Our training and facilitation provision is a growing aspect of the diverse Research Consulting range of consultancy services. To a certain extent we have become ‘accidental trainers’ – we didn’t set out to become a training company, but the path to providing training provision as part of our wider consultancy work has been a natural one. Through the consultancy work we do and the relationships we build, we get invited to support various types of training, usually bespoke or in areas not available as ‘routine’ in the wider landscape of training provision. As our team has expanded and the range of insight and skills has broadened and strengthened, this has been recognised by universities and research networks at home and abroad interested in learning from our expertise.
We were really pleased with the work Research Consulting did. It was an absolute pleasure to work with them, they offered new perspectives and were able to organize our training materials in a much more accessible manner. The communication was great as well, I always felt well informed on the progress and what they needed from us.Victoria Babbit, Director of Researcher Development and Outreach, Taylor and Francis
Developing bespoke content to meet client needs
Our training offer for clients can lean on a range of pre-prepared learning and development materials but tends to be developed and delivered on a bespoke basis, responding directly to a specific need(s). Our training sessions can be provided for an hour, half-day, full day or across several days, it just depends on the client’s requirements. We are often asked to help due to the client’s awareness of our specific subject knowledge and expertise in relevant areas – across the sectors of universities and research organisations, charities and learned societies, government and research funders, and publishing and scholarly communications.
We’ve conducted training sessions for UK universities, academic publishers and international organisations, both online and in-person. Our projects have included business development training for academics at the University of Lincoln, research impact training for doctoral students at the University of Nottingham, and European workshops on research management. We also helped facilitate workshops to develop technology transfer and industry collaborations in Malaysia, informed research strategy development in Saudi Arabia, and trained academics in Egypt on knowledge exchange and research marketing. We’ve also developed course materials for academic publishers to use in upskilling researchers worldwide and have provided expert training for commercial partners to better understand university research offices and how to effectively market their products.
The needs of our organisation were clearly understood and that was reflected in the quality and content of the course, providing our staff with an excellent training course.
David Williams, Partnerships Support Officer, Research and Enterprise, University of Lincoln (2022)
Engaged participants
Feedback routinely praises the interactive nature of our sessions, the way we engage participants and keep them actively involved. We often use Mentimeter or PollEverywhere where workshop participants use their mobile phones to answer survey questions for instant feedback, creating an interactive and dynamic session where all delegates are able to contribute. These tools stimulate debate and help prevent only the loudest in the room having their say. They can be a very useful way of beginning a conversation with a diversity of viewpoints.
Another interactive element we sometimes use in our training sessions is Research Management – the board game. This is a game we created initially as a fun team building activity to use within our training provision for EARMA students studying for their Certificate in Research Management. Since using it in training sessions it now has its own small band of admirers in the research community, having been downloaded almost 2,000 times! In the game, competitors seek to build up their academic research areas, research management capability and research facilities, while being confronted with a series of fortunate and less fortunate occurrences, against the backdrop of an ever-changing government policy landscape. It provides an interesting and engaging way of playing out scenarios that many workshop participants can relate to and is often a more creative and thought-provoking activity than an after-lunch lecture.
It has been a great pleasure to work with you and thank you for all the support helping to make the Certificate in Research Management such a success.
Emma Lythgoe, Executive Director, EARMA
A valued part of our portfolio
We are keen to provide more training in the future, in part a response to the feedback on the quality of the sessions provided to date, and in part because it is an aspect of our service portfolio that we really enjoy. There are also benefits to the team too, as we are always learning new insights from our training and facilitation participants. With team members who are highly credible subject experts in their fields, there is always satisfaction in sharing knowledge and deepening understanding in the communities we serve.
To see how we can meet your learning and development training needs, contact Research Consulting today.
Chris provided an engaging and interesting workshop for the Doctoral Training Partnership, which completely met the brief we discussed. She created useful slides and materials that were of very good quality. I hope that we will be able to work with Research Consulting again.
Michelle Hudson-Shore, University of Nottingham
I have run a few training events on research impact, which have been very well received. Impact at a very basic level is the way that research makes a difference in the world. The training provided for universities is often focused on broadening the horizons of researchers as to the wide-ranging applications and potential benefits of their research. I have also worked with Dan (King) recently on training for Egyptian scientists on the marketing of research, of which impact is one important factor. I find it really rewarding when people have that light bulb moment when they realise what impact is and how they can achieve it (or already are in some cases!).
Christina Mellor, Research Consulting Senior Consultant
