What senior academics can do to support reproducible and open research: a short, three-step guide

Increasingly, policies are being introduced to reward and recognise open research practices, while the adoption of such practices into research routines is being facilitated by many grassroots initiatives. However, despite this widespread endorsement and support, as well as various efforts led by early career researchers, open research is yet to be widely adopted. For open research to become the norm, initiatives should engage academics from all career stages, particularly senior academics (namely senior lecturers, readers, professors) given their routine involvement in determining the quality of research. Senior academics, however, face unique challenges in implementing policy changes and supporting grassroots initiatives. Given that—like all researchers—senior academics are motivated by self-interest, this paper lays out three feasible steps that senior academics can take to improve the quality and productivity of their research, that also serve to engender open research. These steps include changing (a) hiring criteria, (b) how scholarly outputs are credited, and (c) how we fund and publish in line with open research principles. The guidance we provide is accompanied by material for further reading. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s13104-022-05999-0.


UCL
Applicants for promotion are required to confirm that their publications are openly accessible. Promotion to above grades 7-10 include the expectation that all research outputs are made available through open access wherever possible.

Cardiff
The academic promotion procedure makes reference to DORA, and specifies that when assessing research quality, consideration will be given to all outputs including datasets and software, as well as a broad range of impact measures.
Have asked some candidates applying for positions in psychology to provide a track record of open science methods.
Netherlands* Utrecht Adapting tenure and promotion criteria to include openness. The university welcomes open access publications, FAIR and open data, sharing code and software, outreach and public engagement. To provide incentives for staff retention, the university aims to fully implement DORA, and facilitate the reuse of data and code.

Eindhoven
Prospective applicants and employees need to abide by the code of conduct which states that research products as well as the materials used to produce such outputs should be made openly available. Such materials include any information needed for intersubjective testing of design results and processes. Research data should be available to colleagues, after publication. Publications methods should be meticulously described to ensure that replication studies could be performed based on such descriptions. Additionally, it does not accept the fabrication and falsification of results as well as unjustified selective reporting. Authorship should be granted to researchers who made a significant contribution to a research study.

Vrije
Their strategic plan for 2017-2020 states that the university will provide infrastructure for new ways to assess academic values to underpin open research ambitions. Research data will be considered as part of assessment, reward and evaluation systems.

USA Harvard
The School of Engineering and Applied Sciences recommended that faculty applying for promotion or tenure archive their articles in the university's open repository.

Oregon
Many job advertisements include the following statement: "Our Department embraces the values of open and reproducible science, and candidates are encouraged to address (in their statements and/or cover letter) how they have pursued and/or plan to pursue these goals in their work."

Wisconsin-Madison
Policies for post-tenure review include considerations for "open-source databases, online tools … and other networked, digital resources related to scholarship" as evidence of productivity.

Utah Valley
Interviews include the question: ""Describe any steps you have taken to implement the principles of open science in your research".

IUPUI
Promotion and tenure criteria specify placing higher value on quality rather than quantity of publications, require applicants to specify their exact contribution to publications, and highlight the importance of open-access publication.   • Providing visibility and recognition for researchers working in large teams whose individual contributions are lost in an expansive author list.
• Providing visibility for a diverse range of research contributions that are key to research output being published beyond a traditional focus on writing and drafting (e.g. data curation, statistical analysis, etc.).
• Supporting research institutions and authors to resolve author disputes by providing more transparency around individual author roles and responsibility.
• Supporting research and researcher evaluation by providing a more holistic and nuanced view of the contributions of researchers to research output.
• Improving the ability to track the outputs and contributions of individual research specialists and grant recipients.
• Easy identification of potential collaborators and opportunities for research networking.
• Supporting identification of potential reviewers, experts, and specialists for a variety of roles across research.

Resource (URL) Description
Digital Curation Centre (https://www.dcc.ac.uk/about) The DCC provides expert advice and practical help on how to store, manage, protect, and share digital research data. They provide a broad range of resources including online tools, guidance, and training. DCC also provides consultancy services on issues such as policy development and data management planning.
FAIRsharing.org (https://fairsharing.org/) A curated, informative, and educational resource on data and metadata standards, inter-related to databases and data policies. An alternative to journal impact factor (JIF) to evaluate qualities of journals, the TOP Factor assesses journal policies for the degree to which they promote core scholarly norms of transparency and reproducibility.