Open gvwilson opened 5 months ago
Thanks @gvwilson - this would be a great thing to have happen. Can you (or others) help by pointing to some of this research and experience and training that people who want to make changes (such as many RSEs) could use to actually make them?
I found Manns and Rising's Fearless Change (978-0201741575) a very useful guide to tactics within institutions (their focus is Fortune 500, but I think most of it applies to academic institutions and government research labs); Brown's Building Powerful Community Organizations (978-0977151806) is more of a grassroots take, but equally informative. I'd be very interested in hearing from RSEs and others about whether either or both would be applicable to their situations or whether I've wandered too far afield.
A great deal of research has been done on ways to effect change within large organizations, and many advocacy groups also have field experience that they can share. Training delivered by people with this knowledge on how to identify low-hanging fruit, determine whose support is needed to institutionalize desired changes, recruit allies, raise awareness, persuade or sideline those satisfied with the status quo, and ensure that changes aren't rolled back would have more impact than further studies of benefits.