Cash for Questions | Research Funding, Policy and Development

Professional development for research development staff: Group Coaching?

I’ve got an idea for a professional development programme for research development managers, and I’m interested to see if there’s (a) the appetite; and (b) the funding to make it work.

I’m a qualified coach, and I’ve experience with individual coaching, but also group coaching. I’ve also got around nineteen years of experience in research development, and I’m wondering about putting those things together and offering short programmes of group coaching for research development staff.

What would that look like in practice? Well, I’m still working on that, but roughly….

A group of three or (ideally) four research development professionals with at least some experience (let’s say a year or so), plus me as the facilitator. Each session would involve two or more members of the group presenting a problem, issue, or challenge that they’re currently facing. The rest of the group (including me) would then ask questions to make sure that we’ve understood the issue. We’d then support the presenter in finding their own answer, or their own way forward. While direct advice (“at my institution, we do X”) isn’t forbidden, the focus would be more on helping each person solve their own problem rather than giving advice.

Over a programme of sessions (probably 4-6), each member of the group would have the opportunity to bring forward issues or challenges to discuss on an equitable basis. We’d also talk through potential issues or challenges that people bring to see whether we can usefully combine any of them and address them together. We’d also revisit questions we’d discussed previously, to find out about progress/results and hold each other accountable for steps we said we’d take.

Sessions would be run under the Chatham House Rule, which states that participants are free to use the information they receive, but not to identify the other people/institutions involved. At the end of the agreed number of sessions, group members are free to continue to keep meeting, but without direct facilitation (and therefore no additional cost).

Why I think it might be a good idea

There’s not a great deal of professional development opportunities for Research Development staff (though see below). RDNs at smaller and/or less research intensive institutions are often relatively isolated without access to a broader community of practice. And even in larger/research intensive institutions, there are often small teams or individuals who don’t have a great deal of contact with peers.

My experience at multiple ARMA conferences and other RDM networking events over the years has been that people in similar roles at different institutions tend to bond quickly over their shared experiences and issues/challenges. Perhaps counterintuitively, it’s easier to talk about challenges with people from other institutions than those at your own. Whether that’s because people don’t want to admit weakness in front of colleagues, or because colleagues will know too much about the politics and personalities involved, or whether there’s something of a seal of the confessional about talking to someone you don’t know… it just seems to work well.

I could, of course, offer a programme for research development staff from a single institution on a bespoke basis. This could be very valuable, provided that participants feel able to openly share their issues of challenge and ask constructive, challenging questions of each other. I’d be happy to discuss this. But I think external perspectives are useful, and for the default model I’d be looking for a mix of institutions.

Essentially, the offering is support for an individual RDM in finding ways forwards with the challenges they face in their work. That support is from me (as an experienced RDM and coach) and from peers at other institutions who may have different ways of working. They’ll also learn from helping others, and potentially gain access to an ongoing network of mutual support and assistance.

Why it might not be a good idea

(1) There’s already some training in this area.

The Association of Research Managers and Administrators (ARMA) offers Supporting Research Proposals and Raising the Quality of Research Proposals. The former is for new Research Development Managers, and while the second is aimed at those with at least two years experience, it’s still fairly bread and butter. I led on the development of an ‘advanced’ course – Building Relationships, Increasing our Influence – which is due to run for a third time this year. This focuses less on the fundamental skills, and more on our ability to be persuasive and influential. It’s not enough to be right about something – what matters is taking others with you. ARMA also offers a mentoring programme.

But ARMA courses only run once or twice a year, and I think there might be scope for something more flexible, more individually tailored, that provides the opportunity to address particular issues or challenges. Cross institutional mentoring programmes can be a bit hit-and-miss, and often depend on the relative time commitments of both parties. They’re also quite long term, which can be an advantage and a disadvantage. In contrast, this would be (initially) relatively short term and focused, with a clear purpose and beginning and end.

I think group coaching offers something unique. Both in terms of supporting participants to develop their own solutions to their particular challenges, and in terms of developing expertise in supporting others to do the same. There’s a huge crossover between Research Development and Coaching, and even those research developers with no desire to obtain a coaching qualification can benefit from coaching skills.

(2) Everybody’s institution is stony broke, and the training budget is the first to go when it comes to cost savings.

Yeah. Mine too. And this is the big worry. Actually, I think a time limited programme of group coaching conducted over Teams could be pretty economical, given costs are split between three or four participants. There aren’t many overheads – no travel, no accommodation, no subsistence… it’s mainly time.

Also… we would only need three or four people (from different institutions) in order to run this. A lot of other training offerings (especially in-person, whole day events) need substantially more to be financially and pedagogically viable. So we wouldn’t need much… I can run one programme and then operate a waiting list until there are enough people for a second one.

So… yeah. Is this a good idea? Would you/ a colleague like to participate in something like this? And just as importantly, is there a budget to pay for it? Or might there be in the future? Please email me (in strict confidence) at [email protected]

Health update, and a shameless request for sponsorship

Me, ringing the bell after the end of my treatment.

This post was supposed to be an account of how my cancer came back, how I went through chemo, and how I came out the other side. Followed by a request for sponsorship (in aid of Cancer Research UK) for my latest act of folly, which is to try to get fit enough to run the Robin Hood Half Marathon in six weeks time. My hope was that the post would be informative, honest, informative, and amusing in places… you’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll learn… that sort of thing.

It was going to feature such gems as that time the ceiling (tile) collapsed, and nearly hit the healthcare assistant changing my hospital bed. About the chap in the bed next to me, whose otherwise pleasant conversation took a weird and somewhat fascist turn. The family member of another patient who took one look at me and told me that I was too young to be in that ward. My children, who found – and continue to find – my lack of hair a source of amusement. The expression on another parent’s face when my child proudly announced that “daddy has to have a special medicine that’s so powerful that it makes all his hair fall out.” Feeling so fatigued and tired that I couldn’t stay up even for the exit poll on election day. That day when I was so far gone with fatigue, I just sat staring into space, unable to do anything. Nausea. My corrupted sense of taste.

But this post isn’t, it turns out, going to be like that. The above paragraph is probably as close as it’s going to get. Except for the begging for charity sponsorship. You better believe you’re getting that bit.

Why isn’t this post going to be like that? Well, it turns out I’m just not ready to write that post yet. Maybe that tells you something about the whole experience. It certainly tells me something.

The good news is that I’m almost certainly going to be fine. I had testicular cancer a few years ago, and it seems that some of it somehow escaped the surgical procedure known as a “radical orchidectomy” and fled to my abdomen to set up a new home. These (along with the rest of me) have been carpet bombed from orbit via the medium of chemotherapy, and are now gone. Hopefully.

One reason I’m almost certainly going to be fine, of course, is research. Seems that testicular cancer of the kind that I had/have is… in research terms, it’s done. No trials for me to volunteer for. Testicular cancer… well… it’s low-hanging fruit. But you don’t need to me to tell you that there’s a lot of work still to be done on other cancers, because everyone knows somebody…. everybody probably knows multiple somebodies.

Another reason I’m almost certainly going to be fine is the medical and healthcare staff. Everyone involved in my treatment, at all levels of seniority, has been nothing but lovely to me. The consultant who co-founded Move Against Cancer, which reminded me that while I can’t run my normal distances or my normal speeds, I can still go and complete a Parkrun, however slowly, when I’m feeling up to it. The oncology outpatient nurse who, recognising my anxieties and the Lowness of my Ebb, made a point of getting her top canulator to plug me in, so I only had to go through it once. The healthcare assistants with breakfast and tea and coffee and a kind word for everyone. And the quiet solidarity of – and with – other patients, most of whom have things far harder than me.

Last year, the day after the Robin Hood Half Marathon, I entered this year’s Robin Hood Half Marathon. I’ve run it (or the full marathon, when it existed) every year since 2014 apart from the COVID years. When I entered the 2024 race, I was hoping for a good training year and a faster time, maybe even a post-pandemic PB.

I wasn’t expecting to be six weeks before race day, and struggling to complete a super-slow 5k training run. But here we are. Here I am. But I’ll get round, even if I have to walk some/much/all of it. It’s my hometown race, I absolutely bloody love it (except that nasty early climb through The Park) and I’m too pig-headed to drop out.

And so… even though I am a veteran of many distance runs (including ten marathons), I am asking for sponsorship. I’ve decided to take advantage of the weird cultural thing we have where we’ll only give money to good causes if someone does something difficult, unpleasant, or arduous. Or when we can pretend to think that, when in reality we’re subsidising someone else’s leisure activity. Though I should say, in the interests of transparency, I paid my own race entry fees.

So if you’ve got money to spare and if anything I’ve written over the years has been useful to you, please think about donating. Either through sponsoring me, or if there’s another worthy cause that’s close to your heart, by supporting that instead.

Thanks in advance. I really appreciate it.

Adam.

Proud Womble, and possessor of the average number of testicles for a human being.

The art of the sift

A version of this article first appeared in Funding Insight in February 2022 and is reproduced with kind permission of Research Professional. For more articles like this, visit www.researchprofessional.com

How to select bids when funders restrict the number that each university can submit

Nicolas Poussin (1594–1665), The Judgment of Solomon (1649), oil on canvas, 101 x 150 cm, Musée du Louvre, Paris. Wikimedia Commons.

One of the most awkward challenges in research development is responding to a ‘restricted’ funding call that only permits a limited number of applications per university. This requires an internal selection process. I’m going to share some of the things I do when I set one up. I don’t have all the answers, and I’d be interested to hear what others do, via twitter, or email or the comments.

This article refers primarily to funding schemes with a hard limit on application numbers. In the UK, that includes the Leverhulme Trust’s major calls and the Academy of Medical Science’s Springboard Awards. Some of the suggestions may also be relevant to panels for schemes with a ‘soft’ limit. These typically don’t set a formal limit on application numbers, but require universities to have a process to manage demand, submit only their most competitive applications, and not support others. There are good arguments for saying that we should be doing this sift anyway, if only to prevent our researchers wasting time and effort.

Promotions and Commotions – part one: APM staff

King Louie, from ‘The Jungle Book’ (1967)

This is the first part of a three part series about promotions and careers in UK universities. This first post focuses on “administrative, professional, and managerial” (APM) staff, although I touch issues related to other job families, especially research and teaching. A second blogpost will have more to say about academic promotions, and a third with some thoughts on possible changes and reforms, and a few things I’ve learned over the years. I’ve not written the second or third yet, but I’m going to publish the first in the hope it motivates me to write the others faster.

Opportunities for career progression and promotion and the level of fairness and transparency and consistency (or lack thereof) is inevitably a hot topic in every sector. However, I have a theory that the situation in universities can be particularly problematic because of mutual envy and incomprehension between academic and non-academic promotions.

To a non-academic like me, academic promotions are odd. Sorry, but they are. It’s hard to think of many professions where it’s possible to be doing largely the same job – teaching, research, administration/management – while still having the potential for advancement from Assistant to Associate to full Prof, and then potentially up the various Professorial pay bandings.

Of course, that’s not entirely fair – the level of performance and expertise and expectations and responsibilities in those three core areas increases up the academic payscale. Or at least they should. I guess medical doctors are a good parallel case. And professional footballers.

APM staff – by which I mean “administrative, professional, and managerial” staff – careers work very differently. I’d note in passing that every institution seems to believe that its own chosen nomenclature for grades and job families (APM4, APM5, APM6) is universal and understood sector wide, when it’s only the pay spine that’s common, not the grade boundaries.

Postdoc Fellowships: Should I Stay or Should I Go?

A version of this article first appeared in Funding Insight in March 2022 and is reproduced with kind permission of Research Professional. For more articles like this, visit www.researchprofessional.com

Is relocation always advisable for a postdoc fellowship, and what if it’s not possible?

Most postdoctoral fellowship programmes encourage potential applicants to move institutions, though the strength of that steer and the importance placed on researcher mobility varies from scheme to scheme. At the extreme end, in Europe, the Marie Curie Fellowships programme (not exclusively a postdoc scheme) requires international mobility for eligibility.

“Until tomorrow, the whole world is my home…”

In the UK, most schemes have softened their steer over recent years. Where once staying at your current institution required ‘exceptional justification’ or some similar phrasing, there’s now an increasing awareness that researcher mobility doesn’t make sense for everyone and enforcing it has negative ramifications for equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI). It’s much harder and more disruptive for researchers with family commitments to move institutions, and harder for those with partners who are tied to a particular location for family or job reasons. There will be other researchers who are already in the best environment for their research, and so any move would be a backward step. It’s now common for application forms to allow space for both (a) personal/EDI reasons why moving institutions is not possible; and (b) intellectual/research reasons for not wanting to move.