If you want people to do something really well, then engage and motivate them. The most successful organisations when it comes to intellectual property strategy are those that have full engagement from their entire team.
So how do you achieve this?
1 – set your intellectual property strategy goals (based on business or corporate goals) – make them achievable and concrete;
2 – delve deep until you really understand the behaviours you need from the entire team to achieve these goals;
3 – develop and implement appropriate positive and negative feedback to guide people’s actions;
4 – clearly communicate the goals, behaviours and feedback that can be expected;
5 – keep your ears open and actively seek employee comments and suggestions for improvement;
6 – iterate.
Here’s a quick example. Say you need to reduce your IP budget but make it more effective. Then, reward team members (even after they have left the organisation) if a patent for which they are an inventor is issued / granted. The long term commitment by the organisation to getting granted patents will help motivate your team to invest the time in more solid patent applications. (On this particular issue, you should obviously also take a serious look at your invention screening process.)