Resource Library

A collection of materials to facilitate the development of responsible research and researcher assessment policies and practices.

Search and Filter

Resource type

Intended audience


Good practicesPosition papers
For: Research institutes
2020
In support of the Dutch Recognition and Rewards Programme, Leiden University published a position paper “Academia in Motion: Recognition & Rewards at Leiden University” in 2021. In 2020, Leiden University’s Executive Board established a Recognition & Rewards steering committee made up of staff from a variety of positions and roles. The goals of the Recognition…
Good practicesPosition papers
For: Research institutes
2021
In this article, Jonathan Grant outlines nine cases that highlight examples of new academic incentives at multiple levels (e.g., system, institution, and individual level). These include: System-Level Examples like the United Kingdom Research Excellence Framework (REF), which reviews the quality of research conducted at universities in the United Kingdom, including societal impact and research environment.…
Good practices
For: Professional societies
2017
Three national academies issued a statement on good practice in the evaluation of researchers and research programs in October of 2017. The statement recognized the need for efficient, fair, and robust researcher evaluation, especially as the size of the research community continues to increase.
Case studiesGood practices
For: Research institutes
2023
The ARRC team at the University of Cambridge is running a controlled trial to investigate the effects of using narrative CVs in postdoc recruitment. Narrative CVs aim to avoid placing a narrow emphasis on lists of achievements such as authored publications, awarded grants, etc. Using a narrative CV might allow researchers to highlight their wider…
Good practices
For: Professional societies
2019
The idea for the San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment began at the 2012 ASCB Annual Meeting. As one of the initial DORA signatories, the ASCB does not promote its publications by the Journal Impact Factor.
Good practices
For: Funders
Applicants understand how funding decisions are made, because the Agency openly shares a general summary of its decision-making process on their website written in English and French.
Good practicesPolicies and guidance
For: Funders
2018
The NHMRC guide for peer review instructs assessors not to rely on the Journal Impact Factor when making judgments.
Good practices
For: Funders
2018
CRUK recognizes value from all outputs of research, including publications. CRUK has modified its grant application process to ask candidates to describe the significance and impact of 3-5 key research achievements, which can include preprints, training delivered, contribution to consortia, patents, and sharing of key datasets, software, novel assays and reagents, and research publications.
Good practicesTools
For: FundersResearch institutes
2021
CIRAD developed the ImpresS method to assess the environmental and societal impact its research.
Good practices
For: Funders
2014
The application process for EMBO Long-Term Fellowships emphasizes the most important outcomes and impact of the applicant’s work rather than where it is published and specifically states that journal impact factors should not be provided.
Good practices
For: Funders
2022
The fundamental activity of the ERC is to provide attractive, long-term funding to support Principal Investigators and their research teams to pursue ground-breaking, high-gain/high-risk research. The ERC puts particular emphasis on the frontiers of science and scholarship. In particular, it encourages proposals of a multi- or interdisciplinary nature which cross the boundaries between different fields…
Good practicesPosition papers
For: Funders
2017
Evaluation of Research Careers fully Acknowledging Open Science Practices, a report released by the European Commission in 2017, recognizes the emerging Open Science movement creates an opportunity to develop an evaluation system for hiring and promotion that is focused on the equal treatment of applicants.
Good practicesPosition papers
For: Professional societiesResearch institutes
2017
The Federation released a report in 2017 to support the ongoing conversation in Canada about the assessment of research impact in the Humanities and Social Sciences (HSS).
Good practices
For: Funders
2022
Strengthening equity in international research partnerships can help address the current power imbalances that characterize the global research ecosystem and improve the ethical integrity of research agendas and knowledge production. This document was jointly created by the UK Collaborative on Development Research (UKCDR) and ESSENCE on Health Research to provide practical advice and actionable steps…
Good practices
For: Research institutes
Ghent University published a vision statement for evaluating research based on eight principles agreed on by the University’s Board of Governors.
Good practices
For: Funders
The Health Research Board (HRB) has taken several actions since 2016 to implement DORA’s principles in its grant review process.
Good practices
For: Research institutes
In keeping with HHMI’s commitment to basic scientific discovery, the Institute employs outstanding researchers for renewable seven-year terms as HHMI Investigators.
Good practicesPosition papersTools
For: FundersResearch institutes
2016
The IDRC in Canada developed a tool called Research Quality Plus (RQ+) to assess applied and translational research.
Good practicesPolicies and guidance
For: Professional societiesResearch institutes
2018
The Linguistic Society of America (LSA) published a statement of recommendations concerning the appropriate means of assessment of varied research outputs. In the statement, the term “corpus” refers to the body of language documentation scholarship that is deposited in a language archive. The statement notes that “unlike traditional publications, documentation is not ordinarily peer-reviewed. Thus,…
Good practicesPolicies and guidance
For: Professional societiesResearch institutes
2021
The Linguistic Society of America (LSA) published a statement on their commitment to Open Scholarship and recommendations for the fair review of Open Scholarship in hiring, tenure, promotion, and awards. The statement defines Open Scholarship and outlines how LSA intends to apply principles of Open Scholarship: “The LSA encourages scholars, departments, and evaluation committees to…
Good practices
For: FundersJournals and publishersResearch institutes
2023
The Luxembourg National Research Fund (FNR) introduced a standardized narrative-style CV format in 2021 as a requirement for applicants to all of FNR’s funding schemes. This new format was introduced to streamline and simplify the evaluation process, broaden the types of contributions considered during review, and to align with DORA’s principles that research should be…
Good practicesPolicies and guidance
For: Funders
The ORFG released guidance for funders called, Incentivizing the sharing of research outputs through research assessment: a funder implementation blueprint.
Case studiesGood practicesPolicies and guidance
For: Research institutes
2023
In this booklet by the UK Collaborative on Development Research (UKCDR) 10 exemplary case studies submitted to Research Excellence Framework (REF2021) are discussed, highlighting international development research by the UK and its non-academic impacts. All 10 case studies are evaluated for how the research at each location was conducted and what the real-world impacts were…
Good practices
For: FundersResearch institutes
2022
Research Capacity Strengthening (RCS) is essential for developing people and institutions, fostering collaborations, and building supporting infrastructure that enables research actors to thrive. Through responsible funding and evaluation frameworks, inclusive and sustainable research capacity can be built. Recognizing this, in 2022 the UK Collaborative on Development Research (UKCDR) published a report that collates learnings from…
Good practices
For: FundersResearch institutes
2019
The Researcher Development Concordat is an agreement among organizations in the UK in support of career development of researchers. It outlines a set of principles and requirements aimed at fostering a sustainable research culture within UK research institutions. The Concordat is focussed on the rights and obligations of researchers who are primarily engaged in research…