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One way for universities to revitalise academic medicine might be to
look outward. Research takes money, and competition for funding is
fierce. The chances of success are improved by demonstrating an expertise
in both the subject area and the appropriate methodology. Collaboration
can be one way to achieve this, but how do you know who to collaborate
with? It’s not just about the interests or the skills of course. If
successful, you have got to actually work with these people.
A recent approach we have used to improve our collaborative outlook
was a modified form of “speed dating”. Primary Health Care and the School
for Policy Studies are research active departments within the University
of Bristol, but within different faculties. We were aware of some overlap
in subject areas and methodological expertise, yet to date we have had
little experience of working together. We devised “speed networking” as
an efficient means for members from each unit to meet and identify areas
for possible future collaboration.
We introduced the groups to each other through brief oral
presentations that gave an overview at a departmental level. Members from
Primary Health Care were then stationed at points around the room and, at
three minute intervals, colleagues from Policy Studies invited to rotate
between each station. After 24 minutes, all 16 participants had had the
opportunity to meet and rapidly outline their skills and interests.
Thereafter followed coffee to allow interested “pairs” to follow-up their
introductions in more detail.
We acknowledge that other means of networking exist, but as far as we
are aware this is the first application of a populist approach in a
research setting. Feedback from participants was positive and we suggest
that other departments, looking for research relationships, may wish to
adopt our idea as an ice-breaker to future collaborations.
Competing interests:
None declared
Competing interests:
No competing interests
14 July 2005
Matthew J Ridd
MRC Clinical Research Training Fellow
Alison R G Shaw
Academic Unit of Primary Health Care, University of Bristol, BS6 6JL
Speed-networking
One way for universities to revitalise academic medicine might be to
look outward. Research takes money, and competition for funding is
fierce. The chances of success are improved by demonstrating an expertise
in both the subject area and the appropriate methodology. Collaboration
can be one way to achieve this, but how do you know who to collaborate
with? It’s not just about the interests or the skills of course. If
successful, you have got to actually work with these people.
A recent approach we have used to improve our collaborative outlook
was a modified form of “speed dating”. Primary Health Care and the School
for Policy Studies are research active departments within the University
of Bristol, but within different faculties. We were aware of some overlap
in subject areas and methodological expertise, yet to date we have had
little experience of working together. We devised “speed networking” as
an efficient means for members from each unit to meet and identify areas
for possible future collaboration.
We introduced the groups to each other through brief oral
presentations that gave an overview at a departmental level. Members from
Primary Health Care were then stationed at points around the room and, at
three minute intervals, colleagues from Policy Studies invited to rotate
between each station. After 24 minutes, all 16 participants had had the
opportunity to meet and rapidly outline their skills and interests.
Thereafter followed coffee to allow interested “pairs” to follow-up their
introductions in more detail.
We acknowledge that other means of networking exist, but as far as we
are aware this is the first application of a populist approach in a
research setting. Feedback from participants was positive and we suggest
that other departments, looking for research relationships, may wish to
adopt our idea as an ice-breaker to future collaborations.
Competing interests:
None declared
Competing interests: No competing interests