Map Time Allocations and Governance Conflicts
Define the exact operational boundaries between academic responsibilities and commercial duties, specifying weekly time allocation in realistic day counts. Identify potential conflicts of interest, including research overlap, student supervision, and spinout board seat governance.
Completing this action isolates potential institutional friction points and realistic time constraints before they jeopardise commercial momentum. It provides the essential operational clarity needed to define the founding team structure and governance model accurately.
The founder must deliver a detailed conflict-and-time matrix clearly separating university work from venture tasks, complete with realistic full-time equivalent commitments. It must detail a clear governance protocol for handling overlapping research interests and student involvement.
Five questions an expert would ask when reviewing your output
Use these to challenge assumptions, pressure-test your logic, and check the quality of this action's output in the context of the parent task and wider venture development.
- 1
What hard evidence proves you can deliver your proposed venture workload alongside your remaining university teaching commitments?
- 2
How will you resolve direct conflicts of interest when university research overlaps with the venture's proprietary roadmap?
- 3
Why do you believe your academic department head will sign off on your proposed external day rate or time allocation?
- 4
What mechanism is in place to ensure PhD students under your supervision are not exposed to spinout conflicts of interest?
- 5
How does your governance design handle voting rights and board representation if university policies limit your directorship status?