The Code-Switch Consultancy Programme is our flagship researcher training offer, partnering PhD and postdoctoral researchers from the Social Sciences, Humanities, the Arts and STEM with business clients and experienced Code-Switch Consultants.

Businesses are invited to partner with the programme by submitting project briefs for the consultancy projects, offering researchers the opportunity to collaborate on real-world challenges. Business partners benefit from having an interdisciplinary team of highly skilled problem-solvers who apply their expertise, the latest academic insights and research techniques to solve your business challenges.

Code-Switch’s MBA-style consultancy programme attracts researchers from around the country. Applicants are motivated to learn from consultancy and project management professionals to deliver impactful results such as the development of new products, services and accelerating innovation. Code-Switch provides training, coaching and mentoring throughout the life of the programme to ensure the benefits of this great opportunity are maximised for researchers and businesses alike.

Working in interdisciplinary teams, our Associate Research Consultants have successfully helped businesses solve a wide range of challenges, including:

• Marketing strategies
• Evaluation of services
• Development and validation of new products
• Investment
• Creating capability
• Business change
• Entering new geographical markets
• Expanding from B2C to B2B and from B2B to B2C
• Launching, positioning and communicating new services and products
• Measuring impact of products
• Achieving strategic goals

This programme is open to SMEs, start-ups, social enterprises, sole-traders and co-ops from all sectors.

Confidentiality

Project teams will sign a confidentiality agreement if the project is deemed to involve confidential business information.

Intellectual Property (IP)

Any IP generated and/or deliverables produced in connection with the research consultancy project (foreground IP) will vest in the business client, on the understanding that:

• • ‘Know-how’ is excluded from the definition of IP, since this cannot be unlearned by the researcher.
  • Researchers reserve the right to use the skill, know-how and expertise developed during the project to provide similar services to any other business client.
  • Business partners credit researchers and Code-Switch Consultants in any publication of the project’s outputs (standard wording and logo to be provided by Code-Switch).
  • Researchers are not entitled to publish any IP from the project without written consent from the business partner.

Case studies

A project case study will be published on the Code-Switch website and, in some cases, the websites of affiliated universities with prior agreement from the business partner.

Projects will be delivered by a team of 5-6 researchers. The delivery stage of the project lasts for eight weeks and involves 350 hours of research time. Business partners are expected to commit an average of 15 hours hours throughout the programme (24 weeks). This time is largely spent in scheduled activities such as consultations, progress reviews and presentations. Some time is also required for ad-hoc online meetings with project teams and Slack communications to ensure the project remains on track.

The programme comes at no cost to businesses, other than minimal necessary costs associated with the generation of empirical data from, for example, surveys, focus groups or interviews with members of the public.

Businesses are invited to partner with Code-Switch’s Research Consultancy Programme by submitting project briefs. Our next programme starts on 1st July 2024 and the deadline to submit project briefs is 15th May 2024. If you would like to discuss a project idea, email hellen.parraflorez@codeswitchconsultants.com.