Impact & Research Communication Skills - 2023

This interactive workshop by Josie Dixon (Lucian Consulting) is designed to develop the necessary skills for effectively communicating the significance of your research outside the immediate environment of fellow-specialists in your own discipline or subject area.

The relevance of this training will be far-reaching in a range of contexts central to any researcher’s career (grant applications, presentations, publications, job applications, public engagement, and all forms of contact with the media). It answers a pressing need in the current climate for researchers to engage with wider audiences and show the social relevance of academic research, and responds to the increasing requirement on the part of funding bodies for the research they support to have a demonstrable impact outside the academy.

Practical exercises encourage a focus on the purpose, impact, outcomes, benefits and applications of participants’ research.

The following topics are addressed in the workshop:

• Making the case for why your research matters: Key skills for engaging non-specialists and getting their attention
• Looking beyond the case study: The micro and the macro dimensions of your research
• Defining your contribution to the field: What is the nature of your intervention, and what difference will it make?
• Making the headlines: Finding the story in your research, and how to announce it
• Closed and open-ended research: Nailing the facts / pointing outward and onward
  

Learning outcomes

After attending this workshop, you will ...

• have a new awareness of the expectations of universities and funding bodies for public engagement and impact outside the academy
• have developed strategies for counteracting the specialism of doctoral research with a view of its wider implications and applications
• have learned to focus on the outcomes and benefits of their research to others
• have developed their understanding of the wider stakeholders in their research beyond the academy
• have reflected on the differences involved in engaging non-academic audiences, developing their skills for non-specialist communication
• have developed new ways to present their research to the public and to journalists, both verbal and written
• have begun to think about the potential impact of their research in society, and what will be necessary to achieve it

Competences

An important part of preparing for any further professional step is becoming (more) aware of the competences you have developed and/or want to develop. In the current workshop, the following competences from the UHasselt competency overview are actively dealt with:

• interpersonal competences
  • presentation skills
  • oral & written communication
  • stakeholder awareness
  • persuasion
• task-orientedness
  • result-orientedness
• intellectual competences
  • vision
• personal effectiveness
  • self-confidence

For whom?

• The workshop is open to Humanities & Social Science PhD students and postdocs, but priority is given to PhD students. It is designed for postgraduates a year or more into their PhD; early career researchers are also welcome.
• 16 places available

When and where?

• The workshop will take place on May 16, 09:30 - 16:00.
• Campus Hasselt, Old Prison, OG-C1.1Bl (Blue Room)

Registration?

• Registration is closed.
• As places are limited, registering does not automatically imply that you will be able to participate. You will be notified by email after the registration deadline has passed.
• Please cancel your registration at least one week in advance in case you cannot make it (cf. cancellation & no-show policy).

Preparation?

• Participants are required to submit a brief outline of their research (a short paragraph, outlining their research project) so that the examples and exercises can be built around their own work in the course of the workshop - Deadline for submission of the project description is May 02, 2023. 

Acknowledged as?

• DS BSH: category 'research management & communication skills' - workshop aimed at developing general communication skills