The Corporate University as the Internal Expert and the Strategic Partner of the Organization

The article illustrates the importance of corporate education in current business environment and describes the role of the corporate university within the system of corporate education. The corporate university is defined as a strategic tool used to ensure the training and development of employees, customers and suppliers to implement company's business strategy. The four main roles of the corporate university: Training Centre, Leadership Accelerator, Strategy Platform, and Learning Network are described. The problems in creating corporate universities faced by Russian companies are reviewed. In most corporate universities there is a comprehensive, fundamental approach to training based on professional standards or competency models. Most corporate universities were set to achieve internal company goals. Only a few universities were founded as separate business units, earning not only from in-house orders but from offering services to third parties as well. The dynamic development of major Russian companies encourages the creation of corporate universities that will help the companies stay aligned with the ever-changing and complex global business environment. The development of a corporate university as a priority project involves large financial investment, including investment in advanced learning technologies and campuses. The corporate universities in Russia are developed at the time when the national education system is experiencing a certain decline, and corporate universities often have to compensate for the lack of proper professional training. The experience of Sberbank in creating its own corporate university is analysed. The stages of the university development and the Development Strategy 2018 of the Sberbank Corporate University are described. The conclusions were drawn: The creation of the corporate university is not a whim, but a necessity for any large company that desires to stay competitive. To become one of the world's best corporate universities the Sberbank Corporate University has to implement a number of strategic initiatives, to build a regional network, to develop a self-learning culture throughout the bank. The Sberbank Corporate University, on the one hand, should actively support the strategic interests of the bank, and on the other hand, it should develop and train personnel, and should not aim to become self-sufficient.