Publishing, Beachcroft LLP, Herbert Smith and the Management Consulting Group plc. Robinson can benefit in many different ways from corporate support and the examples below are designed to show some of these, but are not exhaustive, please contact the Development Director, Helen Cornish, on hec39@cam.ac.uk or development-office@robinson.cam.ac.uk to discuss your specific ideas.

Proudfoot Consulting Director of Studies in Management Studies

Proudfoot Consulting Director of Studies in Management Studies Robinson College is working with Proudfoot Consulting over a period of five years, following the company's commitment to sponsor the post of Director of Studies in Management Studies. The Director of Studies, Dr Ian Rudy (1981), is known as the Proudfoot Consulting Director of Studies in Management Studies and is a key link between the College and the company.

Proudfoot is one of two companies that comprises The Management Consulting Group (MCG) and is a specialist firm of consultants that implements sustainable operational improvements at no net annualised cost to their clients. MCG is an umbrella organisation for a diverse range of consulting and professional service offerings and the combined organisation (including sister company, Parson Consulting) operates globally with offices on five continents.

At the launch, Robinson Warden, Professor David Yates, commented "We are most grateful to Proudfoot Consulting for its gift and for Kevin Parry's (1980) advocacy on the College's behalf within the firm. The company's support helps the College to ensure that it maintains the highest standards of teaching in Management Studies, whilst introducing the students to a "hands-on" consultancy that not only seeks to identify potential efficiencies, but also to help clients to implement those recommendations. We look forward to working with Proudfoot over the next five years."

On March 19th, 2007, Robinson College hosted the first stage of selections for the MCG internship; a chance for one Robinson undergraduate to spend the summer in the US as an intern to one of the firms of the Management Consultancy Group Plc. The group was keen to give an exceptional student the chance to experience working for a major firm in his field of business.

There was significant interest from the undergraduate members. Thirteen students took part in this part of the recruitment process, which consisted of a business simulation exercise, "the Wine Bar game". The students were split into teams of 3-4 and were given numerous decisions to make about the running of their own (hypothetical) wine bar - everything from branding to ordering of stock, from staffing, to maintenance and expansion of the premises of the bar. At various stages in the process, each team's decisions were processed through a computer to determine the outcome of the choices that had been made. We were very lucky to welcome Richard Briggs and Bob Henderson from Proudfoot Consulting to run the event.

The winning team comprised James Gordon, a second year Land Economist, Adam Jones, a second year Physical Scientist, and Romana Karim, a third year Philosopher. This team went through to the next stage in the selection process; a round of interviews with Kevin Parry at the MCG London offices. Ally Considine, in her third year reading English, was also offered an interview as the most outstanding candidate from the other teams and, in fact, succeeded in securing the internship after the second round interviews. An article that Ally wrote following her internship can be seen on page 10 of the Michaelmas 2007 edition of Bin Brook at http://www.robinson.cam.ac.uk/alumni2/binbrook/binbrook_mich07.pdf

To learn more about Management Studies at Robinson today, or about sponsoring another subject in a similar scheme, please initially contact Helen Cornish on hec39@cam.ac.uk. To learn more about Proudfoot Consulting, see www.proudfootconsulting.com

Beachcroft LLP Fellow and Director of Studies in Law

Thanks to very generous financial support from law firm, Beachcroft LLP, Robinson was pleased to welcome Dr Isabella Alexander as Director of Studies and a Fellow in Law. Managing Partner of Beachcroft LLP, Paul Murray, said in announcing this partnership:

"We regard this as an excellent way to bring together academic lawyers of the highest calibre with those in practice at Beachcroft LLP so that each may benefit from the experiences of the others and offer rounded and high-quality teaching, learning and research opportunities to students and staff alike."

Dr Alexander maintains regular contact with Beachcroft and visits their London offices from time to time to give seminars on her specialist area of the law. Beachcroft lawyers visit Robinson and take part in the College's annual Law Revision Week and other Robinson College Law Society activities.

To find out more about corporate giving and relationships with Robinson College, please contact the Development Director, Helen Cornish, on on hec39@cam.ac.uk or development-office@robinson.cam.ac.uk to discuss your options.