Translating Research for Practitioners
Most researchers operate under some variety of mandate to disseminate findings. But formatting research results so that practitioners will find them readable (or listenable) is far from an automatic result. Something more is needed. We looked into various kinds of "translation service," as well as other ways of making the search for new ideas and broader perspectives more time-efficient for practitioners. Our conclusions from several years' experiments were published in The Conflict Resolution Practitioner. This monograph was published in spring, 2001 by the Office of Dispute Resolution, Supreme Court of Georgia, in conjunction with the Consortium on Negotiation and Conflict Resolution, a joint center of Georgia State University and Georgia Institute of Technology. It features a theme-setting article by Christopher Honeyman, Bobbi McAdoo and Nancy Welsh, as well as an article by Jeffrey M. Senger and Christopher Honeyman describing what it takes to introduce important theories to skeptical practitioner audiences -- in this case, assistant U.S. Attorneys.
But as this page is about a method of working, it's worth noting here that the above monograph was the product of a variety of experiments. These included
This activity added up to a large percentage of the overall work of Theory to Practice. Many of the specific publications have since been superseded, however, so only the key ones are included in these pages.
Most researchers operate under some variety of mandate to disseminate findings. But formatting research results so that practitioners will find them readable (or listenable) is far from an automatic result. Something more is needed. We looked into various kinds of "translation service," as well as other ways of making the search for new ideas and broader perspectives more time-efficient for practitioners. Our conclusions from several years' experiments were published in The Conflict Resolution Practitioner. This monograph was published in spring, 2001 by the Office of Dispute Resolution, Supreme Court of Georgia, in conjunction with the Consortium on Negotiation and Conflict Resolution, a joint center of Georgia State University and Georgia Institute of Technology. It features a theme-setting article by Christopher Honeyman, Bobbi McAdoo and Nancy Welsh, as well as an article by Jeffrey M. Senger and Christopher Honeyman describing what it takes to introduce important theories to skeptical practitioner audiences -- in this case, assistant U.S. Attorneys.
But as this page is about a method of working, it's worth noting here that the above monograph was the product of a variety of experiments. These included
- developing a set of research FAQ's;
- having scholars who were particularly good at explaining their findings in "civilian" terms write examples;
- having practitioners try their hands at explaining research (accompanied by a review of the result, by the original researcher);
- mounting a student competition for the best research translation, and last but not least,
- fostering a full-scale academic unit devoted to developing the interface between dispute resolution / law and journalism. Initial discussions with three of the U.S's leading journalism schools led to a focus on one, at the University of Missouri, which also harbored one of the leading law-school-based ADR programs. The final result, after great deal of work by faculty in both schools, was the creation of a joint program which continues to this day. Among its offerings are four different graduate joint degree programs.
This activity added up to a large percentage of the overall work of Theory to Practice. Many of the specific publications have since been superseded, however, so only the key ones are included in these pages.