These are the KM Daves I know I know

SSHRC KIS/Cluster meeting: Day 2 (October 23, 2009)

Recharged after a good nights sleep in the Albert @ Bay Hotel, the 34 knowledge brokers reassembled to continue the dialogue on KM, research and the services to support them both. One message we heard repeatedly on Day 1 was the need for institutional infrastructure to support KM and Day 2 added the need for infrastructure to support networking amongst an emerging KM community of practice.

Here are two KM Daves you may know who are here to help: David Phipps (York University) and “the younger and better looking” David Yetman (Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador) were repeatedly called on to comment, offer best (ok, good) KM practices, provide leadership for local and national KM and continually offer each other jovial one upmanship (enjoy the Perrier, Yetman!). York and MUN have made institutional investments in KM that, when combined with SSHRC grant funding, has allowed these two institutions to demonstrate national KM leadership such as yaffle and ResearchImpact. A number of KIS and Cluster projects wished their institution had a David. We can’t be cloned (which would be a breach of CIHR guidelines on human cloning) but we can be exemplars for other institutional knowledge brokers.

Yet here, a caution. David Yetman employs methods (such as yaffle) that could not have been developed at York. UVic runs grad courses in partnership with the BC Government that could not be replicated in Ontario. York has a portfolio approach that has allowed us to create over 150 partnerships, a track record UVic cannot replicate. KM is not a cookie cutter approach. There are basic underlying principles common to all our KM practices but the tools that work in St. John’s can inform decisions in other locations but should not be assumed to be the solution to all things KM. KM services need to respond to local opportunities and engage decision makers in contextually appropriate ways (see here). What we can learn from the Davids is reminiscent of a previous Mobilize This! blog post. By learning KM principles from the Davids and adapting them to your own local context you can create conditions where maybe knowledge can be mobilized – nothing is guaranteed.

A few other items of note from Day 2. Chad Gaffield spoke about the institutional and cultural barriers that need to come down to embrace a new paradigm of scholarship. He spoke of the need for institutions to invest in an institutional KM capacity for KM the way we invest in technology transfer, which, despite sustained investments has not been an innovation panacea. Kudos to SSHRC who unveiled their new program architecture – keep your dial on SSHRC for more information to come. And we spoke about other organizations who should partner in KM including CFI, Foundations and the for profit sector – it shouldn’t all be “mama SSHRC”. The Davids welcome this news.

There may be many Davids out there and each one is going to be and act a little different. But they’re all Davids. And that is a good thing.

more about “The Daves I Know Video by JonathanThe…“, posted with vodpod

 

Polivery (or, if you prefer Delivercy)

The KM Unit at York was present on Thursday, October 8 at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre along with over 400 Ontario Public Servants to learn about the intersection of public policy and program delivery (hence the catchy title!). York’s KM Unit was present as both an exhibitor and as delegates. With 21% of our brokered opportunities being initiated by government, the opportunity to have such a captive audience was one we took full advantage of. The Policy Innovation and Leadership Roundtable within the Cabinet Office coordinated this event and we are pleased to continue to build our relationship with this important unit of the Ontario government. The theme of Polivery was Wicked Problems (such as climate change, poverty, addicitons, domestic violence…) which continue to challenge policy development and delivery.

As delegates, we had the chance to attend sessions on Web 2.0, Horizontality (another new term to add to the lexicon and impress friends at dinner parties) and Finding the Evidence. Horizontality highlighted the Toronto Waterfront development and focused on challenges, barriers and successes to work horizontally, often within an organization that has several departments/units. Finding the Evidence featured a presentation by the Climate Change Secretariat that illustrated the challenge of coordinating cross-Ministry responses to a wicked problem like climate change.

York was the only university present at this event. Early in the planning stages York’s KM Unit held a couple of conversations with Policy, Innovation and Leadership to help frame the conference and to introduce them to York’s Brenda Zimmerman who has written about wicked problems and spoke at the conference. We had a prime, strategic location for our booth (close to coffee!) and enjoyed numerous conversations with government staff from numerous ministries. We shared examples of how we have worked with OPS, how we can tailor our services to meet the research or knowledge needs of policy makers or government program officers, and demonstrating how we are leading a national network, which gives the province access to research experts from across the country. We spoke to about 100 people and many of those that we spoke with signed up for our monthly newsletter. While we are active knowledge brokers, we are also proud to support informed polivery here in Ontario and throughout Canada!

Thirty four mobilizers walk into a bar…

SSHRC invited 34 knowledge mobilization projects from their Knowledge Impact in Society and SSHRC Clusters to a workshop in Ottawa October 22-23.

Day 1: Not being challenged by systemic introversion our mob of mobilizers (mostly academic leaders, some project coordinators and two lone staff leading institutional knowledge mobilization services at York and Memorial) had no problem mashing up in different combinations be it in their KIS or Cluster cohort or the sector of primary engagement. Most of the day was spent exploring “issues” around knowledge mobilization. The usual topics of incentives, barriers, metrics & evaluation were on the agenda. Refreshingly some new topics including an alleged research/KM dichotomy and social media were also discussed.

Research vs KM got a lot of play with opinions on both sides of and in between the hypotheses that research and KM are either on a spectrum of activities or they are two sides of a coin, related but separate. ResearchImpact works with researchers, their institutions and their non academic research collaborators to create space for basic research AND space for applied research linking to extra academic impact (thank you Clair Donovan) as well as a spectrum of activities and services in between. KM is a process intimately interwoven with research. It is not a discrete event that happens in isolation of the research. Measures of extra academic impact complement, they do not conflict, with measures of academic quality. A repeated theme was the desire for infrastructure (cash, expertise, systems) to support the spectrum between basic research and extra academic impact.

Also interesting was a breakout session on social media. ResearchImpact tweeted @researchimpact during this session resulting in a number of RTs and DMs – on the spot web 2.0 mobilization of knowledge about knowledge mobilization. SSHRC, our academic researchers and their non-academic research collaborators only need to look at their graduate students to see how social media will play an increasingly important role. You don’t have to lead the wave but if you don’t ride it, it will pass you by.

York is definitely leading the wave. With a total of 5 engaged research and knowledge mobilization projects York has by far the best representation of any Canadian university at this meeting. ResearchImpact was pleased to be joined by Canadian Homeless Research Network, Canadian Refugee Research Network, Canadian Business Ethics Research Network and the Toronto Employment Immigrant Data Initiative.

Reception done. Dinner done. Blog written. Beer being consumed thanks to Southern Cross Grill. Need to recharge before day 2 of this important workshop. Thank you SSHRC for creating this space where 34 mobilizers could walk into a bar and begin to network. Trouble was it was a cash bar and alcohol is not an eligible expense on a SSHRC grant even though it is a key success factor in networking and knowledge mobilization! Maybe we’ll make that a recommendation for future program development.

Married to a Mobilizer

As a York University graduate, a volunteer at York’s KM Unit, and the husband of the Director of the Office of Research Services & Knowledge Exchange at York, I have become quite familiar with the world of knowledge mobilization. David and I have been together for over fourteen years, and I’ve seen him grow personally and professionally from a post-doc research fellow to managing the business side of science, innovation and knowledge transfer at the university level.

More importantly, I’m proud and inspired to have witnessed the initiative of my husband in helping build the KM Unit at York (along with a great KM team), developing ResearchImpact – Canada’s knowledge mobilization network. David’s keen interest and involvement has taken KM from an early “pet project” of interest several years ago to participating and contributing today at both the national and international levels of knowledge brokering and policy making.

It was David’s initial, personal conversations we shared about KM that sparked my own interests in the variety of methods in which research and knowledge is exchanged, co-produced and practically applied between researchers and research-users. In fact, before graduating, one of my own research projects focused on the extent to which York University’s Department of Psychology has embodied KM.

I am a graduate of York’s Department of Psychology. After graduation – as a continuation of my own interest in knowledge mobilization – I began providing volunteer support at York’s KM Unit. To avoid any scrutiny of favouritism or conflict of interest, David placed me under the excellent and professional supervision of KM Unit Manager, Michael Johnny (I challenge you to try and find a clear profile headshot of him on the internet anywhere – either not wearing sunglasses or blinking!)

I am exclusively reporting to him as a volunteer. I have helped with the successful development and delivery of the annual KM Expo following the excellent lead of Knowledge Mobilization Officer Krista Jensen.

This is where some of you might remember me from the KM Expo last year, or from attending some of the KTE Communities of Practice meetings. I’ve also provided some support around key areas of data analysis for the ResearchImpact project. It was an enjoyable opportunity to join the KM Unit for a business trip to the University of Victoria earlier this year and present data at a ResearchImpact meeting (read the blog post here).

It’s a great privilege to have met such esteemed international and local mobilizers – from both university and community sectors – such as Angie Hart and Kim Aumann from the University of Brighton’s Community University Partnership Program; Stan Shapson, York’s Vice-President of Research & Innovation; Jane Gibson, Director of Knowledge Transfer and Exchange at the Institute for Work & Health; and Daniele Zanotti, CEO of United Way of York Region.

I’m looking forward to volunteering and participating in KM Expo 2010, hoping to see many of you again while networking with many more people within the KM community.

And remember; keep talking to your husband, wife, partner, girlfriend or boyfriend about KM because – sometimes when you marry a mobilizer, you can become a mobilizer too!

ResearchImpact pleased to help Canadian Policy Research Networks provide an update on Social Innovation in Canada

In 2004 the Canadian Policy Research Networks (CPRN) released their first review of Canadian social innovation titled “Social Innovation in Canada – how the non profit sector services Canadians and how it can serve them better”. On October 9, 2009 CPRN released its update called “Social Innovation in Canada – an update ” (no marks for snappy title!). Funded by SSHRC and authored by Mark Goldenberg (who authored the 2004 report) and colleagues with an introduction by CPRN President Sharon Manson Singer, the report presents a snapshot of Canadian social innovation through literature review, key informant interviews and provide recommendation for enhancing social innovation in Canada. York’s Vice-President Research & Innovation Stan Shapson and ResearchImpact’s David Phipps were pleased to be among the Canadian leaders engaged in social innovation to be interviewed by CPRN. York’s KM Unit and our ResearchImpact partners University of Victoria and Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador got a shout out from Mark Goldenberg and his team.

Sharon Manson Singer

Key findings include:

• The role of the non-profit sector in social innovation remains critical.

• There is increasing acceptance of social innovation and a broadening of our understanding of the concept.

• New forms of collaboration, both within and across sectors, new ways of working, and new models are emerging in the social innovation field.

• Canada is lagging behind other countries on some fronts.

• Further research, study, and work with respect to social innovation will be important in order to increase our understanding of it, including how to encourage it.

Stan Shapson

In addition to these key findings the report identifies that the for-profit sector has moved into the social innovation space in a way that was not seen in 2004. No surprises but the report identifies there is a lack of agreement on the definition of social innovation (read our previous blog post on this topic ). The report also offers 13 pages of references on social innovation providing a valuable resource for any reader. For ResearchImpact, key amongst these findings is the observation about new forms of collaboration. Since KM brokers relationships between researchers and their non-academic research stakeholders KM is itself a means of enabling those new forms of collaboration. We would add to CPRN’s report an examination of social media as an emerging infrastructure to increase transparency and thus enhance collaboration between social innovators (read the paper by Christian Dalsgaard and Morten Flate Paulsen on the use of social media in learning environments ).

David Phipps

“Social Innovation in Canada – an update” concludes by making six recommendations for governments, funders, universities, for-profit and not-for-profit organizations and the social innovators who work towards a better world. The last of these recommendations is “Knowledge transfer strategies and their adoption by social innovators need to be profiled and shared. This would help build capacity for social innovation”. For ResearchImpact this final recommendation is critical. Social innovators are natural knowledge mobilizers brokering relationships between social need and innovation capacity. We need to get our stories out and heard so that our KM practices can be themselves evidence based. Thank you Sharon, Mark and the rest of your team for keeping the conversation on social innovation going….what’s next?

Read the full report here.

Still an overall outstanding opportunity – now everyone knows it

As we previously wrote on July 21 O3, Ontario’s new social networking platform from ORION, is a great tool for developing and sustaining research based relationships and collaborations. On October 6, ORION hosted a launch of O3 at the Royal Ontario Museum (see ORION’s press release here). The group included academic colleagues from OCAD, Centennial College, UOIT and CAMH but York’s close relationship with Ontario’s broadband network was highlighted by attendance from Bob Gagne (CIO), Janet Murphy (ABEL), Allan Anderson (CONCERT) and Kay Li (Faculty of Liberal Arts and Professional Studies) who is working with the Sagittarius Project which is digitizing literary resources for Canadian students.

Also featured was Mobilizing Minds, the York co-lead project that links academic research to young adults for mental health.

But it was ResearchImpact that took the stage with ORION. David Phipps was invited to speak about how York’s Knowledge Mobilization Unit is using O3 to enhance the connection of York’s research with partners from community, government and industrial organizations. As these collaborations produce research and knowledge mobilization outputs the collaborations will disseminate these outputs using ResearchImpact’s O3 site allowing the site to become a publicly accessible repository of knowledge mobilization products and tools. As reported by President Shoukri in the recent Research edition of York U magazine, “Knowledge mobilization is the intersection between researchers and research stakeholders; it’s where research and evidence help inform decisions about public policy, social programming and professional practice.” Essentially knowledge mobilization is a research dating service. Since 1/8 couple married in the US last year met using social media (watch a video about the social media revolution here), social media such as O3 can also support research based partnerships.

York’s KM Unit has been using O3 since its soft launch in May 2009 – visit researchimpact.othree.ca for our O3 site. Mobilizing Minds is the first community engaged project to adopt O3. York also has created a research sub-community on O3 to support. If you are interested in exploring the features of O3 please contact Omar Mohammed, Manager of Research Computing (omoham@yorku.ca) or Krista Jensen (kejensen@yorku.ca) if you are associated with ResearchImpact and/or knowledge mobilization. If you are interested in starting your own O3 community please contact Gary Hilson (gary.hilson@orion.on.ca).

After the reception we got a tour of the Schad Gallery of Biodiversity and saw some of the interactive broadband communication tools used in this multi-media installation. We used this technology to speak to a paleontologist about digging up dinosaur bones and the extinction of dinosaurs. Dinosaurs evolved and died out over 165 million years. Social media has evolved in the span of only a few years but it is here to stay. For an idea of the speed of evolution of social media take 4 minutes and 22 seconds to watch the YouTube video above. THAT’s why you should care about social media.

Gary Hilson demonstrating O3

After 12 years… I’m back!

You’re used to reading about York’s KM Unit and ResearchImpact in this blog as well as on Twitter @researchimpact. Occasionally we get some press that we don’t have to write like the article on KM in Canada done by University Affairs (April 7, 2008). Now we’ve passed peer review. In the August 2009 edition of Evidence & Policy, David Phipps and Stan Shapson published “Knowledge mobilisation builds local research collaborations for social innovation”. Read the abstract here. The paper positions York’s KM Unit amongst other initiatives to link research to practice including the ubiquitous technology transfer office but also offices such as the University of Brighton’s Community University Partnership Program (shout out to Angie Hart for her wonderful work). We ground our work in Lavis’ KTE methods of producer push, user pull and knowledge exchange [J. Health Serv. Res. Policy (2003) 8(3):165] and we extend those to include the co-production of knowledge.

From the paper, key lessons learned (ok, learning) include:

• Developing an institutional capacity to support KT (as institutions support technology commercialization) results in benefits to the institution, researchers, graduate students and research users
• It takes time to break down community–university barriers and develop trust. Care must be taken to manage expectations on both sides.
• The use of broadband technology to connect stakeholders over distance and over time can facilitate research utilization over a large geographical area
• Community/government partners are earlier adopters of the services of the KT unit than faculty
• Decision-maker partners must be engaged throughout the planning, funding, delivery and evaluation of the KT Unit

We are delighted that Evidence & Policy agreed to receive our article and that its peer reviewers recommended it for publication. Evidence & Policy is an important journal for KM. “Evidence & Policy is the first peer-reviewed journal dedicated to comprehensive and critical assessment of the relationship between research evidence and the concerns of policy makers and practitioners, as well as researchers” (Read more here). We are delighted because our work is hitting a wider audience. We’re delighted because of the validation this provides to our work. And I am delighted because this is my first peer reviewed publication in 12 years but I remain grounded because I recognize that recognition of peers is nice but the continued validation provided by partners is more valuable. As Kathleen Bloom wisely points out, “impact is determined by the user” not by academic peers.

Knowledge Brokers and the Metaphors They Love

The following is a guest blog from Jason Guriel. A Research Assistant in the Knowledge Mobilization Unit at York University, Jason works to summarize and communicate the results of York research. He is also a PhD Candidate in English at York and has published two collections of poems.

As a graduate student at York University, the Knowledge Mobilization (KM) Unit has provided not just summer work but an opportunity to learn about some of the more policy-relevant research being carried out on campus. But as a PhD candidate in York’s Department of English, my relationship to KM is a bit murkier. Scholars, critics, professors, and graduate students who study literature are not typically engaged in research that is obviously policy relevant or that has much of a direct, material impact on, say, a local community. The same is probably true of academics in other areas, such as the fine arts. KM encompasses a pretty broad suite of services, but what can it offer disciplines like English – disciplines where research, though valuable in and of itself, does not necessarily always aim to have an explicit social use?

Well, one thing KM offers – or, at least, one thing it has offered me – is a better understanding of the nature of collaboration. There’s a lot of chatter, in the world of research, about the need to break through the silos in which academics are often isolated, and to bring these supposed hermits blinking into the light, into contact with others. Of course, the image of the researcher in the silo has become a cliché, and clichés can grate a bit, especially when you study poetry, as I’m fortunate enough to do. (Poetry, see, often tries to avoid clichés in pursuit of some more memorable way to say what amounts to the same old thing.) But when I really think about the cliché of the silo, I can’t help but picture an academic in an actual grain silo, up to his Adam’s apple in sorghum or something. As I picture it, this poor professor (or graduate student, or researcher) is talking and talking, saying important things even though the words remain trapped in the silo, caroming around, echoing uselessly. Outside of the silo, passing pedestrians hear only muffled noises, if they hear anything at all – if they even notice the silo! The silo, I should add, isn’t necessarily the academic’s fault; it may be the result of a discipline’s insularity, or the rigidity of institutional barriers, or any number of roadblocks for which there may be good reasons.

Knowledge brokers would seem to be those folks intent on knocking some holes into the silo – not just to let some beams of light in but also to let some beams of light out: out of the silo and into the community. They don’t want to dismantle the silo per se; they just want to help spread the sorghum. Or something.

So the silo metaphor, though a little cliché and unwieldy, is not so bad, if you really think about it (and, by doing so, rehabilitate it). And KM people, like poetry people, are always, it seems, thinking in metaphors and analogies and similes. One of the better metaphors sees knowledge brokers as agnostics: in other words, they believe in collaboration but have no firm, orthodox ideas about the form that collaboration should take. Another good one: knowledge brokers are especially imaginative matchmakers. They’re always looking to manufacture novel matches between researchers, policy-makers, and practitioners. They’re open to different, Twister^®-like relationships.

Whatever else KM represents – and this may include many things – it surely represents the potential of two-way relationships, the potential to learn from others even as they learn from you, the opportunity not just to mobilize knowledge (like the cliché of the rolling, moss-less stone) but to share knowledge. To engage in activities that are mutually beneficial. To make, I suppose, metaphors. A metaphor, after all, enables us to see one thing in terms of another. It enables a connection.