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Kotarski2011
The document discusses the findings of a project that examined the information management needs of an accessibility research group (ARG) at University College London. It was found that the ARG researchers have significant needs for training and support with basic information management, data management, and navigating administrative requirements. While universities provide some services, they are often fragmented and not tailored to specific research areas. The document proposes embedding a "Research Information Manager" role within research departments to help address these needs by conducting information audits, developing training and data management plans, and acting as a liaison between the research team and central university services. A pilot project is suggested to demonstrate the benefits of this new role.
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Kotarski2011
- 1. Defining a newrole: the embedded Research Information Manager Rachael Kotarski, STM Content Specialist - Datasets
- 2. 2 Science, Technology &Medicine at the British Library: What we do Partnership building Information gathering The STM team Initiating new projects Managing our collections Developing new services Engaging with researchers
- 3. 3 JISC Research InformationManager Project http://www.jisc.ac.uk/whatwedo/projects/rimroles.aspx
- 4. 4 What do wemean by Research Information? Why is it important? Research Information is: All information used in, produced by, and descriptive of, researchers and their research activity, including: scholarly publications and other research-focussed literature, electronic resources, data, information systems, software tools, workflows and methods, funding information and metrics, know-how & tacit knowledge Of importance to Universities/Services • Management reporting • Research Excellence Framework • Better promote University’s research expertise Of importance to Researchers • Requirements and mandates • Improve research efficiency • Maximise utility of research outputs
- 5. 5 We focused onpeople! Accessibility Research Group (ARG) ‘Understand what accessibility is, why it is important, what barriers to access exist and who these barriers affect’ http://www2.cege.ucl.ac.uk/arg/
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- 7. 7 Project Methodology Scripted,recorded interviews • Researchers • Services • Best practice Research lifecycle - ‘end-to-end’ view Services interviewed were based on the needs reported by the ARG group. This included IT, respository, library and research support. Best practice interviews included the DCC, and embedded and liaison roles Discussion group with researchers at the end of interviews Discussion group with UHMLG
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- 9. 9 Shape of ARG’sresearch
- 10. 10 Information management needs Even just the information needed for and generated by their experiments is complex and varied, let alone the administrative information they need to navigate, such as funding, ethics and IPR Training in basic information management is huge need for the group. • This is available, but researchers do not think it is tailored to their specific needs e.g. in terms of subject or information types and sources • They want context-specific search methodologies and strategies, from someone with considerable subject knowledge © The Shopping Sherpa CC-BY--ND
- 11. 11 Data management issues Data management was the single biggest concern for the group Funders’ requirements for data sharing don’t necessarily filter down The two issues researchers are aware of, are data storage and organisation The group need someone to help them develop data management skills and represent their requirements to the university © Afraid of Ducks/Mark Merrifield CC-BY-NC-SA ViaFlickr “We just don’t have the skills in relation to data across the group… we know it’s an issue we need to deal with and we talk about it forever but haven’t come up with a solution as yet” “There is no archiving of everything produced at PAMELA and because there are no standard approaches and formats, data is kept in different places”
- 12. 12 Services: what isthe reality? These gaps need to be tackled on 3 levels: • Policy • Technology • People Most institutions approach these issues at the technological level: numerous, distributed, bespoke systems, which academics add to with local, unsupported solutions – less focus is given on the people to support new systems But there are pockets of excellence and effective practice: Join-up of communities of practice is required to share learning in new areas Technologies and tools part of the solution but central to it all is people “Digital or not, it always comes back to people and relationships”
- 13. 13 The solution? :Embedded roles Embedding roles within departments gives services seamless integration into researchers’ day-to-day activities. Clinical libraries are leading the way, examples: • Welch Medical Library (MIT) • Monash • NIH Library And other support areas are emerging: • Universities of Leicester and Bristol (UKRDS) • University of Glasgow But how can these roles be implemented, specifically: • How can they be funded? • Where will they originate from? • What should their skills set be?
- 14. 14 Proposal for aResearch Information Manager (RIM) Role: What would they do? TommiKomulainenCC-BY-NC-SA.ViaFlickr.RemixedbyR.Kotarski Act as an interface between research teams and central services Data and information audit: replicate this process! Develop a data management plan Develop a training plan for information and data management Survey and implement best practice from outside the institution Would need to prove the concrete benefits of the role: Pilot is the natural next step
- 15. 15 Thanks for listening! AnyQuestions? Acknowledgements: Project Lead Professor Nick Tyler Project Board Lee-Ann Coleman Nick Tyler Liz Lyon Paul Ayris Allan Sudlow Elizabeth Newbold Project Team Karen Walshe (karen.walshe@bl.uk) Rachael Kotarski (rachael.kotarski@bl.uk) Roselle Thoreau Kamalasudhan Achuthan Project Advisors Kim Morgan Taku Fujiyama Allan Sudlow Elizabeth Newbold The final report is available from: http://www.jisc.ac.uk/media/documents/programmes/RIM/RIMReport_FINAL.pdf
Editor's Notes
- #3 The team undertakes a wide range of activities, with the ultimate aim of supporting contemporary scientific research and researchers in the UK, with quality information and services. To meet changing needs and develop the tools and services that researchers will require in the future, we take a very user-centric approach: underpinning all of our activities is a strong understanding of the working practices of scientific researchers. We also want to understand how the research process is changing – scientific research by its nature is a dynamic process, but it is also subject to influence from the external landscape. For example: a daunting volume and range of research information digital publishing options, open access mandates and data management requirements have resulted in confusion increasing range of tools, technologies and systems that they are required to use and understand How are researchers equipped to deal with this?
- #4 The RIM project was a 6 month scoping study in partnership with UCL that was funded through JISC Research Information Management Call. The project aimed to define a need for, explore the potential benefits of a dedicated information specialist within a multidisciplinary research environment. We called this role the Research Information Manager. Many JISC funded projects focus on technology or system-based solutions but we felt there was a need to look beyond purely technological solutions - we took the view that effective information support for multidisciplinary research is fundamentally about people. The inspiration for this project was the concept for the role of ‘Informationist’ (Information Specialist in Context), which arose in a clinical context to provide specialised information services within a clinical research team, supporting and encouraging evidence-based practice – with research information and knowledge management, expertise as well as a strong understanding of the clinical/research culture and processes.
- #5 Research information has different meanings, but for the project we defined it as all the information types that researchers require to undertake their research projects, including the administrative information about researchers, research projects and their outputs and funding. Hidden within all of this is the tacit knowledge or know-how that is very difficult to capture and resides within people not systems or technologies. The benefits that improving information management can bring, can be seen from 2 perspectives: Universities and their central services: Who need to manage and monitor information about the research they host, in order to inform strategic decisions about that research, to allow reporting to external stakeholders such as funding councils and research funders, for the Research Excellence Framework (REF -new system for assessing the quality of research in UK HEIs) and to develop useful services to those within and beyond the institution’s boundaries. Academics: Senior academics spend a lot of time on basic administrative tasks, required by universities and funders. Streamlining this process would mean they could spend more time doing what they are best at – high quality research.
- #6 The Accessibility Research Group (ARG) was established by Prof Nick Tyler at University College London (UCL). It is quite small (15 researchers) but highly multidisciplinary very successful group Their research areas include: accessibility policy; transport infrastructure; built environment and fuses elements of engineering, architecture, design, social science, bioscience, public health, and environmental sciences to identify ways to improve accessibility. Good model to test the RIM proposition because: they face the common problems facing researchers in addition they face challenges of fusing different research domain vocabularies conceptual viewpoints information types, and knowledge backgrounds
- #7 The pathfinder comprised four phases: Capture and evaluate information/data needs and practices of a multidisciplinary research group - the Accessibility Research Group (ARG) at University College London (UCL) - throughout the research lifecycle via a series of in-depth structured interviews, on site-research and focus groups. Capture the views and experiences of key institutional stakeholders across UCL such as research managers, administrators, ICT service providers, repository administration and library services on the management of research information and data. Identify existing models of good practice that mapped to the context-specific information requirements of the research group through desk research, study visits and telephone interviews. Report evidence of unmet research information and data management needs, identify the benefits and implications of a new role to improve the efficiency of information use for the research team and host institute, and define the practicalities for establishing such a role.
- #8 This was only a 6-month funded project so detailed ethnographic and diary-based methods for investigating the groups information flow, needs and use were simply not going to be possible. However, the group had members at all stages of their career, from first year PhD to Professor, so interviews would capture various recent-past experiences of their information needs and the perceptions of how these needs are met at each stage in the research process. Interviews were drafted with a script we could follow so that they kept to the 1hour time limit and the structure meant that points of discussion were covered and could be directly compared. All interviews were recorded so that we could review and analyse them later, and so we didn’t have to take too many notes! Interviews used the idea of the research lifecycle to help give context to the questions and a visual cue to help them think of specific examples. - Not all members of the group had yet experienced every part of the cycle Idea inception: generating a research question or hypothesis. Needs = keeping updated and finding collaborators Securing funding: Needs = identifying sources of funding and putting together a bid. Experimentation: collecting data and analysing it. Needs = sharing experimentation knowledge and skills; data capture management and storage Dissemination: sharing and publishing findings. Needs = finding appropriate places to publish and present; sharing and publishing data After researcher interviews, we identified the services within UCL that were related to the reported needs and processes, and see where needs were already met. Interview scripts for services and best practice were based around the same questions for researchers, but with more selected questions for their areas.
- #10 The first thing we learnt is that there isn’t a ‘typical’ ARG experiment. But each one demonstrates the varying information challenges the group faces. Here we can see in experiment in PAMELA to investigate optimum train design for efficient boarding and crowd control measures. The information input into the experiment includes: the research brief (from DfT) CAD designs and dimensions of the train and platform Passenger volume scenarios Variables to be tested include: Train and platform dimensions and arrangements Data outputs include: Manual counts of people on the platform and carriage Videos of each test run from various camera angles Processed video with ‘observer’ software Processed Excel data. But PAMELA can be reconfigured to test a wide variety of environments: such as pedestrian spaces – and variables such as lighting and sound environments can be adjusted and recorded and data on things such as the force required to manoeuvre a wheelchair through this environment can be recorded. - All these require their own protocols and methods that also need to stored and shared, as do the set-up and designs of each environment.
- #11 As you can see, even just the information from experiments is complex and varied, let alone the administrative information they create and need, such as funding, ethics, IPR. Despite this, researchers are not required to be trained in any kind of information management, and tend to simply follow any rules the group has established piece-meal. It’s not that training isn’t available, but that the team don’t think of it as useful, because they don’t feel it’s tailored enough to their specific needs e.g. in terms of subject or information types and sources. It is seen as being very much geared toward teaching and undergrad students. If you look at the issues that arise from the experiments I’ve described, they are very different than you would encounter if you were a microbiology researcher or a geologist. Structuring or formalising of the tacit knowledge sharing process would also aid the group.
- #12 It was obvious from our interviews that data management was the single biggest concern of the whole group, as you have seen, the nature of experiments within PAMELA means they are difficult and expensive to re-run – so data are valuable. Wide ranges of data formats (e.g. text, Excel, Access, image). Different levels of data ( observational, instrumentation raw data, interpretation, modelling and derivation of this to secondary datasets and interpretative information) On top of all this, as data sometimes involves people, they have to be careful to annoymise sensitive data But the two sticking points around data management that the group were aware of revolve around data storage and organisation. Data within the group is currently managed on a small scale, for instance in personal lab books, lab computer, laptops and flash disks but rarely on network storage. Remote access to PAMELA data is not allowed, which encourages the this ad-hoc practice. Once it has been stored, management of the data in terms of filing, naming and storage sometimes prevent researchers from understanding their own data at a later date. This all makes sharing data with colleagues within the lab difficult, let alone with external collaborators. The group were aware of these issues, but were not sure of basic data management issues or terminology and as such found it difficult to articulate their needs and frame their requirements.
- #13 So what would help to fill the gap between the groups’ needs around information and data management and what is available that could help them to save time and work more efficiently? A top level institutional policy would ensure its researchers can meet funder requirements, but would also give the institution a platform to show researchers how it will support them in terms of the systems and support services. A repository or a system for simple and secure deposit of full research records, including proposals, ethics papers, experimental data for each project; tools for workflow management and collaboration, but even simple things like shared calendars would improve efficiency of the group. UCL are working on a data repository. On a support level, people are needed who are clear points of contact and responsibility for these systems. But these still cannot necessarily make sure services are taken advantage of. Outreach and communication between central services and research groups is required so that systems reflect academic community requirements, but it’s very hard to draw researchers in – do services need to push out to researchers where they work: in their departments. Our interviews with stakeholders across and external to UCL show that these are problems common to all institutions. Institutions themselves have to tackle issues of thinly-spread resource, maintaining a research/teaching balance and remaining relevant. There are pockets of best practice located within and outside of institutions across the UK and internationally, but it is hard to identify counterparts: join-up would aid sharing of best practice for support roles in the UK and further a field. These demonstrate that the key to maintaining coherent technologies and services across institutions and maintaining relevancy across the landscape is having communication channels that fundamentally understand the research perspective and can communicate this to all levels.
- #14 Library-based embedded roles take the approach of specialist subject-based librarians, but go out to departments (with office hours, set times) to become a visible point of contact. They reported a host of benefits that researchers are seeing such as: Time is less of a barrier to obtaining the information they need (literature) Feeling better equipped to find answers to clinical questions Recommending the service to colleagues Using library services more. Funding for these roles is varied, with Welch informationists funded via the library, Monash roles are supported by funds from the Australian National Data Service. Welch does find that they are being written into research grants (even though this isn’t necessary). The scope of info management goes beyond what libraries can offer on their own. Other support areas: Universities of Leicester + Bristol: As part of UKRDS pilot, they have recruited Data Liaison managers. This is mainly with the aim of better data management, but the roles cut across IT, and research support. University of Glasgow: Resource Development Officers: Help with ITC-based support, especially for helping researchers identify what systems they will need and how much this will cost to implement in grants. Issues to cover include funding, benefits shown and areas of support.
- #15 Summary: Many of the perceived gaps in researcher needs could mostly be met by existing services, albeit with improved channels of communication. The vital missing services and support are around data management Services need to be presented to researchers within the context of their research environment. This is best facilitated by embedded support roles. Support roles can also represent the needs of researchers to services to guide developments. The role would be an information conduit between services and the researchers they support, capturing and feeding researcher requirements into strategic developments, developing researcher awareness of available systems, but also notifying research groups on what is required of them in terms of policies and mandates. Audit info and data management practices across the department to highlight where they could help improve efficiency and reduce duplication of effort. The process that I’ve detailed here, of surveying information and data practices then matching these with what already exists, would be an important part of establishing the role within other institutions. Findings in other institutions may be very different, some may also be lacking appropriate tech. systems or the focus on data may be far less, but it would still help researchers make better use of what is available and help service providers define their use cases. For the ARG group : There is a significant risk that important, valuable and costly to reproduce data is being lost with current lack of data management – the RIM could provide expertise and advice on how researchers could maximise use and reuse of their data. This is not about managing data for them, but finding ways to facilitate transfer of tacit knowledge or a more formal input into researcher training plans. In general researchers want to develop the understanding and skills themselves so they retain control. Now we have evidence of the need for an embedded support role within the group, evidence needs to be gathered for the concrete benefits it could provide – ideal way to test this would be with a pilot.