TECHLOG - O.5.4 - Training Course for Innovation Trainers

This document proposes a Training Package and guidelines for Innovation Specialists and experts in the field of logistics and transport.

In the context of the TECHLOG (Technological Transfer for Logistics Innovation in the Mediterranean Area) project, a Training for Innovation Trainers (ToIT) has been designed and carried out in the Eastern (Livorno, Italy) and Western (Alexandria, Egypt) Mediterranean.
The objective of the actions was to provide representatives of EU-Mediterranean transport and port institutions or organizations with the tools necessary to become innovation trainers in the field of advanced simulation for port and transport activities.
That is, to train representatives of such institutions to be capable of promoting, leading, and accompanying innovation processes in their own local contexts; to be able to recognize the benefits of academia-industry cooperation for innovation in the sector; and to understand and explore the benefits and potential of simulation for training and innovation in the logistics and transport sector.
As such, it is not the objective of the TECHLOG Training of Innovation Trainers to present a comprehensive overview of new technologies or developments in the field in question, but rather to provide the tools and guidance for the exploration, design, development, and implementation of new, innovative solutions.
Therefore, the TECHLOG ToIT package places the focus on how to think about problems and their potential solutions rather than what to think and how specifically to solve them. This makes it a timeless and highly adaptable approach.
The participants/users of a ToIT are “building the plane while flying it”. They are learning by doing, meaning that they are trained on new concepts like open innovation (theory) and living labs (praxis) while at the same time building and actively participating in a living lab, sharing ideas, and coming up with innovations to test in the future.
In this sense the generic ToIT package gains concretion by establishing more specific objectives and questions. During the ToIT sessions held by the TECHLOG project in Livorno and Alexandria, the training revolved around the main question of “how might we design and build an enabling environment (favorable context) to do technology
transfer for logistics innovation in Mediterranean (East / West) port areas?”. And, as a more specific sub-question, “how to design logistics and transport strategies and innovations using virtual simulation?”.