Fast Track Impact

This week Mark interviews Yamni Nigam, Professor of Biomedical Sciences, and Clare Lehane, Impact Support Officer, at Swansea University, about how Yamni got her research on maggot therapy for wounds featured in four episodes of the popular UK soap Casualty, watched by 4.5 million people every week. They have commissioned a polling company to do a before and after evaluation of the impact the episodes have on people’s perceptions of maggot therapy. Yamni’s story shows how curiosity-driven​ research can lead to impact, and how applying that same curiosity to impact can lead to powerful evidence of benefits to the people she has sought to help.​

This week Mark interviews Yamni Nigum, Professor of Biomedical Sciences, and Clare Lehane, Impact Support Officer, at Swansea University, about how Yamni got her research on maggot therapy for wounds featured in four episodes of the popular UK soap Casualty, watched by 4.5 million people every week. They have commissioned a polling company to do a before and after evaluation of the impact the episodes have on people’s perceptions of maggot therapy. Yamni’s story shows how curiosity driven research can lead to impact, and how applying that same curiosity to impact can lead to powerful evidence of benefits to the people she has sought to help.​

This week Mark discusses three ways you can evidence impacts arising from media coverage of your research, with a particular focus on understanding the significance of the benefits, rather than just focusing on measurements of reach.

Have you ever thought about starting a podcast? This week, Mark talks to an academic whose podcast gets 1.5 million downloads a year and has spun off into a book series and live show. Together, they follow James’ story from a history academic who doubted anyone would be in his research, and consider the unique benefits of podcasting for impact. The episode finishes with their tips on how you can pick up the microphone and start one yourself. Read the blog version of this episode here: https://www.fasttrackimpact.com/single-post/2019/06/26/Podcasting-for-impact

Rosmarie Katrin Neumann talks about her PhD research on science-policy exchange, explaining how you can increase the likelihood that evidence from your research is taken up by policymakers. Key messages include increasing meeting frequency to once a quarter, if possible face to face, working with professional facilitators and knowledge brokers, and providing opportunities for co-production from the start. Find out more by following Rosi on Twitter

This week, Mark continues to reframe failure as something that deeply affirms our values and leads to greater meaning and contentment. In part 2, he thinks about how we step back, withdraw from the fight and change tack, drawing on a philosophy of pessimism. This views challenge as a psychological necessity that makes us feel more fully alive, rather than constantly looking forward to a time when there will be no suffering or being nostalgic for a lost time before our challenges began. Academic life is full​ of rejections, but this episode will help you transform your view of failure to become more resilient.

This week, Mark explores how you can reframe the failures and rejections that are part of everyday academic life as something that deeply affirms our values and leads to greater meaning and contentment. In part 1, he focuses on how we pick our battles and choose to do things that are high risk but high reward in terms of expressing our values, and how to know when to stop fighting a losing battle in line with our values. Read some of the tweets quoted at the start of the episode.

This week the podcast showcases a personalized​ approach to impact training being pioneered by Universities of Salford and Warwick. Find out how researcher development and impact teams can co-produce training to meet key skills gaps on impact as part of a long-term personalized​ approach to training that enables researchers to build capacity systematically through a three-year plan including targeted workshops and one-to-one coaching. Find out more about Davina Whitnall's books.

This week Mark interviews Jane Mills and Jasmine Black from CCRI at University of Gloucestershire about how they are using social media to generate research impact. They discuss how to build stories and engagement throughout the research process (including before findings are available), how to break into stakeholder networks on Twitter and how to use case studies to evaluate, communicate and build impact online. Read their paper: Mills, J, Reed, M, Skaalsveen, K and Ingram, J The use of Twitter for sustainable soil management knowledge exchange.

This week Mark considers how we can harness creativity in the research process to derive original insights, and shows how some of the best new ideas arise from the greatest personal and professional challenges. He outlines five practical methods for finding new depths of creativity by embracing and exploring the places we tend to avoid.