Tekes is one of the leading innovation funding & strategy agencies in Europe. The agency is currently drafting a new long term strategy. Key driver within this strategy is how Tekes can create societal benefits how it could maximize the societal benefits. Note that most of the research in this field has focused on analyzing the impacts of r&d&i funding on private sector innovations and business spillovers – societal well-being is still a green field.

As a part of the drafting process of the new strategy, Tekes has asked three international experts to review their strategic plans. The experts focus on three concrete domains: social & health care services, environmental impact assessment, and information society

Robbin te Velde from Dialogic covers the last domain (with a particular focus on eLearning). Core questions in the impact assessment of Tekes are:
• How well have Tekes’ strategic goals (a wellbeing society and environment) been implemented in Tekes’ operations and practices?
• How well have the goals been materialised? What are the most important impacts and with which (national level) indicators can the impact of Tekes be seen?
• Is Tekes a global forerunner among innovation related organisations in any of the areas related to societal wellbeing and environment?
• What measures and indicators could be used and/or developed to continuously follow up Tekes’ performance on societal impacts?

A presentation on the interim results of the expert review can be found here.