Michael Johnny, RIR-York
Impact has become a significant component of the research cycle but how does one actually do this? Dr. Sarah Morton from the University of Edinburgh offers a one-day workshop with methodologies to assess the impact of your research.
L’impact est devenu un aspect très important du cycle de la recherche, mais comment doit-on procéder pour le mesurer? La professeure Sarah Morton de l’Université d’Édimbourg offre un atelier d’une journée au cours duquel sont présentées des méthodologies permettant de mesurer l’impact de vos recherches.
David Phipps of York University (@researchimpact) has recently written about Knowledge Hypocrites. Well, I for one am taking action (sort of). I wouldn’t exactly call myself a bookworm, but I am taking opportunity to learn from other professionals to help inform my practice. Perhaps not a direct solution to David’s point, but I am happy about opportunities to learn from leaders in KMb from Canada and internationally.
A recent post shared my experience attending a workshop from Peter Levesque of Knowledge Mobilization Works. The following week I attended a day-long session led by Sarah Morton (recently Dr. Sarah Morton) of the University of Edinburgh, Co-Director Communication and Knowledge Exchange within the Centre for Research on Families and Relationships. The topic of Sarah’s workshop was how to assess the impact of your research.
I was one of 12 present and felt I was in a unique position, whereas I am not directly involved in or leading a research project, but play a brokering role in developing research projects. For the purposes of the workshop I used York University’s partnership with the United Way of York Region as an example (we are piloting a community knowledge broker role). For me, in my experience, impact is misunderstood with outcomes, or even outputs. So it was refreshing (and validating) for me to hear Sarah speak about a process of inputs, activities, uptake, use and impact.
The significant takeaway for me was a mapping exercise which will help me working with university researchers in developing knowledge mobilization plans. In Sarah’s research and experience, embarking on a process of examining potential assumptions and risks around the process listed above can actually help determine potential indicators around impact. Unlocking a procedure to support this process will help me in my brokering work. The fact that I can employ the tools and not have to read Sarah’s dissertation makes my life somewhat easier. Can I declare myself hypocrisy-free? No, not yet, but I do prefer this active process of knowledge exchange. My thanks to Sarah for sharing her research and methodologies to further unpack the notion of impact in research.