
Opleiding: International Standardisation
Learning purpose
A defining factor in achieving success
Blu-ray has become the new standard for high definition optical discs. The Blu-ray alliance won the battle against the HD-DVD alliance lead by Toshiba. Research at the Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University’s chair of standardisation shows, that Toshiba and its partners could have been market leader if they had applied a different strategy. How? You will learn this in the executive programme ‘International Standardisation’.
The programme aims to provide you with knowledge about how to achieve business goals by participating in international standardisation. At the end of this two-day programme you will be able to:
- assess business benefits and costs of your involvement in international standardisation
- know how to map stakeholders and analyse their stakes in order to assess if you can influence the standardisation process in your favour
- know what to do to have more influence in this process
- get the opportunity to get expert-feedback from Henk de Vries
Achieving business benefits through participation
Research at the Rotterdam School of Management revealed more than 100 factors that contribute to the effectiveness of participation in international standardisation. In this two-day programme we will share ‘best practices’ which combine our research findings with 26 years of practical experience in standardisation. This course will bring you to a level of participation that enables you to achieve organisational success, whether your goals are financially orientated or to make a lasting impact on society.
Target audience
- Participants in international standardisation (for instance ISO, ETSI, ITU, CEN, CENELEC)
- Participants in standardisation activities of organisations like IEEE and ASTM
- Participants in standardisation activities of industrial consortia.
Programme
Day 1
Introduction
- Reasons for participation in international standardisation
- Expectations of the course
Paradoxes in international standardisation
- Cooperation versus competition
- Technical paradigm versus business paradigm
Benefits of standards (1)
- Types of standards and their economic effects
- Impact at company level
- Impact at the level of industry sectors
Benefits of standards (2)
- Exercise 1: Determine costs and benefits of a standard
- Impact of standards on innovation
Business impact of participation in international standardisation
- Research evidence for business impact of participation in international standardisation
- How to determine company costs and benefits?
- Qualitative assessment
- Quantitative assessment
- Exercise 2: Determine costs and benefits of participation in the development of a standard
Stakeholders in international standardisation
- Functions of standards for various stakeholders
- Exercise 3: Identifying the stakeholders and their stakes
- Classifying the stakeholders
- Defining the core stakeholders
- Relating own position to the other stakeholders and their stakes
- Managing stakeholder relations
- Exercise 4: Determine opportunities for increasing influence.
How to make standardisation projects successful – the experience in Ecma International
Day 2
Systematic standards development
- Structure of standards
- Functional requirements for standards
- Designing standards
- Drafting standards
- Integrating systematic standards development in the formal process
- Structure of collections of standards
- Managing standards collections
- Exercise 5: Designing a collection of service standards
Influencing international standards
- Choice of committees to be involved in
- Influencing tactics
- Requirements for participants;
- In-company organisation of standardisation activities;
- Exercise 6: Analysis of own strengths and weaknesses.
Preparing for market success of standards
- Factors that stimulate standards adoption
- Factors that may hinder standards adoption
- Battles between competing standards:
- Factors that stimulate one of them to win
- Factors that may cause different standards to exist next to each other
- Exercise 7: Analysing a standards battle
- Integrating intended standards use in the process of standards development
- How to solve barriers for adoption of standards?
Preparing a company strategy for involvement in international standardisation
- Relating general strategy to standardisation strategy
- Exercise 8: Developing and analysis of own strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats related to standardisation
- Setting priorities
- Implementing a standardisation strategy.
Entry Requirements
- Participants in international standardisation (for instance ISO, ETSI, ITU, CEN, CENELEC)
- Participants in standardisation activities of organisations like IEEE and ASTM
- Participants in standardisation activities of industrial consortia.

