Our group’s site visit to UM6P today really brought to light the importance of first-hand research and connections. Without visiting the university, my project group had a basis of information, but the site visit provided us with new insights we would not have gained otherwise.
Prior to the site visit, I knew OCP Group plays a large role in the financial operations of UM6P, but I did not know how. Today, I learned OCP Group operates in areas where there is phosphate, and in exchange for extracting phosphate, they give back to the community. One of these communities is Ben Guerir, an old mining location, and OCP gave back by creating UM6P. OCP in addition to other partnerships pay for UM6P’s services to solve their problems. In addition, UM6P has an endowment system and brings in revenue through hotels and their startup solutions. Ultimately, the university, OCP, and corporates work together to promote entrepreneurship in Morocco and the public good of the country, while value moves in a circle between them. Further, the university’s different faculties, or schools, have their own budgets and operate as business units. All of this information will be incorporated into the financial overview for our final report.
Because UM6P is not located in a major city, the university needed to develop an entire offer for faculty to settle in Ben Guerir. The challenge with this is that there is not much life outside of UM6P’s campus, and people want to get to the bigger cities. This partially leads to faculty commuting to the university, some from Marrakesh. While talking with someone who works at UM6P, I found out that Morocco is building a high speed train for 2030 that will have a station in Ben Guerir. Pairing the weakness of UM6P’s Ben Guerir campus location with the opportunity of the high speed train could be a weakness-opportunity strategy we recommend to UM6P in our final report.
We also had the opportunity to walk through UM6P’s campus and hear about the various resources students have access to. In addition to clubs, there are hair salons, supermarkets, festivals, and other facilities for students to use. Despite all of these amenities and activities for students, UM6P’s website does not currently showcase them. My group may be able to provide suggestions to them about how they can make this information more accessible on their website.
Our guest speaker also mentioned that as UM6P continues to add initiatives, they could face challenges with recruiting. He described recruiting as a “governance nightmare,” so our group may be able to develop a strategy for UM6P to streamline their recruiting process.