Madeline Smith and Joe Lockwood on new approaches in cluster evaluation, presented at the 15th TCI Global Conference, Basque Country 2012.

2. New Approaches in Cluster Evaluation
TCI Bilbao 2012
Madeline Smith, Joe Lockwood

3. New approaches (and some old)
 Scope and context of evaluation
 Mixture of measures and methods
 Focus on qualitative
 Framework for evaluation/strategy

4. Evaluation is….
 Reviewing progress
o Against original intent and ambition
 NOT audit
o Not an end in itself but should be part of the process
o Not just about numbers involved – difference cluster is making
 All about learning
o What worked /what didn’t
o What more to do
o Informing changes and next steps
 Flip side of strategy development
o Good baseline = gaps/weaknesses/opportunities
o Helps set priorities for action

5. Evaluation challenges
 Different audiences want different things
 Different levels
o Project
o Programme
o Regional impact
 Complex and causality challenges
 All about showing change
o Hard economic data
o Softer measures of improvement
o Stories of the process – building collaboration etc.
o How and why it works

6. Regional
Benefit/Impact
Why?
What?
How?
Indicators and Themes
•Jobs
•GVA
•Industrial Structure
•Distribution of opportunity
Cluster
Projects
•Who involved
•Type of partnership
•Depth of partnership
•Behavioural changes
•Growth in sector
Business Environment, i.e.
•Innovation performance
•Physical assets
•Finance and Funding
•Skills
•Talent attraction/retention
•Internationalisation
•World Class
Partnership –
Connectedness and Social Capital
Strategic Operational

7. Partnership and Collaboration
 Capturing change
from collection to
cluster
 Growing levels of
trust
 Deeper collaboration
 Opportunity to build
impact that is greater
than the sum of its
parts
 Changes in behaviour
reflect embedding
•Groupwithcommonagendabut little formalor
informalinteractionCollection
•Givingandexchangingof information.Individual
Programmesstill totally separateCommunication
•Jointactivities andcommunications, givinggeneral
supportandendorsement of each other’s
Programmes,servicesorobjectives
Co-operation
•Jointactivities andcommunications, jointplanning
andsynchronisationofschedules, activities, events
andobjectives.
Co-ordination
•Individuals,groups,organisationrelinquish some
autonomyandsharerisk, formutual gains.True
collaborationresultsin changesto behaviourto
supportcollectivegoals.
Collaboration

8. Capturing change
 Change at different levels
o Cluster
o Company
o Individual
o (people collaborate
not companies)
“When you deal with collaborations you are working with a
complex web of people, egos, relationships, loves, hates,
friendships and a big nest of politics”

9. Individual/company
Awareness
Understanding
Action
Convincing
Others
Telling the story of change
o Innovation journeys for individual, company and cluster

10. Cluster
Awareness
Understanding
Action
Convincing
Others
Awareness
Understanding
Action
Convincing
Others

11. Capturing change
 Telling the story of change
 Key points explored:
o Evidence of behaviour change (embedding/long term)
o Triggers and critical moments
o Catalysts
o Culture shifts
o Barriers and challenges
o Ripple effect

12. Evaluation and strategy
 Should run hand in hand
 Baseline = Gap/opportunity analysis
 Baseline against where cluster hopes to be
 Set framework at start to show progress
o Overall
o Sub-themes
 Need to have common language and perspective
o Challenge in diverse groups
 Developing framework in Scotland (acts as both strategy
development and evaluation tool)

13. ways of
being
ways of
seeing
ways of
thinking
ways of
doing
©Prof Irene McAraMcWilliams, GSA
insight identity
implementationideas

14. ways of
being
ways of
seeing
ways of
thinking
ways of
doing
Prof Irene McAraMcWilliams, GSA
insight identity
implementationideas

15. co-ordinate
cultivate
sustainability,
repeatability
Organisation
continuous reflection
dynamic ‘balance’
triple bottom line
Diversity
coping with variety
meeting customer
expectations
on time, on spec, on cost
Delivery
desire, delight
Quality
people want more
repeat customers
no returns
Operations
making it happen
processing, transformation
allocating resources- people, kit, skills,
finance
developing and building
Innovation
making change happen
support for forward
development
Ways of Doing
Creating Cultures
of Innovation

16. Active looking
appetite
restless with the status quo
vision
eyes up, heads
up!
Opportunities
‘catching the
wave’
‘zeitgeist’
imagination-rich
alternative futures
Speculation
scenarios
looking for unknown wants
Users
needs, wants
opinions
Focus
persistence
right-down-to-the detail
problem-seeking and problem-solving
seeing the opportunity space
Breadth of Vision
Fresh perspectives
optimistic/ pessimistic (Yellow and Black thinking)
Ways of Seeing
Creating Cultures
of Innovation

17. Progress
 Testing as strategy/evaluation framework
 Helps set ambition and develop common perspective
 Self assessment in group
 Need hard ROI measure and evidence of deeper trust
etc. as well (external view)
o Also measuring econ indicators, stories of change etc.

18. Summary
 Evaluation of clusters complex – especially causality
o What difference is the cluster making
 Need basket of measures
o Hard economic data
o Quantitative indicators (especially company improvement)
o Qualitative – stories of change and process
 Build framework
o Help define strategy
o Show difference making across range of indicators
o Tells story of change (how as well as what)

19. Madeline Smith
Head of Innovation
EKOS Ltd
Email: madeline.smith@ekos.co.uk
Tel: +44 141 353 1994
www.ekos-consultants.co.uk
Joe Lockwood
Project Director
Centre for Design Innovation
Glasgow School of Art
Email:j.lockwood@gsa.ac.uk
Tel: +44 1309 678137
gsacdi.com