2. Identifying and capturing IP

a. Training in IP Identification

All employees, whether permanent, casual, full-time or part-time, should be given an introduction into IP awareness and what constitutes IP rights.

b. Incentives

Employees should be acknowledged appropriately for their efforts. The possibilities for incentives are broad, ranging from ‘open’ recognition for the generated IP, through to compensation via the generated revenue.  This should be measured upon commercialisation, or at time of IP sale, product sold or royalties paid for milestone achievements.

c. Capturing IP for future success

All IP related to the business and generated by employees, volunteers, trainees, and contractors (if agreed) should be transferred to the organisation. Written agreements between the organisation and each employee are a mandatory process the business should consider introducing immediately.

In order to achieve this objective, procedures and guidelines can be put in place to capture and record ideas and concepts as they emerge, such as registering all IP and its relevant information in a central register.

Work leading to new IP generation should be frequently recorded.  An IP Disclosure Form can be used to capture details about ideas and IP that emerge through the business activities.  This is then supplied to the appropriate manager who registers the IP and takes it through the next phases of the management cycle.

Links to subsections of this topic

Scan your organisation for IP
Introduce an IP Management Strategy
1. An organisation IP policy
2. Identifying and capturing IP
3. Storing IP
4. Evaluating IP
5. Protecting IP
6. Enforcing IP