Exploring potential barriers to effective knowledge exchange. Blog by Sarah Golding

George Murrell

Clare Twigger-Ross, who works as a consultant social researcher at Eunomia, highlighted two challenges for social scientists in consultancy roles:

“When working in research as a consultant, we aim to work collaboratively with our clients as far as possible. However, a key area of knowledge that can be underestimated is that of the institutional, governance context of the project.

Understanding the flows of knowledge and influence within an organisation is important. Who are the key personnel and drivers behind the project? This is vital if project findings are to be embedded and have meaningful impact. Time is needed to actively listen to gather that institutional knowledge.

On the client side, challenges arise when there is a focus on only engaging in detail at the end of the work. By this time, it is too late to alter how the data might have been collected or analysed.

Key to success within our projects is the development of trusted relationships between our staff and clients that enable critical and active engagement throughout a project lifetime. This can help ensure that knowledge is co-produced rather than just exchanged.”

Sarah Golding

Tony Craig, who leads the Social, Economic and Geographical Sciences department at the James Hutton Institute, was in the audience. Tony reflected on the role of social scientists in the knowledge exchange process:

“The ACCESS panel session at the IAPS conference was exactly the kind of discussion that one hopes to find at an academic conference. It had a sense of authentic questioning at its heart, and generated a lively discussion.

One of the issues that was raised was that of responsibility. It can sometimes feel as if the number of demands being put on junior academics are way higher than would have been the case at the time that senior academics were carving out their careers. Demands to travel sustainably, demands to achieve impact, and demands to facilitate effective knowledge exchange.

One could reasonably question whether all of the responsibility for effective knowledge exchange should fall on the shoulders of every individual researcher, and it sounded like the ACCESS project took this issue quite seriously – as evidenced by the existence of knowledge exchange fellows on the project.”

Temujen Gunawardena

During the session, the audience and panel also explored aspects of the ACCESS Guiding Principles. Debate swirled around the tensions between the urgent need to reduce the environmental impact of academic research, while also avoiding exclusionary actions or overly moralistic narratives.

Dmitry Dreyer/Unsplash

George Warren, who is an early career researcher, and a Knowledge Exchange Fellow for ACCESS, commented:

“We often reflect on how we might integrate the Guiding Principles into our own work and practice across ACCESS. This was no different when reflecting on attending this conference in Barcelona. While many of us had flown to Barcelona, I had been able to take the train for one leg of the journey. As a team our travel choices were impacted by factors including time, family responsibilities, and costs.

This tension was also evident among the audience, most of whom had flown. Debates were had about fairness regarding who should ‘get to travel’. Some senior academics raised fears about ‘pulling up the drawbridge behind themselves’. For example, if conference travel became restricted or limited for more junior counterparts, or those from the Global South.

At the same time, it was clear that this practice is unsustainable. Even if there is no simple solution, we still need to strive for change to reduce our carbon impact. As one audience member put it, “the world is still burning.”