Sadly this will be OTalk last every chat, please join us for one last twitter chat. Don’t forget the hashtag!
Hosts: Dr. Gill Ward, Head of Research and Innovation, Royal College of Occupational Therapists
Dr. Elizabeth Taylor, Research and Development Manager, Royal College of Occupational Therapists
OTalk support: Nikki Daniels
Title: Developing a research community network for occupational therapists.
We’ve enjoyed a fabulous seven years of bringing members of the occupational therapy community together to connect around topics related to research. But sadly, this will be our last #OTalk Research. In this final chat, @DrGillianWard and @ElizaTay1 will help us to reflect on how networks have supported us to develop our research confidence and capability and to think about how RCOT Research Connect could offer us a space to continue to connect.
Background
RCOT Research Connect is a UK-wide virtual occupational therapy research networking space for RCOT members, hosted on a closed LinkedIn group.
The purpose of the RCOT Research Connect is to support the development of a research community for networking, mentoring, information sharing and to advance research capability and capacity in the occupational therapy profession across the UK. It aims to enable occupational therapists to support each other to develop and use the research evidence base to the improve services we offer to the individuals, groups and communities we work with.
Network members are free to post content relevant to research, this could include:
- a research-related question to start a discussion on the group
- signposting members to a research resource
- a link to a funding opportunity, research studentship, or study participation
- a research paper or piece of work.
Any RCOT member is welcome to join the network. We strive to create an inclusive community where everyone feels encouraged to get involved with research. We have 52 occupational therapy research champions at all levels of practice, across all four UK nations who have volunteered to give regular time to support the network.
We are running a 6-month pilot started in April and plan to evaluate the network and it’s use in October.
Even if you’re not a member of RCOT Research Connect at the moment (but we do hope you’ll join us), we’d really love to hear all of the creative ideas that you can come up with as we move into the evaluation phase of the RCOT Research Connect pilot.
The questions forming the basis of our #OTalk discussion are:
- Can you share with us your experiences of being part of a network or community that has supported you to develop your research confidence and capability?
- What would be the advantages of joining the RCOT Research Connect Network for you personally?
- What would encourage you and your peers to join our network?
- Many people join networks, but how can we encourage active contribution and participation?
- Finally, how do you think we can we best support the aim of the network; “to support the development of a research community for networking, mentoring, information sharing and to advance research capability and capacity in the occupational therapy?”.
If you’re not a member and you’d like to join Research Connect before the OTalk, first set up a LinkedIn account if you don’t already have one, and then follow this link to join the closed group.
Click ‘Join’ and your request will be sent for approval. As the network is a member benefit, we’ll need to check your RCOT membership number before you can join the group. This might take a day or two, but we’ll do our best to approve this as soon as we can.
Thank you, we look forward to chatting with you.
OTalk 