In universities, innovation can cut across campus life, curricula, facilities, faculties, patents, students, and/or technology. There can be innovation in products, processes, markets, inputs, services, or organization in relation to any of these and so each target of innovation requires its own approach.

The more difficult point to make is that organizations that think they have an innovation problem have, in fact, a leadership problem (hence recent interest in management innovation too). Innovation requires resources and long-term commitment, rooted in the external environment in the sense that it aims to offer what the world does not yet know it wants or needs. Ultimately, lest we forget, innovation lies in the eye of the beholder and the beholder is the client.

In universities, innovation can cut across campus life, curricula, facilities, faculties, patents, students, and/or technology. There can be innovation in products, processes, markets, inputs, services, or organization in relation to any of these and so each target of innovation requires its own approach.

The more difficult point to make is that organizations that think they have an innovation problem have, in fact, a leadership problem (hence recent interest in management innovation too). Innovation requires resources and long-term commitment, rooted in the external environment in the sense that it aims to offer what the world does not yet know it wants or needs. Ultimately, lest we forget, innovation lies in the eye of the beholder and the beholder is the client.

If you are asking about innovation in the way universities are managed and organized I think it is mainly a matter of incentives for professors and staff. But if you're asking about product innovation ... I'm not sure this is somehting universities should focus on. Innovation should be the main focus of firms. However universities can help the firms with their research, education and technology transfer policies favoring IP transfer and spin-offs.

The book, "The Innovative University: Changing the

DNA of Higher Education from Inside Out" written by  Christensen et. al., can hopefully provide you a comprehensive account of managing  innovation at universities. The reference is: Christensen, Clayton M. & Eyring, Henry J. The Innovation University: Changing the DNA of Higher Education From the Inside Out. Jossey-Bass 2011.

Best regards,

R. Biria

I agree with all the previous answers. I would like to add two more important aspects:

1.Developing policies for protecting the intellectual property of all the people creating new ideas, methods, and products.

2.Developing centers for technological transfer toward society.

The most important issue in my view is to develop a culture of innovation, and to develop the students' mind for understanding and performing innovation.

Innovation or innovative ideas can come from people that are in every level of the organization. The important thing, in my opinion, is for the innovative idea to find a good spot to grow (it needs to be able to be developed from an idea stage to a concept or a product  - an end result). Innovation ideas in the development stage can be negatively affected by the perceptions of the leaders/ people with authority to decide what is better for the organization. Therefore it is important to have an open mind but we still need a type of system in order to be able to filter and promote promising new innovative ideas. My explanation may  sound complicated but in reality it could be even more complicated to implement policies (as dr. Bratianu suggested) or developing centers for technologies (the are limitations such as financial ones). 

There is always the need for success and the end result in many cases. It is important to be able to support a new idea even if it comes from a person that may not fave a history of success/big results in the field( to have an open mind- Einstein's genius changed science's perception).  

Hi,

many excellent suggestions above. I find one focus area missing in particular: Training the employees from doctoral students to professors in thinking commercially about their research and the output of this research. The only audience we traditionally are trained to communicate with is ourselves (science discourse). How many in here can honestly make an elevator pitch about their research in such way that a lay(wo)man will understand the value of it???

best,

Jacob

Hi everyone,

In my experience, universities typically concentrate on research (R), while development (D) part of R&D is often lacking. Yet, innovation requires D. So, serious R&D units/centres/institutes should be nurtured.

Meliha

Remarkable breakthroughs happen at public research universities everyday, but bridging the gap between early innovation and widespread adoption is a challenge that these institutions know all too well. This is especially the case when it comes to education technology and curricular innovation.

I offer our colleagues at peer institutions and ed-tech companies several considerations for cultivating innovation on campus and beyond:

-Establish clear values and guiding principles.

- Be impractical: Then consider constraints.

-Build a dynamic team.

-Welcome talented student contributors.

-Design a model for agile development that leverages opportunities for discovery and scale.

-Build products with—rather than for—users.

-Recognize exit as opportunity and not a four-letter word.

-Embrace emergence and continue to strengthen capabilities as new opportunities emerge.

-Provide links between research and practice.