The 2nd User Partner Workshop of the Certus Center was held on 18/19 October 2012 in Holmen Fjordhotell, Asker. The workshop gathered about 30 participants, half of them coming from the Industrial and Public Administration partners of the Center.
The Certus Center plan to arrange two annual User Partner Workshops with a strong focus on user partner perspectives, one in March and one in October. The present workshop was the second in this series.
The workshop was divided in two parts, where the first day focussed on evaluating the work and performance of the center in the preceeding year. The participants worked in groups to evaluate both
- Results – the outcome of the work efforts the preceeding year, and
- Processes – how the partners had worked together to achieve the agreed goals.
Under these two main areas the groups discussed several topics, including
- Quantity and quality of deliverables
- Scientific publications and achievements
- Scientific synergy across projects and partners
- Industrial impact and other impact
- Quantity and quality of host/partner collaboration
- Quantity and quality of collaboration between User Partners
- User Partner involvement and commitment
The second day of the workshop focussed on planning. The day started with short presentations from each of the user partners outlining their expectations for the year to come. Then the participant went into technical meetings to follow up on both the user partner perspectives and the work that had been performed under the Annual Work Plan 2012. The second day of the workshop functioned as the first step of the development of the Annual Work Plan 2013, and the partners would continue this work in the weeks following the UPW.