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Advice on submitting a vital post-approval application section
Francesca Monaco works on EU research and innovation policy at the Centre for Industrial Studies in Milan, Italy, and has experience as a consultant in five different European policy areas. She is often called on to help grant applicants master the difference between communication and dissemination, and refine their approaches to both when working on Horizon Europe bids.
At a recent online workshop run by Europa Media Trainings, Monaco said many researchers find dissemination plans difficult, especially considering the short timeframes provided by project grants. She gave applicants and project leaders some advice on how to strategise their dissemination plans and work with, not against, the Horizon framework.
Defining dissemination
Monaco began by underlining the essential differences between dissemination and communication. Dissemination, she said, is focused on scientific information and therefore is more focused on results, in contrast to communication.
Although the focus is on scientific information, the audience for dissemination material is not purely composed of scientists. As guidance from the European Commission states, it will also be intended for “others that can learn from the results: authorities, industry, policymakers, civil society”.
For this, Monaco said, dissemination will include information about the outcomes, and on how this project is most likely to bring benefits, such as making a process cheaper and increasing productivity.
Dissemination needs to stay true to the direct research results and outcomes, Monaco stressed, and is closely linked to exploitation. It is, in the Commission’s words: “The use of results in developing, creating and marketing or improving a product or process, or in creating and providing a service in standardisation activities or shaping a policy.”
Communication, on the other hand, will tend to engage with more general advantages of the research for European citizens. “‘We’re going to live in a better city thanks to this research’—that is more [the realm of] communication,” Monaco said.
Why and how
There are several reasons why dissemination is important, Monaco said, ranging from furthering open science to promoting the uptake of the results by others and thus leaving a legacy. But perhaps the most compelling is that dissemination is a legal obligation of every Horizon Europe grant agreement.
When a project is funded through Horizon, grantees have a maximum of six months to submit a deliverable plan for dissemination and exploitation of research results, in addition to a plan for communication activities.
Even though they will be submitted after the grant has been awarded, dissemination, exploitation and communication plans must be robust, Monaco said: “You must show that you’ve done your research.”
The first step in building a dissemination plan is knowing which results you want to build upon the most, which then allows you to build a strategy for who to disseminate your research to, and how.
“So, firstly, think of what is going to be exploited at the end, and then you do a sort of reverse engineering, trying to understand exactly how to disseminate it to the right audience,” Monaco explained.
Defining the audience is a crucial step, she said. It should involve listing people from the scientific community and end users, but also financial actors and sections of the wider public. The question to ask is: who should learn about the specific research results and why?
Monaco advised all those drawing up dissemination plans to make use of the tools provided by the Commission itself, which include the Open Research Europe platform, the Horizon Dashboard, and the Horizon Results Dashboard. The results dashboard in particular is a useful resource for those who struggle to exploit their results within the first year of their projects.
Goal-setting
The dissemination proposal should also include key performance indicators, Monaco said, and these should be drawn up with the target audience in mind. “Again, there’s a certain amount of ‘working backwards’. From the target audience, you can discern the tools and channels for dissemination, such as conferences and journals,” Monaco said. “From there, you can set KPIs such as the number of press releases, publications, and deliverables, like the number of unique visitors to, or downloads from, your project website.”
All these numbers can easily be tracked for free through online monitoring tools, or, in the case of real-world events, simple sign-up sheets. “You do not necessarily need to be an expert in marketing” to use these tools, Monaco stressed, and they give access to useful qualitative and quantitative feedback.
Monaco’s concluding advice was not to be lured into overpromising—and then underdelivering—with KPIs. Keep expectations realistic so they are achievable and may even be exceeded, then let stakeholders request higher numbers if need be, she said.
This is an extract from an article in Research Professional’s Funding Insight service. To subscribe contact sales@researchresearch.com