This research intends to advance knowledge in the technology management field, most importantly in the study of organizations that develop technologies in-house and wish to enhance their technology transfer performance while maintaining adherence between R&D activities and overall business strategies. The objective was to build a multi-criteria decision-making model capable of producing a technology transfer score, which can be used by practitioners in order to assess and later improve their organizations' technology transfer capabilities -- ultimately aiming to improve technology development as a whole. The model was applied to a major power utility organization in the Pacific Northwest of the United States. The introduction brings initial and basic information on the topic, along with the problem statement -- this chapter is aimed at situating the reader on the boundaries of the topic while highlighting its importance within the technology management field of study. The second chapter is the literature review. It brings general and specific information on technology transfer, as well as its complexities, gaps, relationship with other fields and the characteristics of this topic within the energy realm. It also tries to shed a light on how the alignment between R&D and business strategy is perceived by the literature, discussing some of the methods used and its shortcomings. Additionally, the literature review brings an analysis that builds the argument in favor of a continuous technology transfer process, and tries to show how it would be helpful in aligning R&D and business strategy. The third chapter presents the methodological approach -- hierarchical decision modeling (HDM) aided by action research -- which constitutes a methodological novelty piloted and validated throughout the development of the study. The fourth chapter details the model development process step-by-step, and the fifth chapter details the model application process with the analysis of the aforementioned organization. Additionally, results are interpreted and analyzed, and insights for the specific case and for technology managers in general are discussed. Lastly, the contributions of the study towards the advancement of the body of knowledge are discussed, as well as the study limitations and future research opportunities.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:pdx.edu/oai:pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu:open_access_etds-6067 |
| Date | 10 May 2019 |
| Creators | Lavoie, João Ricardo |
| Publisher | PDXScholar |
| Source Sets | Portland State University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | Dissertations and Theses |
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