UKSG webinar: Getting the Rights Right - or When policies collide! with Bill Hubbard, CRC

Getting the Rights Right

- or, When Policies Collide!

Bill Hubbard

Director, Centre for Research Communications

University of Nottingham

UKSG Webinar

19th May 2015

Overview

• Open Access

• The policy environment

• Getting a clear perspective on policies

• Dealing with policy detail and clashes

• A strategic institutional response

• Strategy and tactics for getting action

Open Access

• Budapest Declaration

– “... the peer-reviewed journal literature and

completely free and unrestricted access to it

by all ...”

• Implications . . .

– CC-BY to CC-BY-NC-ND

– What re-use? Commercial? Cure for cancer?

– Text-mining - data-mining?

– Data?

What policies exist?

• Publisher policies

• Institutional policies

• Funder policies

• REF policies

– REF is principle mechanism for determining

research funding

• Government policy

– Finch Committee

Why have policies? - Open Access

• Without policies in favour, Open Access

adoption hovered at ~15%

• Overwhelming majority of researchers in

favour of OA concept

• Uptake throttled by set working habits,

esteem indicators, reward mechanisms

• Cultural change requires strong incentives

– Money, esteem

Why have policies?

• For control

• To support paths for development

• Understanding background and motivation

can be key for an effective response

• For the explicit motivations, ask the policy

bodies themselves: the following is my

own interpretation . . .

Why have policies? - Publishers

• Driven by perception of commercial need

• Faced with uncertainty, human reaction is

to freeze the status quo

• Controls environment while a sustainable

path is worked out

– depending on view, controls might read

restricts; sustainable might read profitable

• “Permissions” or “Restrictions”

Why have policies? - Government

• Strategic steer, given trends in access to

information, transparency

• Improved value and returns for public

investment

• Greater exposure of UK research leading

to investment

• Improved research environment

Why have policies? - REF

• Following lead from Government in

shaping future of research

communications

• Reducing administrative overhead in REF

– although it might not seem like it right now!

• Improves records and clarity in national

research picture

• Alignment with RCUK and others

Why have policies? - Funders

• Improved return on public investment

• More transparent use of public money

• Improved research environment where

more research is shared more widely and

more quickly

• Professional and ethical drivers

Why have policies? - Institutions

• Positions institution in line with information

trends on openness and re-use

• Greater exposure for institutional research

• Greater engagement with research users

and investors

• Improved admin, record keeping and

picture of institutional research

• Aligns with REF and Funder policies

What drives compliance?

• Professional ethics

• Social morality

• Fear of consequences

– personal

– institutional

• Can you prioritise by examining

compliance drivers for each policy - what

are the consequences?

Dealing with policies

• What should be tackled first?

• Achieving recognition of the need for

compliance in-house

• Efficient support structures and processes

• Who deals with compliance?

Authors cannot be left to sort it out for you

Researcher’s view from the past. . .

Researcher

Other Funder

Institution

Publisher

Funding

RCUK

Researcher’s view . . .

Researcher

Other Funder

Institution

Publisher

Institutional Repository

Funding

RCUK


Researcher

Other Funder

Institution

Publisher


Funding

Mandate

RCUK


Researcher

Other Funder

Institution

Publisher with OA Option

Open AccessPublisher

Central/subjectRepository


?

?

Funding

Mandate

RCUK


Researcher

Other Funder

Institution





?

?

Funding

Mandate

RCUK


Researcher

Other Funder

Institution





?

?

Funding

Mandate

RCUK


Researcher

Other Funder

Institution





?

?

Mandate

RCUK

Funding


Researcher

Other Funder

Institution





?

?

Mandate

RCUK

Funding


Researcher

Other Funder

Institution





?

?

Mandate

RCUK

Funding

Mandate


Researcher

Other Funder

Institution





?

?

Mandate

RCUK

Funding

Mandate

Institutional Database

Institutional OA Fund


Researcher

Other Funder

Institution





?

?

Mandate

RCUK

Funding

Mandate


REF



Researcher

Other Funder

Institution





?

?

Mandate

RCUK

Funding

Mandate


REF



Researcher

Other Funder

Institution





?

?

Mandate

RCUK

Funding

Mandate


REF



Researcher

Other Funder

Institution





?

?

Mandate

RCUK

Funding

Mandate


REF



Researcher

Other Funder

Institution





?

?

Mandate

RCUK

Funding

Mandate


Researcher’s view from the past. . .

Researcher

Other Funder

Institution

Publisher

Funding

RCUK

REF



Researcher

Other Funder

Institution





?

?

Mandate

RCUK

Funding

Mandate


REF

and soon, with added research data?!


Researcher

Other Funder

Institution





?

?

Mandate

RCUK

Funding

Mandate



Researcher

Other Funder

Institution





?

?

Mandate

RCUK

Funding

Mandate


Authors cannot be left to sort it out for you

Is there a key?

• Publishers need author compliance to

publish

• Publishers need institutional compliance or

could take legal action

• Institutions need compliance or, ummm ...

• RCUK wants ~ 60% compliance, rising

• REF needs 100% compliance in 101/2

months

Priorities and Precedence

• We tend to see the publisher policy as

being the source for rights in an article -

the thing that defines what else can be

complied with

– exemptions (REF)

– levels of compliance (RCUK)

– “where possible” get-outs (institutions)

• Why? This is back to front!

Research cycle

Is there a key? #2

• Publisher policies should respond to the

research agenda and not act in opposition!

• First decide what the institution needs to

comply with, within the research cycle

• Respond to the public investment you

have been entrusted with

• Then see if publisher policies comply with

your requirements

Is there a key? #3

• Deal with REF

• Deal with RCUK and others

– Ok for REF, ok for most funders (some

specific deposit venues and embargoes)

– lower levels of compliance required in 2016

• Deal with institutional policies

Is there a key? #4

• Does not take away publisher restrictions,

but puts them in context

• Now time to address publication choice

– previous advocacy avoided this

• HEFCE wants to see an institutional

process to inform academics of publication

choices with exemptions by exception

– not business as usual + exemptions

Open Access and the REF

To be eligible -

• Deposited at the point of acceptance

• Metadata immediately available

• Full-text available after 12 or 24 months

• Institutional process to handle exemptions

• Applies from April 2016

• In-house systems, processes, workflows:

ready in 101/2 months!

Institutional strategy

• Prepare for an OA future

• Comply with REF, RCUK and other funders

• Address academic issues of choice of

publication by opening debate

• Examine place of journal brands in rewards

• Ensure institutional policies in place and

reflect policies of REF and Funders

• Ensure support structures in place

Internal strategy for change

• Use the REF to gain traction for change

• Engage senior levels of management in

seeing the need for compliance

• Engage senior academics in asking for

support with REF process

• Use the REF coordinators to push for

coordination, who know what it is like

Summary

• Build institutional response around

prioritised policy compliance

• Open Access is the rule, with exceptions

• All institutional stakeholders on top of OA

– as an idea; as a process; as a work-flow; as

requirements; as developing policies

• Researchers need to know what to do -

– clear, concise, contextualised

There are issues - BUT !

• Open Access is a real benefit for

researchers, the research process,

institutions, funders, tax-payers, the public

and for our culture and our future

• Support and belief from all of the

stakeholders in the research process

• All of the issues can be resolved

Bill Hubbard

Director, Centre for Research Communications

University of Nottingham

[email protected]

sherpa.ac.uk/romeo

sherpa.ac.uk/juliet

sherpa.ac.uk/fact

sherpa.ac.uk/opendoar

UKSG webinar: Getting the Rights Right - or When policies collide! with Bill Hubbard, CRC

Education

research users

open accesswithout policies

compliance drivers

policy bodies

open access adoption

information trends

unrestricted access

status quocontrols environment