Why Every Scientist Needs a Knowledge Mobilization Plan
You know when you hear a new word or song or re-hear it after many years and think 鈥渨ow, this has existed for so long and I have never heard of it until now". And then you hear it again multiple times over the next days or weeks. There is probably a word for that鈥揵ut that is not my point. Something similar happened to me recently around science and knowledge mobilization.
Knowledge mobilization & "basic science"
Recently, frequent questions and conversations have come up around the relevance of knowledge mobilization to 鈥渂asic science鈥�. Particularly as it relates to knowledge mobilization that actively engages community throughout the research life cycle, and how this engagement could risk intellectual property. Reflecting on this, I want to share some thoughts. These are not new, not exclusively mine, not exhaustive, and likely open to disagreement.
If you have taken a workshop with me on knowledge mobilization you know I like to use the five knowledge mobilization planning questions: who, what, why, how, so what? These five questions can be used for all different types of research, science, or research creation.
You also know that I emphasize the importance of answering the 鈥渨ho, what, why鈥� first, and using those answers to inform the answer to 鈥渉ow鈥�. In other words, tailor your knowledge mobilization activities and approaches based on your message, audience, and goals. The point of knowledge mobilization is to increase relevance, usefulness, and impact of scholarship. To achieve this, different projects need different approaches and need to engage different communities.
For example, the 鈥渂asic鈥� scientist may have a knowledge mobilization goal to inform future research in an area that is slightly outside of their field because of the potential for that to advance their discovery into something applied. So, their audience is applied scientists in that field. They could engage that community in the research journey, publish in a more targeted journal, attend a conference in that field, and create outputs that are more accessible to researchers outside their discipline. That is not the only pathway, but it is one.
There are many ways to engage community in the research life cycle. There are also many ways community is defined. Define community for your project, and then pick the engagement that makes sense for your who, what, and why.
Intellectual property (IP)
Intellectual property (IP) refers to the ownership and usage rights of inventions and creative works (e.g. art, writing). IP is protected in law through various means such as patents, copyright, trademarks, trade secrets, industrial designs, geographical indications, and database rights. Non-disclosure agreements (NDA) are about keeping information private, and can be a tool for protecting IP.
IP does not only impact or apply to 鈥渂asic鈥� science. In fact, this blog post is now my IP and is covered by automatic copyright law.
Even if you are under an NDA or planning on filing a patent, you can still benefit from a knowledge mobilization plan. The patent is part of the plan; the NDA is a limiter to the scope of the plan. There still might be key messages that you can be sharing with your audience to move toward your longer-term goals that do not disrupt your patent or breach the NDA. And actually, maybe the NDA can help too. If community engagement is the best strategy for achieving your knowledge mobilization goals, perhaps you can have community partners that sign an NDA.
Disclaimer 鈥� I am not an expert in IP. There are lots of folks that are experts. Talk to the copyright librarian, the technology licensing officers, lawyers, etc. Get them to review your knowledge mobilization plan.
At the end of the day, all scholars can benefit from having a knowledge mobilization plan. And I can help you with that.