Encouraging innovation in research data management: The Green Shoots initiative at Imperial College London

Abstract

Academics consume and create data in ever-increasing quantities. Petabytescale data are no longer unusual on a project level, and even more common when looking at the outputs of whole research institutions. Despite the large amounts of data being produced, data curation is relatively less well developed. In 2014, Imperial College London ran a research data management (RDM) pilot. Designed as a bottom-up, academically driven initiative, six ‘Green Shoots’ projects were funded to identify and generate exemplars of best practice in RDM. The Green Shoots projects form part of a wider programme designed to help the college develop a suitable RDM infrastructure and to embed best practice across the university. This paper sets out the context for the initiative, describes the development of the pilot, summarises the individual projects and discusses lessons learned.