Benchmarking University–Industry Technology Transfer: A Six Year Retrospective

Abstract

This paper describes a six-year program of benchmarking research on university–industry technology transfer, conducted by the Southern Technology Council. The program's substantive foci are responsive to two major stakeholder groups: public policy leadership, particularly state economic development; and university administrative and scientific leadership. Primarily involving 50 universities in the South, individual studies have encompassed performance benchmarking as well as best practice analyses. The former incorporates simple, normalized performance metrics for technology transfer activities (patenting, licensing, involvement in start-ups), and reports include both summary profiles of the region and individual states, as well as confidential reports for each institution on how they compare to peers. The practice analyses have generally involved qualitative case descriptions of policies, practices and programs that characterize those institutions which are objectively performing well in some domain of technology transfer. The resultant reports are qualitatively rich in examples, anecdotes and organizational lore. Both types of reports have been widely disseminated among stakeholders in the South, and have been instrumental in informing several institutional and state-level program improvement efforts. The paper argues that benchmarking research—at least that oriented toward practitioners and policy makers—should incorporate defensible but not obscure methodology, and that results should be conveyed in ways that are accessible to a practical, non-academic audience.