Projekti

ERM – Engagement Readiness Monitor

Rahoitusohjelma

Lyhenne
ERM
Projektityyppi
Kehittämisprojekti
Vahvuusala
Uudistuva oppiminen
Toteutusaika
1.11.2020 - 31.10.2022
Yksikkö
Liiketoimintayksikkö
Rahoitusohjelma
Erasmus+ Key Action 2
Projektin kuvaus

Engagement Readiness Monitor Project (ERM)


Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) can enhance their contribution to their cities, regions, and nations through calling upon the society, government and businesses to work together. Whether it is in developing future talent to power our economies, supporting employees' career development and lifelong learning, offering important discoveries to the local community, or fuelling the societal and entrepreneurial development of a region to name a few. Yet, this potential remains partially unfulfilled by the key 'knowledge creators' for the lack of a holistic overarching approach towards integrating engagement in research and educational missions of universities with the efforts being scattered across technology transfer and external engagement offices.

In order to enhance and synergise the approaches towards university-business engagement on the institutional level, we need to develop understanding of the various modes of engagement and the factor that enable engaging externally. Undoubtedly, measurement of university engagement occurs; however, it invariably focusses on quantitative outcome metrics such as patents, licenses, spin-outs and research contracts, ignoring other valid forms of engagement and the mechanisms that need to be in place for it to occur. It is high time that we stop focussing on the narrowly-defined quantitative indicators and ask ourselves the question 'What is the real extent to which universities are ready to engage and how can we enhance their readiness for these engagements to be more successful?'


The Erasmus+ funded project 'Engagement Readiness Monitor' is on the mission to answer the aforementioned question and advance the engagement between universities and businesses by developing tools to measure and scale their socially impactful cooperation. Led by University Industry Innovation Network, with international partnership comprising universities, businesses and intermediaries from The Netherlands, France, Finland, Czech Republic and Italy will investigate and enhance the factors which make HEIs more likely to engage with companies by developing an Engagement Readiness Investigation Report, a Self-Assessment Framework and a Toolkit over the course of 2 years.


For more information please contact Rositsa Röntynen, rositsa.rontynen[a]jamk.fi

Project communication channels:

Projektin tulokset

Implementation Progress

During the period 1.11.-30.6.2021 JAMK's project team has participated in the implementation of Intellectual Output 1 by benchmarking engagement evaluation tools, conducting expert interviews and theoretical research on technology readiness level, as well as contributing to the final report. During the period 1.7.-31.8.2021 as a transition from Intellectual Output 1 to Intellectual Output 2 JAMK specialists have written several blog posts and articles.

Starting from 1.9.2021 the project implementation focuses on Intellectual Output 2, namely the development of a Self-Assessment Framework for measuring engagement readiness.

Partner Impact

The project has been fruitful and useful
for the participating specialists from JAMK in terms of research, publishing, network
building and even self-development. Through the knowledge produced and gained
in this project the participating specialists have influenced and improved
their work in other projects and fields of work. Since a number of managerial
level representatives from JAMK have participated in the interviews, the
project has somewhat influenced their work and leadership vision as well,
directing their attention towards more systematic engagement and the building
of engagement readiness of the organization.

Dissemination of Results

JAMK has disseminated the project results
by using its regular newsletters, website, as well as internal communication
channels in order to reach a large number of its external stakeholders and
employed specialists at all levels. There has been a piece of news on JAMK's website about the
beginning of the project and its communication channels on 23.3.2021
and an internal piece of
news with the same content.

The first e-zine was featured in JAMK
School of Business newsletter in September 2021. A blog post was presented in the newsletter in October 2021 and the report of IO1 was featured in the newsletter in December 2021.

JAMK's specialists disseminate the
blogposts and e-zines by posting and reposting them on social media, using
their personal profiles. In addition, they report their own project
publications (blog posts, e-zine articles) to the research publication portal (https://www.juuli.fi/) of the Ministry of
Education and Culture of Finland, by which the publications get nation-wide
coverage. This linkage of publication from year 2021 will happen in the
beginning of year 2022.

Results

Publications

Updated 25.1.2022 by Rositsa Röntynen