Barriers and enablers to research impact - iPEN's systems analysis

Nearly four years ago iPEN changed from being a group of colleagues talking about how to help their organisations deliver research impact, to the more formal programme of work you can see today.

However before embarking on developing the shared tools, resources and training that is now iPEN's 'core' focus, we were advised to first understand what the 'current state' was across our organisations.

This involved our expert adviser conducting a dizzying number of interviews (over 100!) with staff across all seven of our organisations, and we also circulated a survey which provided us with even more rich information from the 100s of responses we had to that.

We discovered that many of our scientists knew what research impact is, and were highly motivated to deliver it - many commented that was why the became scientists in the first place - what they struggled with was understanding HOW to do it.

However it also became clear from the feedback that there were some others things they felt were getting in the way of impact, but the roots of these ran deeper than just a lack of skills or resources.

Fast forward two years - with our training programme up and running - we decided to return to this information to see if we could learn more about these challenges so we could see if there were things iPEN could do help.

We did a systems analysis

This time we took a 'systems view' as we are fortunate to have a couple of team members with expertise in systems thinking who observed that the kinds of challenges that had been described had much more complex 'roots', and so our work began in earnest, speaking with researchers and scientists who were recognised as have had impact, about what had helped and hindered them.

Along the way we workshopped what was emerging with wider colleagues across the RSI system to check if what we had identified resonated with them, and also to check if our analysis and opportunities for action made sense.

Completely coincidentally Te Ara Pairangi was launched, so we have also been sharing our findings and thinking to MBIE, through including making a submission and also inviting them to join workshops we ran during 2022.  
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so what did we learn?

First we learned that doing a systems analysis is indeed a messy and intellectually challenging process. It was tough to realise 'solutions' are a misnomer in systems (indeed this is a symptom of  'simplistic linear thinking') and that we needed to think about where change might be useful, using out deeper understanding of how things interacted to guide this intellectual detective work.

Notwithstanding the challenge and the 'mess' there were some themes that came through in our analysis loud and clear as either supporting, or slowing down our delivery of impact.

The importance of relationships was identified time and time again. These trusted relationships, built between individuals over time, act very much like mortar between bricks - helping to stick bits of science together giving these 'pipelines' of work strength and resilience.

We heard that research impact required a whole range of other activities that sit outside/beyond the margins so what is traditionally considered doing science, but these invisible or unseen activities are in fact critical to the process of delivering impact. We've called this the 'impact creation cycle' and mapped it against the iceberg concept ​to explain how the current system operates.

Perverse or competing incentives in the system's design was also talked about, and these are experienced at a global level. For example given limited time, scientists described the 'forced choice'  to focus on publications over other 'impactful' activities as these were part of the contract, and support career progression (this challenge is now routinely being identified globally).

In total we identified seven interconnecting themes, which expands to even more when considering what achieving impact might look like from a Te Ao Māori perspective.

The full summary of our findings can be found by clicking here, as well as the companion report identifying where opportunities for action lie.

While we've now learned that 'solutions' are not what we should be looking for, we found the application of 'leverage points' from the systems literature a powerful way to really understand where change could be more or less effective and WHY.
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so what now?

iPEN's mahi is focused on acting, and supporting the HOW of science. So what actions are we taking now?

We are in the early stages of figuring out what next, but sharing our findings and the opportunities for action is one important first step. We are also now taking the conversation wider, with a hui organised with a wider collection of colleagues across the system to share and discuss this work. 

As we say in our 'Making Sense of Impact' webinar, impact is a collective endeavour, so we'll keep you posted on what collective efforts might eventuate as we take our conversation wider.