Actionable Insights
What can we do differently in our practice?
This section translates the ideas from the session into practical actions, tools and approaches that can be tested, adopted or explored.
Celebrate, promote, and report on adoption (or traction), exchange of financial value, and securing investment capital per startup as measures of research translation success. Help researchers and others improve impact storytelling. But recognise that not every research project needs a translation goal: academic impact is a legitimate outcome.
Focus research translation projects as early as possible on validating and creating value, rather than focusing exclusively on grants and funding. Â Support industry (including SMEs) and researchers to engage. Educate and support researchers to design for both research excellence and impact, and encourage the development of a research impact identity.
Include objective assessment of participating projects’ progress towards creation of value and adoption as a basis for constructing, assessing, and improving research translation support programs, as well Net Promoter Score and participant feedback.
Start (or continue) participating in scientific research on the causal drivers of success and failure in research translation to impact efforts. Apply this research to improve outcomes.
Start (or continue) communicating evidence-based reality about RT2i (see the Assumptions Overturned page).
Start (or continue) engaging individuals with first-hand success in achieving adoption or translating research into adoption to support RT2i. Complement this with specialist support from professionals with IP, licensing, and product development experience.
Start (or continue) including a broad definition of ‘return’ to quantify research translation value to reflect a recognition that research translation value is not limited to economic value and (financial) return on investment alone. Build impact champions within universities (starting with us) to communicate the value of multiple impact pathways and increase visibility of diverse career pathways for PhDs.
Start (or continue) using research-informed, empirically validated tools to assess project, organisation, and researcher translation readiness, and to identify and deliver stage-appropriate, results-producing support. Choose tools and methods for effectiveness and match them to specific needs.
Start (or continue) championing role models who exemplify the reality that research excellence and impact belong together. Also, start (or continue) providing evidence-based capability development to support design of excellent research with impact beyond academia in mind – with mentoring for researchers who exemplify this.
Start exploring and championing recognition and incentives for impact and translation within academic roles and promotion in your university.