1. Experience with pretesting the questionnaire for transfer promotors - Czech project partners
TRANS3Net – 1st Partner meeting
Dresden, 1st – 2nd December 2016

2. List of realized interviews
For PP3 (Economic and social council of Ústí region)
Innovation Centre of the Usti Region, Ústí nad Labem
Unipetrol Centre of Research and Education, Litvínov
Research Institute for Brown Coal, Most
For PP5 (Chamber of Commerce of Děčín District)
Chamber of Commerce of the Region of Usti, Ústí nad Labem
Local action group Labské skály, Jílové
Economic and Social Council of Děčín District, Děčín
For PP6 (University of J.E. Purkyně in Ústí nad Labem)
Faculty of Environment, Jan Evangelista Purkyne University in Usti nad Labem
Material Centre of Usti nad Labem, Jan Evangelista Purkyne University in Usti nad Labem
CzechInvest, Ústi nad Labem
because of an illness the interview with this promotor had to be postponed
Dresden, December 2016

3. Most important experiences / suggestions 1
in general the questionnaire is concidered as understandable (competent interviewee needed)
minor changes suggested:
General information (point 1)
It should be stressed that that these data, such as address, phone, etc. should include the organization as a whole (rather than the interviewee).
Identification (point 2.1)
the decision about a form of possible idea protection (e.g. industrial patent or other formal or more informal ways of protection) and services connected with this area can be another possible offered response.
Initiation (point 2.3)
service connected with (pre)selection of suitable partners of a concrete transfer process can be other possible offered response.
Dresden, December 2016

4. Most important experiences / suggestions 2
minor changes suggested:
Economic exploitation (point 2.4)
may be more possible responses should be presented / offered to make it easier for the interviewee to make a decision.
Preparation of economic exploitation (point 2.5)
offered responses 3, 4 and 7 are quite similar and all are connected with consulting services.
may be staff exchange and student theses do not belong to this phase of transfer (?).
Advancement of idea (point 2.6)
clearer explanation of institutionalisation needed - is it also spin-off activities?
Dresden, December 2016

5. Most important experiences / suggestions 3
minor changes suggested:
Contact persons (point 3)
unclear division of particular contacts, does not precise correspond with described phases of technology transfer process.
interviewees would prefer to give one contact person for the whole organisation, in larger organisations they would decide themselves who could help with particular questions.
Target groups (point 5)
just a note – is it even possible that only one side can benefit from the transfer process?
company size too detailed – description as a small, medium or large sized enterprise should be enough.
References (point 6)
In some cases, the references cannot be public – some contracts give both sides of the process an obligation to maintain secrecy of object of the transfer.
Dresden, December 2016

6. Possible missing questions
Sources of financing of the transfer proces,
Total number of employees (not only employees active in transfer process – in many cases it is very hard to distinquish who is and who is not really in touch with transfer processes)
Dresden, December 2016

7. Some general recommendations
to send questionnaire to the interviewee in advance (for preparation of data),
possibility of assistance is welcomed, even in case of online method of the survey,
remember to the need of update of the collected data (once per…year? - opinions differ - from quarterly to 1x per two years), this update should be done online (eg. via ),
remember to privacy – interviewees have to be sure that the collected data would be safe,
most of the information can be collected online – the only „problem“ is with concrete contacts and references.
Dresden, December 2016

8. Conclusions
Based on pretesting – the questionnaire presents a good tool for information detection and mapping of transfer promotors.
It is higly important to openly present the goal of questioning – How are the results going to be used?
basically for creation of a catalogue / map of transfer promotors enabling searching according to topic, target group, geographical range etc.,
networking,
establishment of new subject oriented teams (also cross-border).
Dresden, December 2016

9. your attention and patience
Thank you for
your attention and patience 
Karel Tichý
Dresden, December 2016