Research and Impact @ Manchester (November 2025)
05 Nov 2025
A message from Colette Fagan, Vice-President for Research
Dear colleagues,
The University has now launched our strategy for the next ten years, which is tremendously exciting for our community.
From Manchester, for the world – even the title encapsulates what has always been our research community’s goal: for our work to have a positive impact on the world.
The strategy – drafted with input from you, and more than 12,000 other colleagues, students and friends of the University – promises new ways of making this happen, at pace.
Professor Sarah Sharples, Dean of the Faculty of Science and Engineering, and I have written a Viewpoint blog that gives our insight into the research excellence to impact leap.
We come to this from different disciplines – sociology and human-centred engineering – but we share the same aim: make Manchester the best place in the UK to do ambitious, inclusive research with faster impact. Whatever you are working on, the conditions that help are the same – time for discovery, simple ways to collaborate, trusted data and tools, and partners who can help ideas to develop and travel. In our blog, we discuss how we will phase the work and ask you one question: What single change would most accelerate your path from research to impact?
Please read my and Sarah’s Viewpoint blog and post your answers, comments and ideas.
For further information on the strategy, please visit:
Other news – strong rankings, new senior leaders, AI and the World 100
I’m pleased to say that we’re in a great position to go forward with the new strategy. Our University is one of the leading universities in England for research partnerships, intellectual property (IP) and commercialisation, and public and community engagement, according to the results of the Knowledge Exchange Framework (KEF5). In addition, in 2025 we are 34th in the QS World University Rankings rose to 46th globally in the Academic Ranking of World Universities (AWRU) and are ranked 8th in the UK and 56th in the world in the Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings 2026, which evaluate more than 2,000 institutions from 115 countries and territories.
I’d also like to congratulate our new Associate Vice-President for Responsible Research Practice, Professor Mahesh Nirmalan and our new Vice-President for Civic Engagement and Innovation, Professor John Holden as they take up vital lead roles for our research community.
Do join our celebrations for 75 years of the Turing Test and the work of more than 1,600 colleagues to build on Alan Turing’s legacy.
Finally, I urge everyone to complete the World 100 Brand Tracker, a five-minute survey that’s extremely valuable as the results enable us to see how our reputation is perceived compared to other leading universities and helps feed into our strategic approach.
Colette