SESAM supported working meeting in Amsterdam

April 6th-8th 2009

Report

SESAM supported working meeting - From idea to paper: Let's talk about research!

Amsterdam, April 6-8, 2009

Faculty:

Tanja Manser, ETH Zurich

Peter Dieckmann, DIMS Copenhagen

Local organizer:
Ralf Krage, VU Amsterdam

Participants

16 participants from 5 countries subscribed to this SESAM supported working meeting. It was very fruitful that participants had a broad range of professional backgrounds and of research experience. Participants could thus bring many different perspectives to the discussion and could reflect on their own questions in the light of the questions of others.

Protocol of the actual conduction of the event

This SESAM supported working meeting followed an educational format. The basic idea was to 'simulate' a research process during the two-day workshop to allow for participants to think through the various stages of a research process for a study they are planning to conduct. Thus, the input from the faculty in the beginning of the day was kept rather general and group works focused on participants' own research ideas. The main focus of the work was to more clearly define research questions and match possible methods and research designs to be able to answer the research questions.

Course evaluation

By the time the workshop was carried out, the standard set of evaluation questions to be filled in by the working meeting participants (including open comments) was not available from SESAM. Instead, we conducted a course evaluation by asking participants to write down comments concerning three simple questions:

-          I liked especially

-          I did not like

-          The workshop could be improved by

The results of this evaluation are attached to this report (scanned feedback forms).

Lessons learned

Workshop format:

In general, the format of the workshop was successful and allowed for active involvement of participants, clarifiying research questions and matching methods and for networking among participants. It was seen as important that the faculty participated actively in the small group discussions and provide input from their own experience.

Workshop content:

In planning the workshop we had focused too much on quantitative studies, being already planned in some detail. In future working meetings, issues specific to qualitative research should be addressed more as well as the different planning phases in which participants might be currently

Workshop organization:

It was very good to hold the course at a location outside the hospital. Otherwise it would have been even more difficult for local participants to stay at the course the whole time. For future meetings of this kind, it needs to be clarified how to deal with last minute cancellations that have a considerable impact on the budget. Participants also liked the social programme very much as it supported the networking aspect of this workshop.

Workload:

Working meetings with an educational format cause considerable workload to the faculty who volunteered to run this course. The fact that this is voluntary work should be made transparent to course participants to keep expectations at a realistic level.