EReadyMonitor - The Engagement Readiness Monitor project

Erasmus Plus

Erasmus Plus Programme - Key Action 2 Strategic Partnership in the field of Higher Education

Funding Agency: Co-funded by the European Union

EReadyMonitor project investigates and enhances the factors which make HEIs more likely to engage with companies by developing Engagement.

More specifically, the project has the following objectives: 

  • to gain an in-depth understanding of universities’ engagement with business and their readiness to cooperate in various engagement activities
  • to develop a novel tool enabling the evaluation of the university engagement readiness at the institutional level
  • to design the Engagement Readiness Toolkit that will help increase the readiness of the universities to develop cooperation with business

The Engagement Readiness Monitor project emphasizes measuring the university's readiness to engage according to different perspectives and methodologies, rather than just addressing standard indicators measuring only the quantifiable outputs of engagement and cooperation activities of universities with businesses.

It places more effort in expanding on these metrics to cover a more comprehensive set of engagement activities, including traditional research and education and valorization and governance.

The self-assessment tool will allow for measuring the readiness of HEIs to cooperate in different activities and, through the provision of the tools, roadmap, and other materials created as a result of the project, will help increase their readiness to ultimately turn them into engagement ready and subsequently into engaged universities. 

 Specifically, the Department of Management is involved in: 

- developing a novel tool enabling the evaluation of the HEI engagement readiness at the institutional level (Engagement Readiness Self-Assessment Framework, IO2), concerning activities related to both the commercial valorization of research results and the production of public goods with educational, social, and environmental impact.   

- designing a toolkit that will help increase the readiness of the HEIs to cooperate with different channels through which the output of academic research can be conveyed to the market and society at large, including patents, licenses, university-industry collaborations, academic consulting, and the creation of new ventures. Specific attention has been paid to new  venture creation and the improvement of relations with established companies.  

UNIBO contributes to the project by leveraging on their prior experience developed in research and institutional activities.  

Partners: 

  • UNIVERSITY INDUSTRY INNOVATION NETWORK BV - The Netherlands (Coordinator)
  • Alma Mater Srtudiorum Università di Bologna, Department of Management (DISA team: prof. Rosa Grimaldi and Dr. Elisa Villani)
  • Institut Mines-Telecom Business School - France;
  • Univerzita Karlova V Praze - Czech Republic;
  • JAMK University of Applied Science - Finland.

Duration: 24 months - from 1/11/20 to 30/10/22 

Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs):

9: Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure