What I am taking away from this interesting blog on "The hard labour of connecting research to policy during COVID-19" by Kathryn Oliver and Annette Boaz
1. Connector people – there is good reason to suggest that society would benefit from more paid and valued roles for people with responsibilities and skills to work across policy and research (technical name knowledge brokers or boundary spanners). These people could possibly support research to policy around specific topics. *Finding a non-discipline-specific name for these people that captures what they do would be useful for recognising their work e.g., based on what they are connecting Connector (research/policy); who they are connecting e.g., Connector (citizens/researchers), or the topic of concern e.g., Connector (inclusion).
2. Connection skills – (aka collaboration or knowledge exchange or stakeholder engagement or communication) need to be part of everyone’s job roles e.g., researcher communication, policymaker research literacy, but there probably needs to be more cross-connecting opportunities and openness to knowledge sharing. *These issues are especially important in our new digital future as masses of information become accessible online or is captured by organisations.
3. Connection time – it takes time to make links, transform evidence, and get the right sort of information to the right people, but there are benefits for better evidence-based policy, future collaboration. *Investment in connectors (people, skills, time) etc. could open connection pathways and embedd practices for the future.
4. Connection purpose - inclusion and diversity always need to be tailored to the context and the aim of connection so that people stay on track towards an overall goal.
5. Continuity - To make this work longterm there needs to be structures/people to sustain ‘continual effort’ and keep connections open and growing. *There is a couple of Catch 22s here - a) resourcing will follow if people see the benefit, but the work needs to be done first, and b) if people are employed by one specific organisation they are unlikely to work across organisations.
If you are interested in the policy/research gap, please read the LSE Impact Blog at the above address or the work of these authors (Transforming Evidence blog).