Blog post: ‘Staying curious is a superpower for researchers who want to have impact’

The following blog post has been written by guest blogger, Professor Alice Owen. 

Working with the Caucus team a couple of years ago, I reflected on my eclectic career for a chapter on sustainability in the book “How to Engage Policy Makers with your research” [ed Vorley, Abdul Rahman, Tuckerman and Wallace, 2022] and offered three tips that have helped me bridge the gap between my research and what people who are not researchers need or want to know.  I recently revisited these ideas at the IRC Early Career Researchers Conference in Manchester. The feedback from that session is that these tips are still useful, so let’s look at them here:

1. Start at the other person’s position. No-one was ever properly convinced to think or act differently because someone else was standing on a metaphorical soapbox shouting research findings at them.   If you want someone else to pay attention to your research, you have to be curious about them: what is that other person’s position on the issue you’re researching?  Why is that their position?  In my field, if they tell me they’re not interested in environmental sustainability and respecting planetary boundaries, why is that?  Are they worried about not being able to produce food if land is only managed for biodiversity?  This starts a different conversation compared to telling them that biodiversity brings all sorts of benefits.
2. Assume that you have a shared goal – you just need to work out what it is! This requires you, the researcher, to think about where your interests overlap with the person who you want to notice and use your research. Ask yourself what the world looks like through their eyes and what they need to prioritise.   If a local authority chief exec’s focus is all on social care, homelessness and housing, ask how your research can help both on those issues, and also at the local authority scale.
3. Be determined, but also flexible.  Being determined doesn’t just mean knocking on the same doors over and over again until someone lets you in, it means thinking about where the people who could shape your research might be and going to meet them there, which may not be a place or a situation that you are comfortable with.  For me that might mean 07:30 coffee at the Builders Merchants when all the local builders are collecting the materials they need for the day ahead, not my natural habitat, but exactly the right place to talk about the realities of building low carbon homes.

What fuels your ability to do these three things is curiosity; it’s a superpower that gets even more useful with practice!

Reference:

Owen A. 2022. Supporting Policy towards Sustainability. In: Vorley T; Abdul Rahman S; Tuckerman L; Wallace P (eds.) How to Engage Policy Makers with Your Research The Art of Informing and Impacting Policy.