138 12 Beyond the Thesis
In some universities, activities such as teaching and so on are explicitly struc-
tured into the research program. In others, the formal part of the program consists
only of research and the other development activities are something the student
needs to independently explore. Either way, these are critical skills that you should
acquire before you can embark on a career as an academic. Rather less positively,
being a research student is sometimes said to involve ‘surviving your thesis’, and
thus another group of important skills is learning to anticipate and manage stress,
and developing the ability to work to long-term deadlines in a sometimes chaotic
and high-pressure environment.
These activities—publishing, developing, connecting—are the topic of this
chapter.
Disseminating Your Research
The goal of research is to create or modify knowledge. But whose knowledge? It
isn’t productive to do research and then keep the outcomes to yourself; part of the
aim is to make others aware of what you have found. The purpose of research can
be viewed as being intended to have impact, that is, to change the minds of oth-
ers. Successful research influences people to behave differently and undertake new
activities.
But, you might respond, there are many ways of having influence. In the political
sphere, much of what is said is intended to persuade people to have one view or anoth-
er; the same is true of advertising; and the same is true of all sorts of attention-seeking
activities, from fraudsters to alarmists. What makes academic research different is the
systems of checks and balances. For example, it is widely regarded as unethical to use
the media to publicize research outcomes before the work has been refereed, and there
is an expectation that published results are the outcome of an objective analysis that
is consistent with the best practice of the rest of the academic community. The influ-
ence of work is due to the strength of rational argument that supports it. These kinds
of constraints determine how work is disseminated: not in newspapers, or blogs, or
mailing lists, but primarily through standard academic forums.
An underlying question is: Why disseminate? There are several good answers to
this question.
- To get knowledge of your work into your academic community, as discussed
above. I said it earlier, but it is worth saying again: this is why we take the time,
not just to write about our research, but to write well. People won’t trouble to un-
derstand your ideas if they have to struggle with your writing, while clear, lively
writing creates the impression that what you say is worth understanding. - To fulfil the obligation of a publicly funded researcher to make their work widely
available. - To create an academic track record of publications and presentations. Without a
track record, it is impossible to pursue an academic career. - To get feedback on your work as it develops.