Building successful technology transfer teams: A theory of cascading commitment

The attempt to transfer a technology from a publicly funded laboratory to a profit-oriented manufacturer can be a lengthy and complex process, involving several organizations and several key individuals within each organization. For example, a product technology transfer team may include the public lab itself, one or more end user organizations during product development and trial, a transfer agency, a public funding agency, the receptor manufacturer, and a private funding agency. Studies of such multi party transfers have suggested many factors that have contributed to their success or failure. We feel that most of these factors can be organized under the rubric of a more general theory of cascading commitment. Specifically, in this paper we propose that the likelihood of a transfer's success can be substantially affected by excellent management of the team building process by the public lab's R&D manager/director. Successful teams are built by gaining the commitment of appropriate individuals from appropriate organizations in a sequential cascading effect, by insightful and customized solicitation of each new team member to join at the appropriate stage of commercialization. To do this, the manager must be cognizant of, and individually appeal to, each new team member's perceptions of three sets of variables: evidence of the prior members' credibility, evidence of the prior members' commitment, and the set of personal benefits to be gained from participation.     

China's Exceptionalism and the Challenges of Delivering Difference in Africa

This article explores the notion of ‘China's exceptionalism’ in Africa, a prominent feature in Beijing's current continental and bilateral engagement. ‘China's exceptionalism’ is understood as a normative modality of engagement that seeks to structure relations such that, though they may remain asymmetrical in economic content they are nonetheless characterised as equal in terms of recognition of economic gains and political standing (mutual respect and political equality). This article considers the burden that the central Chinese government has assumed through its self-construction and mobilisation of a position of exceptionalism and, concurrently, the imperatives that flow from such rhetorical claims of distinctiveness in terms of demonstrating and delivering difference as a means to sustain the unity and coherence of these rhetorical commitments.     

Kafka meets Machiavelli: Post-war,post-transition Eastern Slavonia

As the agonising over 'what next' for Kosovo and Serbia continues, Eastern Slavonia offers a transition experience and timescale from which we may learn. Each case is specific in historical and political terms, and in the nature of international intervention. But questions of transition and minority rights are inherent across the region. Though Eastern Slavonia was one of the areas of former Yugoslavia that saw some of the fiercest fighting in the 1991 Serb-Croat war, few international aid agencies now remain. The 1995 Dayton Agreement provided for a one-year transition period for its re-incorporation into Croatia, under the auspices of a special UN mission (UNTAES). Based on extensive fieldwork, this article details the constraints on the UN's input into integrated social and civil structures, and describes the Kafkaesque welter of legal and bureaucratic obstacles as well as economic and other forms of discrimination that now face minority groups living in, or returning to, Croatia. Without a firm government commitment to full equality and fair treatment of all citizens, the pattern of violent 'ethnic cleansing' may yet repeat itself.     

An introduction to the special issue on ‘counterfeiting’

This paper provides an introduction to the articles and report excerpts included in the special issue of Trends in Organized Crime on ‘Counterfeiting’. The aim of this special issue is to add to the relatively sparse literature currently available that addresses this expansive and complex criminological phenomenon. In particular, the special issue draws together empirical research findings and theoretical accounts on the organization of the counterfeit trade across a broad spectrum of goods, and highlights a number of issues associated with researching counterfeiting.     

Volatile organic compounds from the combustion of human and animal tissue

The volatile by-products of the combustion of ordinary fuels such as wood, polystyrene, polyethylene, urethane foam, PVC and the like are well known to the forensic fire debris examiner. When a fire involves a human body, volatile species are produced that are not so well known, including various alkenes and aldehydes. These have sometimes been mistaken for the residues of unusual accelerants. In an attempt to document what volatiles are produced by the combustion of animal fat and human fat, the authors have used an open-tube pyrolysis probe as a microfurnace to burn small samples of unembalmed subcutaneous fat from human, avian and porcine sources, and collect volatiles by charcoal strip adsorption. The volatile products were analyzed by GC/MS. Predominant species included aldehydes in the C6-C10 range, homologous series of alkenes and alkanes, and other hydrocarbon products. These results were compared to those obtained by free-burning (open flame in air) of similar specimens and to the volatiles detected in debris from beneath a human cadaver in a test fire. Differences between the volatile profiles produced by human fat as compared to pork and chicken fat and adventitious sources of such volatiles are discussed.     

Beyond 'Dragon in the Bush': The Study of China Africa Relations

In the wake of China's Year of Africa in 2006, China–Africarelations are currently the subject of unprecedented attention.However, although those relations are widely covered they arealso under-researched. This article offers an introduction toChina–Africa relations, covering background to the historyand politics of Chinese involvement in the continent and identifyingareas of further research. It concludes by calling for the studyof China–Africa relations to develop a culture of seriousresearch beyond current ‘dragon in the bush’ preoccupationsand so engage a complex subject that is about to become a mainstreamissue in African politics. The author is grateful to Nina Sylvanus, Ricardo Soares de Oliveira,Chris Alden, and especially Nai Rui Chng and Deborah Brautigamfor helpful comments on an earlier version.     

Building Successful Technology Commercialization Teams: Pilot Empirical Support for the Theory of Cascading Commitment

Improving the process of commercializing a technology from a public lab requires a deep understanding of which factors actually contribute to successful commercialization. Such factors are complex, including the quality of the technology itself, choice of transfer mechanism, quality of business intelligence, project evaluation and selection techniques, team building processes, organizational structures, reward and penalty structures, financial support, human resources support, and project management tools, among others. This article focuses on the improvement of team-building processes. It describes a pilot empirical test of the theory of cascading commitment, using data from a study of 34 technology transfer cases from 5 different Canadian federal labs. Of the 34 cases, 20 were successful, 11 were unsuccessful, and 3 were uncertain. In this paper, success was defined as the private sector manufacturer's perception of how well the project attained the profit objective associated with sales of a new product which embedded the new technology. The pilot results provide directional support for the key propositions of the theory: 1) a complete team of both public and private organizations is necessary; 2) a complete team of key individuals (linchpins) from within each organization is necessary; 3) there is an optimal sequence for recruiting the organizational partners; 4) there is an optimal stage for recruiting each organizational partner; 5) high commitment from every linchpin is necessary; 6) linchpin commitment to the team is determined by a variety of factors; and 7) the probability of success is improved if the team of linchpins remains intact until the commercial launch is achieved. Some provisional implications for management practice are provided, as well as suggestions for future research.