عوامل کلیدی برای ارزیابی موفقیت و غربالگری مدیران تخصصی حقوق مالکیت معنوی

This research uses the analytical hierarchy process (AHP) to analyze the key factors in evaluating and screening managers of the intellectual property rights speciality in Taiwan, related to industry. Industry can utilize the key factors of human resource management to provide self-growth and obtain competitive advantage opportunities for expanding the global market share. This research summarizes the evaluation and screening criteria of managers of the intellectual property rights speciality via a questionnaire of 29 managerial or technical staff from the IP rights-related industries, technology or management experts from the governmental departments related to IP rights industries, and scholars with backgrounds in IP rights related industries who had actually participated in IP rights managers speciality decisions or related tasks and who had employed AHP screening criteria. The findings include three key factors in evaluating and screening the managers’ speciality: evaluating IP rights competency, locating the core patent group competency, and calculating the chance of patents to be granted competency. This research can provide a reference for Taiwan’s related industry, when evaluating and screening managers of the IP rights speciality.

Intellectual property (IP) rights are invisible properties, differing from tangible possessions not only in their ways of usage but also their evaluation. As the world’s economy is gearing toward becoming a knowledge-based one, knowledge workers hold the key to IP rights (the creations of minds). Hence, there arises a brand new management task: how do companies turn their employees’ knowledge into their intellectual property? In the 1970s, a company’s visible property accounted for 80% of its value while, in the 21st century, 70% of it may come from its invisible property (Davis & Harrison, 2001). The fruit of knowledge is what we call intellectual property (Lou, 2003). IP rights have long been handled as a legal issue (Adams, 1987). With the society becoming ever more knowledge intensive, the prosperity of a company depends increasingly on a systematic integration between IP rights and R&D results. The development and maintenance of IP rights can help companies to increase their revenue as well as retain their competitive edge (Borg, 2001). As the link between IP rights and profit is proven to be positive, managing IP rights naturally becomes a crucial aspect of business strategy. Such management can be implemented through IP development, protection and commercialization, with the aim of strengthening a company’s competitiveness and sustainable progress (Xu, 2004). The technology service providers for IP rights work in an interdisciplinary way to deal with issues of management, legal affairs and technology. As expertise or technology dependent as they are, their products and services are knowledge-based (Bilderbeek, Hertog, Marklund, & Miles, 1998). Currently, in Taiwan, IP rights management is widely acknowledged to be one of the most important topics by industry, the government and academia alike (Lou & Hwang, 2004). Facing the present economic climate, in which innovation and knowledge capital are deemed to be of great significance, companies should take immediate action to promote research and innovation, as well as the effective management of IP rights. This naturally leads to the increasing demand for talent in the field of IP rights management. These professionals are able to provide technological development forecasts and carry out the procedures of patent registration and technology commercialisation. They can also work closely with the R&D teams to enable the utmost worth of any IP rights to become the secret weapon of a company (Xu, 2004). The core of IP rights management is the search for suitable talent, as successful management is decided by various factors, both internal and external. To overcome the internal challenges, professionals from legal, technological and managerial backgrounds have to collaborate, and equally important and difficult is the training of such professionals (Lou & Hwang, 2004). The shortage of talent at the moment is a direct result of the small number of training organizations and staff. Therefore, how to cultivate the most needed talent is currently a pressing issue for IP rights management. Studies on the theories of intellectual property (IP) rights management, technology trading and revaluation abound. Many scholars have also expressed opinions on the technical side of IP rights management, such as the government policies, market regulation and technology trading systems (Lou, 1990). In comparison, there is insufficient quantitative research focusing on the selection of IP rights management personnel. To address this issue, this study is designed with the following aims in mind: (1) To establish the relative weight and deciding factors of the vetting of IP rights managers. (2) To offer concrete suggestions on the training of IP rights managers. (3) To provide information for related industries and aspiring IP rights managers about the requirements of IP rights management as a profession. 2. Definition of the managers of intellectual property rights speciality competency index According to the online platform of technology trading, Taiwan technology market (www.twtm.com.tw, 2006a), launched by the Industrial Development Bureau, Ministry of Economic Affairs, services related to IP rights management fall into five categories: (1) services to establish IP rights management and implementation systems; (2) services to increase the value of IP rights; (3) IP rights evaluation; (4) legal services; and (5) services to plan and implement IP rights, R&D results and corporate strategies, as well as IP rights integration, education and training. The definition here not only highlights the responsibilities of IP rights managers, but also their significance to the industry. Effective management is able to bring forth tactical correlations among internal IP rights in a way that boosts a company’s strategic operation and competitive edge. In recent years, the technology industry in Taiwan has made promising advances in its R&D capability. However, accompanying such a trend is an increase in the number of lawsuits over IP infringement raised by international companies. A missed step in the field of patent landmines often proves costly. The lack of IP rights management is to be blamed for this in most cases, as is the companies’ inadequate awareness of IP rights protection. Technology companies ought to employ IP rights management professionals to enable smooth technological integration, such as technology transfer, evaluation, investment assessment and technology management. IP managers are in high demand in the current marketplace in Taiwan. Where the trained professionals are that the companies need is the hottest topic. In other words, talent cultivation has become the most pressing issue for the authorities and the IP rights service providers alike. Responding to this key issue, this study is as significant as it is relevant to the current climate.

Successful managers of intellectual property rights speciality can help companies to obtain competitive advantages in the market. Therefore, an organization’s important strategic issue is how to select the optimum managers of intellectual property rights speciality in the hope of minimizing the input in order to achieve the maximum output. Nevertheless, when a company makes a decision, it is quite common for changes in the organizational environment and the complexity of the decision factors to become intermingled during the decision making process. Therefore, it is appropriate to form an evaluating project team within the organization to select the solving scheme. While choosing the managers of intellectual property rights speciality, it is usual to face the problem of multiple criteria and many decision makers. Because this problem has the characteristics of unstructured openness, complex environmental factors need to be included when making decisions. Some criteria are often qualitative and are deeply influenced by accumulated experience and the subjective judgment of the decision makers, causing criteria weights to be changed often due to environmental variations at the time of the decision making. We invited managerial or technical staff from IP rights-related industries, technology or management experts from governmental departments related to IP rights industries, university professors or scholars with a background in IP rights related industries executives to conduct comparisons, and we employed AHP to understand the crucial factors of evaluating and screening the managers of intellectual property rights speciality in Taiwanese industry, resulting in actual effects and meanings. The findings of this research can act as a reference for Taiwanese related industry when seeking professionally competent managers of intellectual property rights speciality. This is a solid contribution of this research to Taiwanese related industry. The research results show that professional competency was the managers of intellectual property rights speciality’s main criterion, followed by basic competency. Accordingly, industry companies often combine each other’s complementary technologies and resources via professional competency to increase the competitive advantage of the companies (Hitt and Dacin, 2000 and Schilling, 2005). This verifies and supports the viewpoints of several scholars (Shiea, 2006). In addition, with regard to the second level criterion, the first five key factors that are most frequently stressed are: evaluating IP rights competency; locating the core patent group competency; calculating the chance of patents being granted competency; deciding the best time at which to patent; and applying patents both inland and overseas. The least frequently emphasized factors are: professional confidence; observation; team spirit; the ability to adapt; and English proficiency. IP rights management is crucial to any company’s business operation and asset security. The key responsibility of an IP rights management specialist is, therefore, to work like the protector of these intangible properties. For the realization of IP rights protection within a company, every step of an innovation process should be duly recorded, and any significant patents and trademarks registered. Establishing a system for monitoring IP rights is especially important. This is to ensure the consistent protection of IP rights within the company as well as to prevent information leakage. Employees should also abide by the related rules in order to prevent infringing their own IP rights belonging to their own companies or their competitors. Managing specialists need to have a clear sense of the industries in which their company are involved, as a defensive measure. Recently, the government in Taiwan has launched an on-campus policy campaign over the issue of IP rights protection in order to help students to avoid infringement during this information intensive age. This study investigates the real demands of industry in Taiwan, based on which the competency index and weights of IP rights managers are established. These indexes and weights can serve as guidelines for the development of training courses as well as the company’s human resource management, such as interviews, promotions, performance assessment, wage adjustment and leadership cultivation. Industry, the government and academia in Taiwan have demonstrated significant progress in the field of IP rights, particularly with regard to the quality of managers with a speciality in IP rights. This study shares the vision of promoting the quality of such managing specialists. The US, apart from being an attractive market, presents better knowledge and more mature systems with regard to IP rights management, and so it is worth Taiwanese companies seeking to emulate it. This study, therefore, suggests that, in addition to professional and practical know-how about IP rights, English competency is another important element in the training of IP rights managers. IP trading, IP evaluation and IP rights infringement analysis—the more specific sub-industry IP rights—would require varied professional competencies and personalities. This part serves as a worthy subject for future research.