How can team science be better evaluated?

Research evaluation has traditionally focused on the assessment of outputs, such as publications, as well as the social and economic impact that may result from the activities of researchers. This evaluation ensures accountability for funders and researchers, but it typically does not directly examine the research processes that lead to valued outcomes and so does not address the difficulties of evaluating ‘team science’.

This project explores how collaborative research processes can be evaluated, in order to better support team science. We will bring together researchers, research administrators and funders to co-develop an evaluation approach that includes measures of diversity for team composition and interaction. We will use workshops and interviews to establish key dimensions for evaluation so as to develop and apply a novel evaluation method to a series of case studies of team-based research projects.

The project will also yield insights into the progress of team science.