by Josie Dixon

First-rate research deserves support, funding and recognition, but will have little chance of these unless it is accompanied by the necessary skills to communicate its value and impact.  In the course of running publishing workshops in over 40 universities in the UK, Europe and the US, I have been struck by a prevailing need to develop more basic research communication skills.  The specialist focus of a PhD – narrow and deep – tends to equip researchers for communication with fellow specialists in their own niche, often at the expense of the skills necessary to convey the importance of that research to a broader academic audience or the wider public. 

Interaction with fellow specialists relies on shared assumptions about the significance and value of the research – an a priori sense of its importance which may not be evident to a wider audience.  Effective communication beyond that circle of specialists involves stepping outside the research niche to imagine the viewpoint of the non-initiate.  This is not merely a question of simplifying or dumbing down.  More importantly, it involves supplying the wider context (often taken for granted or even excluded by the narrow focus of specialist research) and above all explaining why that research matters.  Answering the ‘so what?’ question is fundamental, and yet surprisingly difficult for the majority of PhD students.  ‘Who needs it?’ need not be a cynical or hostile challenge, and specialist researchers need the confidence and the skills to answer basic questions about where the benefit of their work lies for others. 

Part of the problem lies in the fact that the method and form of the PhD can encourage a focus on the foundations and processes of research rather than its outcomes.  Literature reviews and a focus on methodology tell us about where a piece of research has come from, but non-specialists want to know where it takes us, and what it yields.  I am often surprised at the extent to which researchers at the conclusion of their project are still talking about aims and objectives or research methods, rather than what has been achieved.  Today’s PhDs also tend to be more narrowly focused case studies; the gain in improved completion rates has to be set against a risk that this encourages a focus on the micro rather than the macro dimension of the research, to the detriment of its broader implications or applications.  Making a successful case for why a piece of research matters requires a degree of reorientation, and a change of ingrained intellectual habits, to turn that backward and inward focus into one that looks onward and outward, to the afterlife of the project and the uses to which the research may be put. 

It is often easier in applied subjects to point to outcomes and benefits, which can be directed towards their value for professionals, practitioners or policy makers.  In more traditionally academic disciplines, researchers in the humanities often struggle to articulate the scholarly or pedagogical benefits of their work.  Another inhibiting factor is the notion that outcomes or benefits are somehow too positivistic a requirement for arts subjects, and only applicable to more quantitative types of research.  This may be true in part, but it is dangerous to claim exemption from questions that reinforce the public accountability of research, and in traditionally ‘soft’ subjects (always more vulnerable to budget cuts) intellectual isolationism can only be damaging in the current funding climate.  The outcomes may be less readily quantifiable than in the sciences or even the social sciences, but that doesn’t absolve our researchers from asking themselves the basic question of what is the pay-off for their work – where does it take us and what does it yield? 

These issues are being brought to a head in the ‘impact’ criteria introduced in the forthcoming Research Excellence Framework.  However ill-defined and highly contested the current rubric, the basic principle is here to stay – funding bodies’ evaluative criteria are set to prioritise research which can be shown to make a difference.  This is not just a self-perpetuating issue relating to departmental research budgets; the skills required to make a convincing case for the value and impact of a piece of research are equally applicable in a host of other career-critical contexts, including job applications, grant applications, presentations, publishing and all forms of contact with the media. 

It was in this context that I was approached by the University of Bristol to develop a new one-day course on Research Communication Skills.  Having since taught versions of the workshop at Bristol, Kent, Birmingham and Reading, I have had the opportunity to run it both for arts and humanities students (focusing on the particular challenges of their disciplines), and for more mixed groups including researchers from the social sciences and also in one case the sciences.  This workshop was particularly interesting, since the case for why these skills are needed was made most powerfully by a group whose mix of research topics juxtaposed cancer therapies with Nietzsche, and endangered tiger habitats with Nabokov.  Those juxtapositions reinforced the sense that different kinds of research have a different rationale and value, which will need to be articulated if they are to achieve the necessary support, funding and recognition with which I began this article.

I have been fascinated by the range of students' responses to the experience of developing these skills in the workshop.   Certainly it was good to see the intended benefits realised, in terms of extending researchers' horizons beyond the university and the thesis: one participant wrote afterwards, ‘Makes one more aware of the meaning of our research outside academe.  Josie talks about things that our supervisors don't'.  But it has been interesting to find that the training has also proved to be enabling for the PhD itself, in comments pointing out that the course was ‘very relevant for thinking about upgrades and, in due course, the viva, as it focuses the mind on the bigger questions of the relevance of your research and its contribution to the field'.  Perhaps the most encouraging responses were from those who found the exercises in communication skills had a clarifying power which gave their research a stronger sense of direction.   One postgraduate wrote ‘This is a workshop which allows you to define for yourself more clearly what it is you are researching and why, and say why it matters!' and another commented, ‘This workshop has been a path-finder and a confidence-builder.  I am more excited about my research, clearer about its potential, and more informed on how to move ahead.'  Watching that increasing sense of impetus develop in the course of the workshops has been a salutary and rewarding experience.  Against the background of the debates now raging about impact, and the political and economic uncertainties surrounding the future of our research funding, I think it is no accident that I have since had a rush of bookings from universities across the country, equally convinced about the urgency of training a new generation of researchers in skills that may be critical to ensuring the survival of their disciplines. 

Josie Dixon is a Research Training Consultant, specialising in workshops for the arts, humanities and social sciences, which she has given in universities right across the sector from Oxford and Cambridge to post-1992 institutions, and in Europe and the USA.  For more details, see the Vitae database of trainers and developers: http://www.vitae.ac.uk/policy-practice/40707-104983/Josie-Dixon.html    or contact Josie at josiedixon@jasmine-winchester.fsnet.co.uk

On June 8, 80 library and library related staff representing 41 institutions from across the UK and beyond gathered at the University of Sussex for a conference. “Bridging the skills gap:  developing innovative library support for researchers” was an event jointly organised by the University of Sussex Library and Vitae South East Hub.

The day was opened by Sussex's Pro-Vice Chancellor (Research) Professor Bob Allison who extolled the role that libraries play in academic scholarship. Stéphane Goldstein from the Research Information Network called for a joined up national approach to researcher training and information handling support in the UK and the plenary session was completed by Alison Mitchell, Deputy Director of Vitae, who outlined the role of Vitae in promoting researcher development and outlined the new Researcher Development Framework tool.

The rest of the day was devoted to a series of workshops highlighting innovative approaches libraries across the South East and London have been taking to support their researchers. Participants had the opportunity to hear about the University of Southampton’s approach to e-theses, the LSE’s information literacy support module for researchers, the work of the Research Liaison Team at the University of Sussex, how the University of Brighton supports the REF, the University of Surrey’s work on information skills training and the University for the Creative Arts’ support for researchers in a ‘Google world’. The conference was rounded up by Kitty Inglis from the University of Sussex.

The feedback from the day was overwhelmingly positive and encouraging. One of the key messages from the day was that successful models have the library as one element of a more holistic approach to offering researchers support and, additionally, that there are dedicated research support staff within the library.

Thanks must go to all the speakers and workshop facilitators who made the day a great success. The slides from each presentation and workshop are available at: www.vitae.ac.uk/sehub.