Presented at the 3rd ICOS Science Conference in Prague, Czech Republic, 11-13 Sep 2018.

1. What is an ICOS identity?
An investigation into the internally
perceived identities of ICOS RI
Evi-Carita Riikonen
ICOS ERIC

2. Introduction and Background
• ICOS RI is a distributed infrastructure with nodes in several
countries
•  Challenging in terms of communication, accessing
information flows and understanding the level of commitment
and motivation of diverse types of internal members.
• Important to establish a clearer understanding of ICOS RI
members’ idea about:
• What is perceived to be the purpose of ICOS RI
• Do members of ICOS RI feel committed to ICOS
• what motivates the members to be part of ICOS RI
and how to describe an ‘ICOS community’
• what are the RI members’ future expectations from
ICOS RI
• This study, referred to as the ‘ICOS Identity Study’,
investigates the above questions
• Data has been collected via an online questionnaire and
thematic interviews among the ICOS RI members
• The study shows that there are several different types of
internally perceived identities of ICOS RI

3. • The analysis of the ’ICOS identity’ is loosely based on a
concept of the ’Sense of Place’; essentially meaning the
relationship between self and place:
– Developed through information received via sensory environments,
interactions, material culture and vernaculars/discourses in one’s
surroundings
• One has different needs from places in different phases of
life: depending on one’s needs, the place is seen according
to how well it can satisfy the needs:
– one can be more/less dependent on a place or feel more/less
attached to it  this has an impact on the perceived place identity
(place image) and subsequently on the attitude towards the place
Theoretical framework – just a little bit of social sciences...

4. ICOS ERIC Head Office, Helsinki, Finland | www.icos-ri.eu 4
ICOS could be seen as a
collectively understood, shared
space, the members of which
identify with it depending on
their most important needs:
• Dependence (e.g. funding, career,
income, future achievements,
collaboration, impact factor,
equipment, accessibility, data)
• Attachment (e.g. organisational
history and culture, long building-
up history, past achievements,
passion for cause)
• Image (e.g. visibility, globality,
political goals, novelty value,
national cultures)
 Development of one’s sense of ICOS
RI

5. Three dimensions of perceived identity of ICOS RI:
Societally
identifiable
Identities
Professionally
identifiable
Identities
Personally
identifiabe
identities
Overlaps and changes over time: past, present, future

6. • Societally
identifiable
Identities:
• ICOS’ ability to
influence policy
making
• ICOS creating new
jobs
• Own work in ICOS
influencing policy
making
• ICOS’ visibility
outside scientific
communities locally,
nationally and
globally
• ICOS’ ability to
expand
(scientifically,
geographically and
in terms of
recognisability)
• Professionally
identifiable
Identities:
• ICOS’ importance for
one’s career
• ICOS producing
cutting edge science
• Clarity of
structure/governance
• ICOS’ ability to
provide
facilities/access
• Possibility to
collaborate across
domains
• Access to support
• Importance of own
work being recognised
• Developing the
abilities of the ICOS
scientific community
• Personally
identifiabe
identities:
• ICOS’ field is
personally important
• Mathing of
competence and
role
• Proud to be part of
ICOS
• Sense of community
• Importance of own
work
• Feeling of own work
being valued in the
community
• Being part of a ’big
thing’

7. People identify with the different dimensions in different ways:
motivations and expectations vary between people. For
example:
Societally
identifiable
identities
Personally
identifiable
identities
Professionally
identifiable
identities
Societal and
Professional
Personal
 Perceived main purpose of ICOS RI

8. Scientific Societal
Conducting Science Facilitating Science Influencing Policy-
Making
Raising
Awareness
Data
Collection
and analysis
Produce
high quality
data
and
maintain
data quality
Support &
Enable
Science
Influene
Science Policy
Enable
production
of
mitigation
methods
to prevent
climate
change
Increase the
understanding
of the general
public about
climate
change
Improve the
standard of
research by
producing
harmonised
data
Provide facilities for
conducting science
Scientific community
building
Obtain more
resources for
research
Enable innovative research networking Obtain funding
or visibility
fore cause
Obtain
resources
for research
Provide data
to serve
researchers
Strengthen a
specific
domain in
ICOS
Collaborate
across
domains in
ICOS
Buidling a
sense of
European
research
communit
y
Funding and
visibility fore
researchers
Data
coverage;
Open data
and Access
to Data for
researchers
Internally perceived primary purposes of ICOS:

9. Some of the perceived roles/functions of ICOS RI
Collector Community builder
Gatherer
Analyser Developer
Evaluator Provider
Producer
Server Facilitator
Harmoniser
Maintainer Enabler
Influencer
Lobbyist
Contributor
Resource obtainer
Educator
Informer
From
scientific
point of
view
From
societal
point of
view

10. 11
So, if we now try to define an ’ICOS community’...
• Complexity; what is meant when asked how the ICOS community
is like? From the data, it often emerged that the sense of
community is somewhat difficult to describe:
’[Sense of community is] great inside my domain, but don’t know how
it would be in other domains’
‘I guess there is sense of community in individual countries, in ERIC,
in centers and so on, but I'm not sure how big is the community
sense in MSAs and then between these blocks’
’Clear [sense of community] I don't now [about that], but [there is] a
sense of community, yes’
• The challenge is to create an inclusive culture where the several
types of ICOS communities, with varying ways of identifying with
ICOS RI, can interact easily and can complement each other,
rather than ‘widen the cap’.

11. ICOS ERIC Head Office, Helsinki, Finland | www.icos-ri.eu 12
The ICOS community is essentially a
collection of communities:
• Closely collaborative nodes within
one or more domains
• Communities across one domain,
across two domains or across all
ICOS domains
• Defined e.g. geographically or
institutionally
• Formed by people working in similar
roles
• Etc. etc. etc.
 Given the varied perceptions of the
primary purpose of ICOS RI, an ’ICOS
community’ could be defined as a
dynamic, complex but internally
complementing structure – at least this
was clearly showing from the data as the
desired definition: something towards
which it was seen as important to
develop the ICOS community

12. Some findings from the Identity Study survey

13. 14
At the
moment
ICOS is currently seen very or
somewhat important for one’s
career by 67%. The vast
majority (96%) indicate that
ICOS’s field is still personally
important to them.
42% feels very much or
somewhat that ICOS should be
more about producing science
than managing science.
Only 34% thinks that ICOS is
very much or somewhat visible
outside the scientific
communities in Europe.
60% still feels that the operating
structure of ICOS is difficult or
somewhat difficult to understand,
or it is not clear to them if they
understand it.
83% indicates that they feel very or
somewhat proud to be part of ICOS.
66% still feels that their work is
being very much or somewhat
recognised as important; while 25%
is not sure and 7.5% strongly or
somewhat feel their work is not
recognised as important within
ICOS.
Only 28% strongly feels like part of
the ICOS community; however, 50%
feels somewhat part of it. Only
48%, however, feels that there is a
clear or somewhat clear sense of
community within ICOS.
62% said they very much or
somewhat feel professionally
supported by the community and
80% feels that collaboration across
domains should be very much or
somewhat increased.
60% agrees or somewhat agrees
that they have access to higher
quality resources than before
ICOS. 31% strongly agree that
their competence and role are
matched, while 56% feel they are
somewhat matched.
66% indicates that there is a high
or somewhat high level of
autonomy in their role. Only 19%
still feels they have very clear
mandates to perform their tasks,
while 53% feels their mandates
are somewhat clear. Less than half
(46%) now feels that their work
could contribute to decision-
making on societal level.
Some
observa
tions
Commitment
Identification with
Felt Importance
Felt Ability (scientific and
societal influence)
Motivations
Community
Sense of Community
Expectations
Operability (performance,
access and management)
Coverage (Geographical &
Societal Influence)

14. 15
Do members of ICOS RI feel committed to ICOS and what
motivates them to be part of it?
• Overall, ICOS RI is seen very positively as something the
respondents felt they could identify with (personally, professionally or
societally)
• ICOS was perceived as a competent, yet a very complex structure,
the components and interlinkages of which were perceived challenging
to understand
• Members of the ICOS community felt proud to be involved in ICOS,
but almost half noted that the sense of community within ICOS is
not felt very strongly. There is a clear need for more across-
domain community building, and the importance of recognition and
valuation of the work carried out should be addressed.
• Access to high quality resources (e.g. more stable funding and
visibility) and to the specialist networks and community were the
most important motivating factors among the members

15. What motivates people to be a part of ICOS RI?
’...nice community
and colleagues’
’Being part of an
international
infrastructure and
network’
’ To me, it is the societal issues that
we can be a part in solving that is
the most important’

16. 17
In the
future:
67% indicated that they
would definitely or
somewhat likely still be
involved in ICOS in the
next 3-5 years.
85% strongly or
somewhat believes that
ICOS data would be in
regular use by diverse
user groups, and 72%
believes that ICOS will be
very much or somewhat
more widely known
outside the scientific
communities in general.
67% strongly or
somewhat envisage that
new countries will have
joined ICOS.
68% said they are very or
somewhat excited about the
future of ICOS. However,
only just over a half (52%)
strongly or somewhat
foresee their work with ICOS
being highly valued.
32% feels very positively
about being part of the ICOS
community, while 53% say
they feel somewhat positive
about being part of the
community.
55% indicated they’d be
very or somewhat interested
in developing community
building (e.g. joint activities)
and 56% indicated they’d
be very or somewhat
interested in developing new
ways to collaborate across
domains.
20% strongly or
somewhat feels that
they need higher level
of autonomy in their
roles.
While 33% indicated
interest in undertaking
training related to
scientific tasks, only
19% expressed
interest in managerial
training.

17. What are the future expectations from ICOS RI?
• Access to high quality resources, autonomy in performing tasks
and correlation between tasks and competences is expected
from ICOS RI. As understanding of the operating structure of
ICOS had been challenging, it could have at times resulted in
the perceived unclarity of mandates to perform one’s tasks and
contributed to the level of perception that one’s work in ICOS
could contribute to decision-making on societal level.
• Overall, it is believed that ICOS will have gained visibility,
operability and geographical coverage. The members are
keen to develop both their own skills and the collaboration
across domains, and most of the respondents see themselves
still involved in ICOS in the near future

18. Some expectations from the future:
’...ICOS activity is not
much supported in many
countries at national
level, [supporting] this
would help’

19. Just a couple concluding points... The study shows that ICOS RI is
perceived in several different
ways among the RI members
Developing the sense of
community within ICOS is
desirable, if challenging –
people are driven by a variety
of perceived purposes,
motivations, and expectations
on societal, professonal and
personal levels
 understanding and addressing
these will enable the
development of a more
inclusive culture inside ICOS RI

20. Thank you!