Directions for Research Data Management in UK Universities

Research data is recognised as being central to research and disseminating, sharing and enabling access to research data are all now seen as essential to research integrity.
Making research data accessible does not simply facilitate validation, it also supports new research and innovation.

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Universities that have begun to address research data management actively have found that they need a multidisciplinary team – people in the research office, the library and the IT department may all need to find effective ways to pool their skills. Progress is being made but research data management solutions in UK universities are still relatively immature and most universities only have partial solutions in place. Many would welcome shared solutions, and it is clear that shared services and more tightly coordinated infrastructure is required for more efficient and effective research data management.

These are some of the motivations that led the Association of Research Managers and Administrators (ARMA), Jisc, Research Libraries UK (RLUK), the Russell Universities Group of IT Directors (RUGIT), the Society of College, National and University Libraries (SCONUL) and the Universities and Colleges Information Systems Association (UCISA) to discuss a joint direction of travel for universities over the crucial next five years. At the same time, Jisc has embarked upon a related area of research and development, namely Research at Risk, which focuses on finding and developing solutions for research data management within universities. Research at Risk seeks to realise a robust and sustainable research data management infrastructure and services to enrich UK research.

This report addresses five key topics:
– Policy development and implementation
– Skills and capability
– Infrastructure and interoperability
– Incentives for researchers and support stakeholders
– Business case and sustainability

For each topic we have included a summary of the main current issues, alongside a vision of where the sector should aim to be in five years’ time. We then suggest actions for each topic, divided into ‘first steps’ and then longer term, more complex priorities. Readers should note that each of the five topics do raise interrelated actions, for example, a usage statistics service is flagged as a potential infrastructure solution and this issue arises again as an action area that can help to incentivise research data management and sharing.

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