University Governance for Innovation: How to Nurture Creativity Through a Successful Academic Entrepreneurship Process

Higher education institutions are today significantly impacted by a number of social and technological transformations. A different archetype of university is emerging, which requires a new governance model able to drive the creation of new socio-economic value into a complex and challenging scenario. This chapter is focused on understanding how universities can valorize the creativity and innovation potential of territories and communities through a governance model supporting academic entrepreneurship. The interest is on analyzing the organizational conditions under which universities can have a central role in stimulating economic growth through industrial research, technology commercialization, entrepreneurial development, and new venture creation. A review on university governance and academic entrepreneurship literature is used to discuss the pillars of the entrepreneurial transformation of higher education institutions and universities. We then present seven successful cases of academic entrepreneurship in Albania and Italy to provide examples of entrepreneurship-oriented governance in two different political, institutional, economic, and cultural contexts. Finally, we derive some conclusions, also based on the comparison of the two scenarios, and identify a recommendation framework in terms of: (1) innovation triggers; (2) key stakeholders; (3) processes and enabling policies; and (4) performance reporting approaches.