ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Educ.
Sec. Higher Education
Mission Orientation, Transfer Competence, and the Wheel of Competencies: A Framework for Innovation-Oriented Collaboration and Capacity Building
Provisionally accepted
- Technische Universitat Berlin, Berlin, Germany
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Addressing grand societal challenges requires a mission-oriented approach that integrates innovation with effective knowledge and technology transfer. Yet the competencies necessary to enable such transfer have remained underdefined and fragmented across research traditions. This study develops a systematic framework of transfer competence, grounded in a qualitative content analysis of literature from education, innovation studies, and sustainability research. Following a typology-building procedure, fourteen competency elements were identified, ranging from agility, agency in systems, and handling complexity to critical thinking, teamwork, creativity, and motivation to learn. These elements were synthesised into the Wheel of Competencies, a conceptual and practical tool that highlights the interdependence of dispositions required for mission-and innovation-oriented transfer. The framework advances theoretical clarity, bridges adjacent discourses, and provides practical relevance by linking competencies to observable performance and potential learning objectives. Beyond higher education, the Wheel of Competencies has applications in further and continuing education, supporting capacity building for researchers, practitioners, and organisations engaged in collaborative innovation. In doing so, it offers both a conceptual foundation and a practical instrument for strengthening the human dimensions of transformative knowledge and technology transfer.
Keywords: collaboration, competency framework, higher education, innovation, Knowledge and technology transfer, Lifelong learning, Mission orientation, transfercompetence
Received: 21 Sep 2025; Accepted: 26 Jan 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Johannsen. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Thies Johannsen
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