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I’m excited to be teaching Innovation & Public Policy again this fall to graduate students at Georgetown University’s McCourt School of Public Policy.

The course examines innovation from both the organizational and public-policy perspectives. We begin with the nature of technological innovation and its relationship to economic growth and prosperity, then move through creativity and design thinking, innovation in organizations, open innovation, business- and mission-model innovation, innovation management, financing, sustainability and inclusion, and finally the policy tools governments can use to stimulate innovation. The emphasis throughout is on connecting ideas to practice through discussion, exercises, individual analysis, and a public-sector team innovation project.

The course also forms the foundation for my textbook, Innovation for Value and Mission: An Introduction to Innovation Management and Policy, which was directly inspired by the content I developed when I created this course and expands substantially on many of its themes. It is not only a textbook, but a reference for practitioners too – I wrote it for myself and often use it as a desk reference!

One aspect of the course feels particularly timely this year. Student interest in artificial intelligence has risen markedly. That is hardly surprising. AI is no longer simply an emerging technology to be studied at some distance; most of us are using AI daily and it is becoming a major technological disruption unfolding around us in real time.

That creates an unusually rich environment for studying innovation. Students want to understand not only what AI can do, but how it may reshape industries, government, employment, skills, organizations, and society—and what public-policy responses may be appropriate. The course’s technology innovation research assignment explicitly asks students to examine a recent disruptive technology, assess its trajectory and use cases, and consider its implications for both government and commercial operators as well as policy makers and regulators.

For students of innovation and public policy, this is an extraordinary period in which to be asking these questions. The challenge is not merely to anticipate technological change, but to understand how we can continually manage and shape innovation so that it contributes to human welfare and prosperity.

I enjoyed participating in the IEEE TEMSCON Global 2026 conference and meeting so many professionals who share my passion for technology, engineering, and R&D management. TEMSCON Global is the flagship conference of the IEEE Technology and Engineering Management Society (TEMS) and a premier venue for research on management, innovation, and leadership across the spectrum of technology, science, and engineering.

It was fun visiting Montreal again (always best in the summer!) and the conference venue, the École de Technologie Supérieure (ETS), was ideal because this Quebec university is so focused on technological innovation. There were several great plenary sessions and paper presentations from researchers all over the world.

In the runup to the conference, I was happy to help the excellent general co-chairs, Andy Chen and Tariq Samad, by reviewing some submitted papers as a member of the International Program Committee.

On Thursday, I chaired the R&D Management session and also presented a paper, “Aligning the R&D Portfolio with Strategy Using a Method Based on Expected Business Impact”, by me and George Hemingway.

ABSTRACT

R&D project portfolios are commonly constructed by applying multiple criteria and weighted scoring methods not widely understood beyond R&D practitioners. This complicates justifying investments in R&D to the CEO and Board. The limitations of valuing R&D projects in purely financial terms point to a need for expressing R&D project value in alternative terms relatable to business strategy. The proposed method aligns R&D investments directly with various intended contributions to business success called Business Impacts. This judgment-based method crucially includes a technique for directly comparing different types of Business Impacts, thereby creating a non-financial, but common, scale for project valuation that all projects can be ranked on. Agreeing with the CEO and other key stakeholders on the composition of a desired Target Portfolio in terms of Business Impact and Time Horizon prior to R&D proposal solicitation and selection will cascade strategy and improve the quality of R&D proposals. The process is flexible and can be augmented by Technology Strategy elements such as Technology Roadmaps and other criteria. The resulting R&D Portfolio is readily communicable at the Board level and facilitates strategic rebalancing as the need arises.

The paper will eventually be published in the IEEE Transactions but here is the preprint for now.