Knowledge Broker Stories: How to go from broke to broker in 17 short years

I first told my story (at least my story to date) in a presentation for KMbW in February 2009. I graduated with my PhD in 1991 coming off a Medical Research Council doctoral scholarship at $15,000 per year (I have no idea how I managed to buy the beer I did – probably thanks to Mom). I identified and isolated a protein derived from insect blood that killed bacteria and (presumably) helped the bugs get better after they get a bacterial infection.

Meandered through a post-doctoral fellowship working in HIV/AIDS, and finally left the lab to join technology transfer, where I was brokering relationships between university researchers and industry around intellectual property (kind of but not quite like knowledge mobilization.

Continuing in this line of business, I worked at the Canadian Arthritis Network, and Canadian Institutes of Health Research increasingly engaged in brokering relationships in and around academic research. I landed at York University as Director of the Office of Research Services (now Research Services & Knowledge Exchange) running the grants and contracts for the university which included a small but active technology transfer operation.

It was at York that we implemented knowledge mobilization as a service to faculty. We conceived it first as non-monetary technology transfer for the social sciences and humanities but quickly realized that the unilateral “university push” of technology transfer was only part of the knowledge mobilization story. We developed methods of “user pull”, knowledge exchange and - what I feel is most important - the co-production of knowledge between researchers and decision makers. These activities are all built upon the knowledge broker who is the heart of the knowledge mobilization unit.

I’ve worked with many knowledge brokers and still don’t know one when I see one. I’m an immunologist – does that make me a good broker? I’ve seen nurses, epidemiologists, librarians, psychologists, literacy practitioners, physicists, evaluators, journalists, poets, political scientists, social workers and anthropologists acting as knowledge brokers. I’ve even seen a flight attendant (formerly trained as a priest) learn the principles of knowledge mobilization. What links all these knowledge brokers?

Maybe we’re all wired for empathy – seeing both sides of a question or a situation. Maybe we’re all just smart enough to learn to talk less and listen more.

We stand between two worlds: the world of research and action; the world of science and politics. We become boundary objects spanning boundaries and mediating relationships that enable research and knowledge to matter.

Some might accuse us of multiple personalities, but that’s a different interpretation!

We have some theory to back up our practice and we have a growing number of tools as our different knowledge broker practices link up in networks like the KTE Community of Practice or ResearchImpact - which now welcomes knowledge brokers from Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador, Université du Québec à Montréal, University of Saskatchewan and University of Victoria. I travel across Canada presenting our work. We have begun to publish and are active in social media with an active blog and a twitter feed and videos posted on our website. We are part of a profession beginning to grow.

What have I learned on this journey from “broke to broker”?

[1] What we’re doing isn’t new, but we have refined and networked a practice that has happened ad hoc and haphazardly

[2] There are lots of us, but we are isolated in our own disciplines – we need some transdisciplinary space so that brokers in environmental policy can speak to those working in health services, education, immigration & settlement…

[3] Many different paths can lead to practice, but a little study along the way doesn’t hurt

[4] Be open to new people, new ideas and new ways of knowing and doing. You can’t own or control it – share your slice of the knowledge mobilization pie.

Visit David and ResearchImpact at:

dphipps@yorku.ca
www.researchimpact.ca
www.researchimpact.wordpress.com
www.twitter.com/researchimpact

To cite:

MLA format
Phipps, David, "Knowledge broker stories: How to go from broke to broker in 17 short years." Weblog Entry. Knowledge Mobilization Works Blog. Posted October 24, 2009. Accessed (enter date). http://bit.ly/1VQpLs

APA format
Phipps, D. Knowledge broker stories: How to go from broke to broker in 17 short years. Retrieved (enter date) from http://www.knowledgemobilization.net [http://bit.ly/1VQpLs]

If you would like to contribute a story to the Knowledge Broker Series, please contact Peter Levesque