Sistema de medição de desempenho de projetos de PD&I em parcerias universidade-empresa: proposta de um modelo para uma agência pública de fomento

Abstract

It is widely recognized that the interaction between universities and companies contributes positively to a country's innovative performance, especially in knowledge-based economies. In this scenario, public funding agencies can play more proactive and relevant roles in innovation systems by encouraging cooperation between these two parties. The initiatives associated with this context generally use calls financed jointly by the agency and partner companies to support research, development and innovation projects conducted by universities. Thus, several complex projects are developed simultaneously, from different areas of knowledge and applications. Managing this portfolio of projects is especially challenging for such agencies by: involving the need to meet the expectations of different stakeholders (company, researcher, university, society, government, etc.); demand new competencies and organizational processes to monitor and control projects of this nature; among others. Thereby, this study proposes a model of performance measurement system for a state development agency with the aim of generating benefits such as: facilitating communication between partners, improving the visualization of project results and supporting decision-making of the institution. The system was elaborated over 10 months, together with the Agency's staff, through an action research that involved: the diagnosis of the organization, the restructuring of the process of executing calls in partnership with companies, the definition of performance indicators and the proposition of an online tool to support the management of the institution's project portfolio. As a result, this study indicated that the performance measurement system can contribute to the Agency by: signaling the need to take actions during the execution of the supported projects, in order to increase its chance of success; provide visibility to the results, giving them legitimacy; support better allocation of financial resources; and, subsidize efforts to maintain or expand the amount of resources allocated to university-company interaction initiatives.