FROM MY PERSPECTIVE

Technological innovation governance for winning the future

M. Nawaz Sharif⁎,1

Myriad Solutions, Inc., Fulton, Maryland, MD, USAEngineering for Professionals Program of Johns Hopkins University, Maryland, MD, USAUnited Nations ESCAP's Asian and Pacific Center for Transfer of Technology (APCTT), Bangalore, India

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history:Received 23 May 2011Received in revised form 19 October 2011Accepted 7 December 2011Available online 21 January 2012

Both developed and developing worlds today face significant economic crises. For winningtheir future, all countries will have to boost their capacity to innovate. Since technological in-novation has now become the mantra for employment generation through growth of exportedgoods and to ensure sustained economic growth, current national technological innovation ca-pacity governance policies need to be grounded on four basic pillars: (1) adopting an action-able taxonomy of technological system components utilized by enterprises operating in thefiercely competitive global marketplace; (2) relying on greater public-private partnership fortargeted specialization in emerging technology industries; (3) complementing research-university-linked incubators with metropolis-based innovation hotspots; and (4) mandatinga prioritized choice criteria function for technological innovation project funding. Why thesepillars are important and how to strengthen national technological innovation capacitybuilding-blocks are described in this essay on the basis of lessons learned from studies inmany Asian developing countries and some developed countries of the world.

© 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Keywords:Technological InnovationInnovation Capacity GovernancePolicy Decision Making

Introduction

Throughmany decades of studies, I have come to understand that a focused technology-integrated development planning pro-cess has led to the economic wonders in Japan and South Korea.

The ascendancy of the latter, in particular, is simply amazing. As recently as the early 1970's, South Korea's GDP per capita wascomparable with that of the poorer countries of Asia and Africa. But by 2004, South Korea joined the trillion dollar club of worldeconomies, and currently is among the world's 20 largest, accomplishing this with a population of about 50 million and hardlyany natural resource reserves. I observe that a carefully-differentiated technological innovation drive (using the essence of theKaizen philosophy of Japan) has been the corner-stone of South Korea's economic development project financing strategy. Itnow seems to me that, under the current global setting, both the economic-recession-saddled industrialized countries and thestruggling developing nations facing a revolution of rising expectations could perhaps try to emulate a Korean-style carefully tar-geted technological innovation strategy for winning their future. In order to implement such a strategy, a country has to developtwo critical infrastructures by — strengthening scientific and technological (S&T) education system for new knowledge and cre-ative talent development; and promoting technological innovation systems through public-private-partnership in research anddevelopment (R&D) efforts that lead to productivity-driven global competition by business enterprises. In this essay, I am focus-ing on the technological innovation requirement for winning the future by a country.

Technological Forecasting & Social Change 79 (2012) 595–604

⁎ 16845 Harbour Town Drive, Silver Spring, MD 20905, USA.E-mail address: Nawaz@myriadinc.net.

1 Formerly, Dr Nawaz Sharif was a Chair Professor and Vice President for Academic Affairs, Asian Institute of Technology (AIT), Bangkok, Thailand.

0040-1625/$ – see front matter © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.doi:10.1016/j.techfore.2011.12.004

Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect

Technological Forecasting & Social Change

In order to appreciate the importance of technological innovation for winning the future, let me start by saying that it is onlynatural for all societies to do so. We know that making and continuously improving technologies are the hallmark of the humanrace, because technologies enhance human capacities of both mind and body with specifically aspired developmental goals. Nat-ural human creativity and an inner desire to compete with others have made technological innovation our second nature. There-fore, I am convinced that technological innovation is really in perpetual motion! Moreover, technological innovation hasaccelerated the process of globalization of the world's societies. Interestingly, history shows that earlier technological changewas a consequence of global societal evolution; but nowadays, it has emerged as a leader of desired societal progress. Therenow seems to be universal awareness that technological innovation is indeed the engine for economic prosperity of a country.Technological innovations provide limitless opportunities for all people to do: more things, newer things, better things, and thingsfaster than ever-before. Enterprises go for technological innovations as better transformation mechanisms in goods producing ven-tures and better operational platforms in services providing endeavors. Technologies provide leverages for productivity gains(through increased value addition, or by decreased cost of operation, or by achieving both simultaneously); gain in productivityenhances competitiveness and contributes to a positive value of trade (export minus import) in the current interdependent worldeconomic system.

Internationally, through the increased application of technological innovations, industrialized societies are competing for bet-ter exploitation of available resources of our planet to achieve a higher quality of life for their people. However, even though tech-nological innovations have enabled people to get more out of less, technological advancements have also made sustainability ofhuman life a global concern due to a trilemma— skewed population explosion, swelling natural resources depletion, and alarming en-vironment degradation. Obviously, even if these impacts may have been caused by increased application of technologies, they canonly be remedied by developing more and innovative technologies that maximize positive benefits and minimize negative im-pacts. Besides, the business world is now facing many mindboggling challenges: a dizzy pace of technological change, a messytype of social connectivity, a fuzzy state of the future, and a shaky kind of stakeholder loyalty. Unprecedented pace of innovationsin the information and communication technologies (ICTs, which include the Internet and digital Social Media) is an underlyingcurrent for creating the incredible new world that we live in today. It is evident that, in the present era of digital connectivity, noorganization and no society can remain insulated from globalization trends. The Internet is also eliminating traditional interme-diaries between consumers and suppliers, and forcing all firms to become flat, flexible, fluid, and mobile. Additionally, it may benoted that new ICTs have opened the eyes and ears of all people in all parts of the world. The growing unemployed middle-classpopulations of the world now want—and want it right away—what they can see affluent people (in nearby and faraway places)are enjoying. Thus, newer goods and services will continue to have great demand, providing opportunities for increased globaleconomic prosperity and social development.

Given that globalization and technological innovation are inevitable, then what are the major imperatives for a country to winits future? In my opinion, current national technological innovation capacity governance policies of a country need to be ground-ed on four basic pillars: (1) an actionable taxonomy of technological system components utilized by enterprises operating in thefiercely competitive global market place; (2) increased public-private partnership for targeted specialization in emerging technol-ogy industries; (3) strong research university-linked incubators andmetropolis-based innovation hotspots; and (4) application ofprioritized choice criteria function for technological innovation project funding. These fundamental-issues are explained in thefollowing sections.

1. Actionable taxonomy of technology system components

What constitutes technology in the economic development context? My experience with the aspirations to integrate scientificand technological considerations into the development planning process in many Asian countries taught me that an underlyingdifficulty faced by most countries is the lack of reliance on an actionable type definition of the term technology that is acceptedby all parties concerned — general public, academic community, science and technology community, research and developmentcommunity, and economic planning community. I recall an age-old cliché: one cannot manage something that one doesn't fullyunderstand; and of course, one cannot manage it well if one doesn't try to measure it. Therefore, to win the future by integratingtechnological innovation considerations with development investment decisions, it is crucial to define technology in a way thatenables managers to pull levers for actions that will produce desirable outcomes.

From the existing literature on strategic management of technology, I take a comprehensive definition given by Burgelman [1]to explain my point. In my judgment, as technology is what technology does, technology should be defined in the context of its ap-plication in all work places. I find that in all organizations (private or public), all work-packages [the term work-package is widelyused in project management where it is defined as a unit of work that can be assigned to a specific party for execution, representing acollection of work actions necessary to create a desired result with a given schedule and resources allocated for the work unit] are in-variably accomplished through the application of technological systems comprising dynamically interacting components (the sys-tem elements). Along with the Burgelman's definition and actionable-measurable rationale, I present the technological systemcomponents taxonomy in Fig. 1. The five components, covering each and every aspect of the most comprehensive definition avail-able anywhere are described below:

▪ Object-embodied component, named TECHNOWARE (T). Technoware refers to the physical capital utilized for various work-packages (in both principal and supporting activities) undertaken by all kinds of organizations (in the private as well as publicsectors). Technoware is the object-embodied physical-visible type of technological system components, including both

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capital- and intermediate-goods, such as: artifacts, tools, software disks, equipment, machinery, vehicles, structures, materials,chemicals, and so on. Important to note: technoware purposively amplifies various human capacities (of both muscle andmind) for producing different types of marketable goods and for providing different types of economic services sought by cus-tomers or clients. The technoware component of any technological system is therefore the necessary core of each and everywork-package in all kinds of organizations. Therefore, understandably, people often refer to technoware as the entirety oftechnology!

▪ Person-embodied component, named HUMANWARE (H). Humanware is the person-embodied art-of-doing-type technologi-cal system components, such as work related specifics: skills, talents, ingenuity, creativity, craftsmanship, dexterity, etc.Humanware refers to the crux of all tool-assisted tasks in all implemented work-packages. Humanware is everything whichmakes people at work do things and which manifests in what people actually do with available technoware by applying per-sonal qualifications and experiences. Most importantly, humanware invariably includes all of tacit knowledge and know-how,human labor, specialized ideas, unique skills, creativity‐based problem solving and decision making skills of people in the con-text of their specific work-packages.

▪ Record-embodied component, named INFORWARE (I). Inforware is the codified (generally in explicit and recorded form in theprint or electronic media) technical knowledge related to specific work-requirements and work-conventions that give thefoundations for any technological system utilized in work-packages undertaken by different organizations. These are the re-cord-embodied know-what-why-how-type technological components, which are the operational frameworks and technicalspecifications, such as: drawings, diagrams, formulae, theories, parameters, technical manuals, guides, etc. Inforware are shar-able knowledge about operational relationships, scientific knowledge developed from experimental results, principles of sci-entifically observed phenomena from nature; and all kinds of technical information, specifications, standards, blueprints,graphs, tables, etc.

▪ Teamwork-embodied component, named ORGAWARE (O). Orgaware refers to the coordinated task–tool relationships in theactual practice of work-packages implemented by organizations. These are the work-operations-schemes-type technologies,like: recipes, operational steps, flows, techniques, procedures, instructions and routines for accomplishing tasks. Orgawareis based upon the logic of systematic integration and coordination of activities and resources that achieve planned goals ofany specific work-package. This particular component of technology essentially refers to the flow of organized team-workthat makes the task–tool relationship meaningful and productive. It involves organizational work assignments for day-to-day operations of production and service activities, and arrangements for using and controlling other factors of productionused by humanware for any project.

Fig. 1. Actionable and Measurable Components of Technological Systems.

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▪ Cyberspace-embodied component, named CYSNETWARE (C). Cysnetware rides on the back of Internet-based communicationstechnologies. The ability for electronic communications has far transcended exchange of data and information. Today, organi-zational systems are able to collaborate electronically to facilitate innovative idea generation and their implementation.Cysnetware recognizes the tremendous power of the digital media for global collaborations amongst people as well as forglobal collaborative processes. Cysnetware further capitalizes on the Cloud-computing technologies to leverage the abilityof community for enterprise agility. Cysnetware enables an enterprise to provide energy to all other components of the tech-nological systems in use and at the same time contributes to get more work done with less resource expenditure by the en-terprise as a whole.

Let's note that the original technological system components concept was developed and published by Sharif [2,3] during mid1980s. While the narratives were continuously fine-tuned ever since, the description given above is the latest. The metric issue fortechnological innovation is also dealt with in Fig. 1. Over the years, I found it straight forward to use degrees of sophistication of atechnology component as a measure of technological innovation. But it's important to remember that the level of sophisticationrefers to each of the elements and also their unique combinations.

Now, reflecting on the technological system component framework, I would like to discuss a number of unique characteristics.Implementation of any production or services related work-package can never take place in the complete absence of any of theTHIOs (and C whenever available). But, every set of THIO+C utilized for any work-package are interwoven and dynamicallyinteracting in accomplishing the work. In practice, specific sets of THIO+C systems are utilized in synergistic combinations as:transformation mechanisms for goods producing and as infrastructural platforms for services providing functions. Next, let mehighlight some of the axioms regarding the technological system components. Most critical for competition is the humanwarecomponent. Without the essential humanware, new technoware is simply non-functional or just useless for actual performanceof the work-package. High caliber humanware can acquire the best technoware and latest inforware; and can also help adaptany acquired orgaware. As inforware is actionable intelligence at work, good inforware enables quicker talent development andalso results in savings in terms of time and resources utilized for work. Since orgaware is a team endeavor, it is the implementableprocedures for producing quality outcomes by a group, at a given time within a permissible cost.

Interestingly, although THIO sets are always present simultaneously, the elements of these components in actual use for anyparticular work are neither equally important nor are equally dominant. Since all work-packages of all organizations require tech-nologies as their work-engines, which are being continuously improved and advanced to achieve and sustain competitive edge,their relative contribution coefficients change over time and space. Anyone dealing with management of technological innova-tion, should know that there are trade-offs between pairs of technology components that make the actual choice issue complicat-ed. Some transformation-facilities (such as aircraft production) and services-platforms (such as a nuclear power plant) are verycomplex and hence the minimum requirement of the levels of sophistication of all THIOs could be extremely high. Some others(for example software development) may require very low levels of sophistication of technoware component. Thus, for a specificwork-package, the relative contribution of each component (in terms of importance or dominance) depends on the unique char-acteristics of the work-package, and the technology content added is an integrated coefficient of contribution. Moreover, one hasto remember that having technology resource is a necessary condition but not a sufficient condition for competition—which in-cludes innovations in technological capabilities, technological competencies and technological strategies. Relying on the taxono-my presented above and recognizing the implications of the tech-system characteristics, Fig. 2 presents a synopsis oftechnological innovation fundamentals for an enterprise engaged in global market competition.

Next, let me explain the usefulness of the conceptual frameworks described in Figs. 1 and 2. The system component frame-work for representing technology in the context of economic production and service activities, indeed serves well to deal withone common misconception regarding international technology transfer. Considering technology as just machinery only, mostdeveloping countries complain that developed countries generally transfer obsolete technologies to keep them dependent. How-ever, developing countries have to realize that they cannot utilize state-of-the-art technoware without having the necessaryhumanware, inforware and orgaware that make that technoware productive. I can also explain to the developed countries that,when an organization invests in new computer hardware and new planning software, they often fail to see the need for changein the human resources (new humanware) and in organizational culture of work practices (new orgaware). Additionally, thisframework helps us to deal with the situations arising from acquisition and merger of enterprises in a better way. It makes enter-prises recognize the importance of special attention needs to be given to organization culture (inherited orgaware) of the parties.See Smith-Sharif [4] for discussions on how an enterprise manager could leverage the power of humanware, technoware, infor-ware, orgaware and cysnetware for market competitiveness.

Let me also try to explain the crucial role played by focusing on technology components — the intelligence based created re-sources (so called intellectual capital) — in making enterprises in Japan and South Korea both efficient and effective for bettercompetition in the global marketplace. First, both Japan and South Korea focused on sophisticated 'H' development. In addition,the Japanese automobile industry emphasized 'O' sophistication to become number one in the world. Successful exploitation ofthe following 'O' innovations (aka, the Toyota way) is familiar to us: just-in-time technique to achieve the ideal zero inventorycost; quality-function-deployment to integrate customer preferences into the design activity; kung-bung (stop-and-run) produc-tion process to ensure total quality management; and popular Kaizen to make things better by everyone. Japanese innovationsin quality control procedures (emphasizing 'O') lead to the same profitability goal at a fraction of total cost saving efforts. Besides'H' and 'O' development, South Korea seems to have also emphasized 'I' sophistication. Successful exploitation of 'I' innovation canbe seen in the case of Korean flat display panel industry, achieved through contract research by Ministry of Science and

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Technology supported R&D institution's linked incubators. The Pohang Iron and Steel Company's focus on specific skills ('H') de-velopment programs created its ability for innovation of 'T' imported from abroad.

2. Public-private partnership for targeted specialization

In a highly competitive world, technological innovation must be targeted. Many high powered national committees and globalorganizations have made this recommendation. The US National Academies established a Committee on "Prospering in the GlobalEconomy of the 21st Century: An Agenda for American Science and Technology." The Committee's final report [5] made the fol-lowing major recommendations: increase America's talent pool by vastly improving science and mathematics education; sustainand strengthen the nation's traditional commitment to long-term basic research to maintain the flow of new ideas that fuel theeconomy; make the United States the most attractive setting in which to study and undertake research; and ensure that the UnitedStates is the premier innovation place in the world by proper funding and tax policies. The United States Council on Competitiveness,with their stated objective of "thriving in a world of challenge and change," published a summit meeting (which included 12 CEOsof Fortune 500 companies and 9 Presidents of Research-One universities) report [6], observing that "the world is becoming dramat-ically more interconnected, interdependent and competitive, where nurturing innovation has emerged as the key strategy for socio-economic prosperity." TheWorld Economic Forum states [7] that "Investors and governments abandon or ignore scientific researchat their peril. The private and public sectors should partner to ensure regulatory structures that enable innovation and sufficientfinancing for long-lead research." As enterprises cannot compete in the global markets without an advantage based on technologycontent of the goods and services offered, the council suggested four high priority initiatives for innovation: preparing a talentedworkforce, increasing R&D investments, strengthening innovation system infrastructure, and targeting selected industries forinnovation.

I would like to suggest here that enterprises compete in the global marketplace on the basis of technology content added, whichis the contribution coefficient of technological system components utilized! With sky-rocketing cost of R&D, even the most re-sourceful multinational corporations nowadays need the helping hands of their governments (in funding basic research) fortheir product focused development research in nationally selected emerging technology areas. Hence, we hear about public-private-partnership more and more. The American Management Association published a report [8] stating, among other things,that: contemporary leaders are evolving from the current information age to the new conceptual age, which appears to focus onartistic creativity and innovation, while ensuring to empathize with the subtleties of human interactions. This observation isbuilt on the premise that modern world executives live in an era of stunning technological innovations and increased behavioral(both ethical and moral) scrutiny. Hence, I think they also need a safety net of their governments' partnership to reduce possiblelitigation risks.

As a practicality, no country can be THE leader in ALL of the technologies in industrial use. Therefore, technological innovationsin carefully targeted industries have become the global mantra for successes in international competition. We have seen that, in

Fig. 2. Technological Innovation Fundamentals for Global Market Competition.

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an era of electro-mechanical devices, Japan focused on mechatronics-based technologies and miniaturization of appliances for of-fices and homes. In an era of electronics dominance, South Korea focused on liquid crystal and wireless technologies in the con-sumer goods industries. Finland and Denmark are now focusing on clean energy technologies for global market competition. Inthe 1960s, Japan focused on adapting foreign technologies; in the 1980s, Japan increased R&D efforts clearly concentrating onmicro-electronics; in the 1990s, they mastered the Kaizen concept of continuous innovation in selected industrial products;and in the decade of 2000s, Japan's registered patents in selected electronics-based technology areas were higher than the USAand Europe. Similar development can be seen in the case of South Korea with about ten years time lag. In the 1970s, SouthKorea focused on reverse engineering to digest imported technologies; in the 1980s, there were very selective but extensive re-search and development funding to a cluster of incubators in special geographic region; in the 1990s, efforts were clearly directedtowards becoming a knowledge economy (inforware); and in the decade of 2000s, South Korea started the 5-7-7 initiative: 5% in-vestment in R&D as percent of GDP, 7 technological focus areas, and 7 targeted world industry leadership positions. Learning fromthe experiences of Japan and South Korea, and adapting the new industrialization pyramid philosophy developed by OECD coun-tries, I have prepared Fig. 3 as a general framework for carefully targeted technological innovation capacity building-blocks thatmay lead to winning the future.

3. Research-university-linked incubators and metropolis-based innovation hotspots

The OECD report [9] observed that "as business entities and civil societies became ever more active stakeholders, educationand research investments are becoming more accountable and outcome oriented." The report identified, among other things,that: innovations occur at public-private and interdisciplinary boundaries; scientific and innovation networks have become glob-al; technological innovation is best utilized not only by the industries but also throughout societies; and knowledge fusion at in-cubators has emerged as very crucial for both competitive and sustainable economic growth. The history of commercialization ofresearch and development (R&D) results show two essential follow-up measures—monetization (capitalizing intellectual proper-ty) and productization (new goods and services)—through incubators. Generally, university-linked incubators focus on intellec-tual property monetization and industry-linked incubators produce innovative goods and services. It's worthwhile to note herethat R&D results commercialization can be understood better if we note two innovation triangles in action. The innovation"area" is the totality of all triangular relationships among the three types of research activities: basic research done by academicinstitutions; applied research done by independent (public and private) institutions; and development research done by indus-trial enterprises. The innovation "zone" is the fertile region for successful commercialization of research results through technol-ogy component sophistication syndication and new products and services development. The vertices of the triangular innovationzone playground represent the following: fusion point of interdisciplinary fields of physical sciences, intersection point ofknowledge-push and market-pull forces, and meeting point of public-private interests on targeted technologies. For additionalinformation on the topic of knowledge fusion see Hefner-Sharif [10].

Usually, incubators are temporary facilities established to produce improvements in 'T' based on 'I' innovation in the univer-sities; but, corresponding 'H' and 'O' improvements are often done in the enterprises. While corporate incubators are primarilyfor-profit organizations with which a company's technology development goal is enhanced, government-supported incubatorstry to syndicate technology innovations from the universities. However, nowadays, there seems to be a general acceptance thatinitiatives to spur innovation need to be geographically focused, in the "hotspots" (which are emerging technology specific S&TParks promoting new products and services development), as opposed to scattering resources to the universities all over a

Fig. 3. Building Blocks of Technological Innovation Based Industrialization Pyramid.

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country. The technology park eco-system includes: related industry clusters, knowledge producing universities, research and de-velopment institutes, and young energetic entrepreneurs — in close proximity. The "related industry cluster" refers to companiesand company groups of an industry that can utilize generic technological innovations and are usually located in the innopolis (aka,technopolis). An innopolis is an emerging-technology-centric metropolitan region developing as an innovation growth pole. Forexpert information on industry clusters and technopolis see Phillips [11] (Fred Phillips' blog URL http://www.science20.com/machines_organizations_and_us_sociotechnical_systems/clusters_technopolis_and_new_industrial_policy ). Fig. 4 is a schematicpresentation of the most important features of technological innovation triangles, incubators and innovation hotspots.

Let me now integrate the fundamentals of technological innovation concepts presented earlier with the actions that lead toactual technological innovation for competition by global enterprises. The incubator concept for commercialization of researchresults by establishing technology transfer centers adjacent to universities has succeeded to a large extent to create improved-technology based small-scale enterprises, but globally competitive giant corporations tend to have started in the innovation hot-spots. It seems to me that one success factor in Japan and South Korea was the deliberate progression from a general factory type(increased R&D expenditure in different scientific areas in government-funded institutions) to the targeted industrial technologypromotion facilities supported by government with private sector collaboration. Unlike the 'T' focus of incubators, innovation hot-spots produce all THIOs and bring the innovation triangle forces into close proximity. Examples of catching-up (gradual improve-ment in the same s-curve) in established industry through 'H' and 'O' focused innovation in industry-supported in-houseincubators are: Japanese Auto Industry (Toyota) and Korean Iron and Steel Industry (POSCO). Examples of leapfrogging (disruptiveimprovement to the next s-curve) are: Japanese Nano-Tech Industry (Gunze) and Korean display panel (LCD, PDP and LED) Industry(LG). Starting with the renowned government funded research and development institute (the Korea Institute of Science andTechnology, KIST, in 1966 in Seoul), the South Korean government established Daedeok Science Town (in 1973) and thenreshaped it (in 1979) and moved KAIST (which was KIST+Korea Advance Institute of Science KAIS) to "Daedeok Innopolis" with-in the Daejon Metropolitan City area for a targeted cluster of emerging technologies.

4. Mandatory application of prioritized criteria function

Here I address the challenge of innovation financing in the current geo-political setting. We have witnessed the rise of inno-vation as a currency of international competition and hence innovation has become a national agenda in every country for dealingwith growing global interconnectedness and interdependence. All countries are enacting "reforms" to establish forward-lookingeducation and talent development institutions and allocating scarce resources into initiatives for new intellectual capital com-mercialization. However, technological innovation efforts can flourish only if it is clearly emphasized as a top priority by nationaland organizational leaderships. Over the years, we have seen that the corporate world has dealt with changes in the market en-vironment incrementally by adding managers to assist the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) in this fashion — earlier by a Chief Fi-nance Officer (CFO), then by a Chief Information Officer (CIO) and lately by a Chief Technology or Knowledge Officer (CTO-CKO). This represents a clear confirmation that technological innovation has become the silver bullet for successful performance

Fig. 4. Naturally Occurring and Deliberately Established Incubators and Innopolis.

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of enterprises in the modern world. Similarly, I also observe a convergence of desires in national leadership to use the technolog-ical innovation currency. It's very common to find that national government policies and development project financing now havetechnological innovation as an underlying focus for economic growth.

Since national scarce resources must be allocated for winning the future by implementing technological innovation projectsthat makes local enterprises successful in the global marketplace, public-private partnership endeavors are becoming popular.However, people also recognize the criticality of the public decision making "process" explained by Simon [12]. Since accountabil-ity and transparency in decision making are requirements, I think people are now amenable to accepting a "prioritized criteriafunction" having the following four strategic dimensions:

▪ INNOVATIVENESS Dimension ('I' focusing on creativity factors) — factors included are focused on winning the future throughmore sophistication of technological system components utilized for principal and supportive activities of an enterprise.

▪ COMPETITIVENESS Dimension ('C' focusing on productivity factors) — factors related to continuous productivity gain of qual-ity goods and services by relentless cost reduction as well as never-ending customer value addition efforts.

▪ ATTRACTIVENESS Dimension ('A' focusing on profitability factors) — factors included are focused on the creation of profitablemarkets through strategic progression and to achieve stakeholder support for self-reliance based performance.

▪ RESPONSIVENESS Dimension ('R' focusing on sustainability factors) — factors related to assurance of freedom for future gen-erations by attending to moral, ethical, justice, solvency, ecological and life sustainability considerations.

The above criteria function of ICAR dimensions is developed by reviewing the "Balanced Scorecard" concept (popularized byKaplan-Norton [13]), where the essence is not to focus only on financial factors but to include non-financial factors as well and the"Multiple Perspectives in Decision Making" model (Technical, Organizational and Personal perspectives popularized by Linstone[14]). In addition, given the concerns for long-term environmental and social impacts of technologies (climate change, terrorism,etc.), along with the fallout from Enron and other Wall Street fiascos, and the still emerging effects from the BP oil spill in the Gulfof Mexico, it cannot be overstated that all institutional leaders should give appropriate weight to the "responsiveness" dimensionfor a sustainable future. I think a mandatory requirement of transparency and rigorous application of project financing assessmentdimensions and factors may provide an alternative against endemic short-term views of the political leadership and the latentpush for pet-projects by professional leadership. An application of ICAR function can be seen in Bitman-Sharif [15].

5. Conclusion and acknowledgement

Latest OECD Ministerial Report on Innovation Strategy [16] says "Innovation is essential if countries and firms are to recoverfrom the economic downturn and thrive in today's highly competitive and connected global economy." According to OECD, "tech-nological innovation based rise of the rest is not a threat to the west but rather good news for global economy." Therefore, I feel allcountries of the world should focus on technological innovation governance to win the future.

For quite some time I thought that a country could easily emulate the Japanese-Korean type governmental models of interestcoordination for target selection and disproportionate resources allocation for successful innovations in the targeted emerging-technology areas. But, I now realize that it is not possible! Japan has a unique situation. The Ministry of International Tradeand Industries (MITI) plays a very crucial role of "interest coordination" for a future oriented national agenda that helps to imple-ment projects requiring greater short-term sacrifices for long-term betterment. In Japan we see demonstrated accountability oftop public leadership—officials resign from high position to take responsibility for failures. Consensus-based decision making ina society that values collectivism and conformity, and a culture of "we over me" were clearly visible during the 2011 disaster—earth-quake, tsunami, and nuclear power plant failure. As the Japanese is the highest-context culture, they work in a close-knitenvironment, and isolation is the strongest punishment that can be given to an employee. In Japan the group of corporations(with interlocked stock holdings, known as Keiretsu), which are all centered on a big bank, divert substantial research effortsto technological innovation. Korea also has a unique situation. Early days in South Korea, the Ministry of Science and Technology(MOST) played a "decision coordination" role for development project financing to promote national interest. MOST of SouthKorea also played a critical role of developing a fine national innovation culture (through rewards and incentives, and by promul-gating national technical qualification laws). The first S&T Minister of South Korea was in reality the secretary to the President(who showed commitment by taking charge of technological innovation as priority number one)! Even the national economic-commission-approved development projects had to be vetted by the Ministry of S&T to ensure conformity with technologicalgoals! After the Korean War devastations, people had no food and still they were running schools under the trees. Self-reliance, beat Japan motto, and sacrifice personal interest are known. The Korean business conglomerates (Chaebol) are managedby families who received very aggressive governmental support and financing for technological innovation.

The cultural differences and digital-age governance constraints may have made the Japanese-Korean "command and controlapproach of interest coordination" difficult to emulate by other countries. Even though there is some awareness that a favorableculture and climate is very crucial for technological innovation, little progress is seen in this area. S&T professionals are alwaysstruggling to "sell" top leadership on the opportunities through technological innovation in terms of investments we have tomake today for a better tomorrow. Therefore, I now feel that developing countries should go for a social movement for creatingnecessary innovation culture. Fig. 5 provides the rationale, procedure and a synopsis of the requirements discussed in this essay.

I hope my perspective presented above will shed some light on important issues when private enterprise leadership and pub-lic policy executives seriously consider national strategies for winning the future in both developed and developing countries. Myperspective is based on many years of studies and many months and years of project-work and living in the following countries—

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Australia, Bangladesh, Canada, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Nepal, Pakistan, Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, SriLanka, Thailand and United States of America.

I respectfully acknowledge the insightful teachings of my Japanese mentor Taro Nakayama and Korean mentor Hyung-SupChoi. Dr Taro Nakayama is a doctor of medicine (MD) and a politician serving in the House of Representatives in the Diet (theJapanese national legislature) as a member of the Liberal Democratic Party. From 1989 to 1990 he served as Minister of ForeignAffairs in Prime Minister Toshiki Kaifu's cabinet. I was fortunate to be trusted with the supervision of translating and publishingone of his books Starting from Zero: Transformation of Japan by Science and Technology (original in Japanese), UN-ESCAP/APCTT,Bangalore, 1985. Dr Hyung-Sup Choi is an engineer (PhD in metallurgy) was the Founding President of the Korea Institute of Sci-ence and Technology (KIST) and for the period 1971 to 1978 he served as the Minister for Science and Technology in PresidentPark Chung-Hee's government. I was fortunate also to be trusted with the translation and publication responsibility of two ofhis lesson books Industrial Research in Less Developed Countries (original in Korean), UN-ESCAP/APCTT, Bangalore, 1984 andSpringboard Measures for Becoming Highly Industrialized Society (original in Korean), UN-ESCAP/APCTT, Bangalore, 1989. Onegreat lesson I have learned from my mentor Dr Choi is: "Adaptive implementation of a progressively improved simple plan is far bet-ter than obsession with grandeur and non-implementation of a grand plan."

For information on many conceptual frameworks for technology management and governance that I have developed, readersmay visit my blog http://mns-technologicalinnovation.blogspot.com/. It's my hobby to make charts/posters/viewgraphs for mak-ing a point that is difficult for me to describe in texts. Therefore, my blog is only a collection of a number of viewgraphs that I keepon revising based on comments received from my teachers, students and friends. I sincerely welcome all comments by anyonewho would kindly review this essay and my blog viewgraphs.

References

[1] R.A. Burgelman, C.M. Christensen, S.C. Wheelwright, Strategic Management of Technology and Innovation, Fifth edition McGraw-Hill/Irwin Publishers, NewYork, 2009.

[2] M.N. Sharif, Measurement of Technology for National Development, Technol. Forecast. Soc. Chang. 29 (1986) 119–172.[3] M.N. Sharif, Basis for Techno-Economic Policy Analysis, Sci. Public Policy 15 (1988) 217–229.[4] R. Smith, M.N. Sharif, Understanding and Acquiring Technology Assets for Global Competition, Technovation 27 (2007) 643–649.[5] United States National Academies, Rising Above the Gathering Storm: Energizing and Empowering America for a Brighter Economic Future, NAS,WashingtonDC,

2007.[6] United States Council on Competitiveness, Innovate America, Council on Competitiveness, Washington DC, 2005.[7] World Economic Forum (WEF), Technology and Innovation: The Next Wave, Davos-KlostersURL, http://www.weforum.org/news/technology-and-

innovation-next-wave2008.[8] American Management Association (AMA), Leading into the Future: A Global Study of Leadership (2005–2015), AMA, Charleston, 2005.[9] Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), Ministerial Meeting Report on Science and Innovation Policy: Key Challenges and

Opportunities, OECD, Paris, 2004.[10] M. Hefner, M.N. Sharif, Knowledge Fusion for Technological Innovation in Organizations, J. Knowl. Manag. 12 (2008) 79–93.

Fig. 5. Energizing the Movement for Creating a Technology Innovation Culture.

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[11] F. Phillips, Google blog on Clusters, Technopolis, andNew Industrial PolicyURL, http://www.science20.com/machines_organizations_and_us_sociotechnical_systems/clusters_technopolis_and_new_industrial_policy 2010.

[12] H.A. Simon, Administrative Behavior—a Study of Decision Making Processes in Administrative Organizations, Free Press, New York, 1997.[13] R.S. Kaplan, D.P. Norton, the Balanced Scorecard: Measures that Drive Performance, Harv. Bus. Rev. (Jan–Feb 1992) 71–80.[14] H.A. Linstone, Decision Making for Technology Executives: Using Multiple Perspectives to Improve Performance, Artech House Publishers, Boston, 1999.[15] W.R. Bitman, M.N. Sharif, A Conceptual Framework for Ranking R&D Projects, IEEE Trans. Eng. Manag. 55 (2008) 267–278.[16] Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Perspectives on Global Development: Shifting Wealth, Paris, 2010; and Ministerial report on the

OECD Innovation Strategy; Innovation to Strengthen Growth and Address Global and Social Challenges, Paris, 2010.

M. Nawaz Sharif is currently a Principal Consultant, Myriad Solutions, Inc., Fulton, Maryland, USA; and an Adjunct Professor in the Engineering for ProfessionalsProgram of Johns Hopkins University, Maryland, USA. Formerly, Dr Nawaz Sharif was a Chair Professor and Vice President for Academic Affairs, Asian Institute ofTechnology (AIT), Bangkok, Thailand; and a Director of the United Nations ESCAP's Asian and Pacific Center for Transfer of Technology (APCTT), Bangalore, India.

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