Abstract
Technology Transfer Centres (TTCs) are expected to drive innovation, commercialisation, and capability building. Yet surprisingly little is known about how they actually organise their work amid the mandate ambiguity, resource volatility, and institutional complexity that characterise emerging innovation ecosystems. Extant research typically applies functional or structural templates, overlooking the situated practices through which actors prioritise opportunities, coordinate routines, and generate the distinct patterned configurations that sustain organisational coherence. Drawing on a discursive-practice lens and comparative qualitative analysis of six TTCs in Ghana, this study examines how TTCs address three core strategic organising problems: foresight, orchestration, and legitimacy anchoring. The study identifies four distinct organising configurations—opportunity-expansive, stability-oriented, dual-track, and fragmented. Foregrounding organising practices as the analytic core, the study advances a practice-sensitive understanding of organisational heterogeneity among innovation intermediaries. It offers a conceptual foundation for explaining how and why distinct TTCs configurations emerge and endure under persistent constraint. The findings provide a horses-for-courses basis for designing TTCs that are more effectively aligned with the contexts they serve.