Workshops

Research Data Conversations is part of a new series of My Research Essentials and Data Stewardship Community events exploring themes within research data and data stewardship.

The sessions will have a collaborative and conversational format and explore themes that promote open and FAIR data practices, and the promotion and development of new and emerging ideas in research data management.

Research data management and data stewardship is an area of growing professionalism and potential for academic-related career paths. These events would be suitable for anyone interested in exploring ideas in the field, connecting with data professionals at different stages of their careers and across different disciplines, and joining a community that feeds into the development of research systems and data stewardship at the University of Manchester.

Our second conversation will be led by Dr James Bird, Technical Specialist (Research IT, University of Manchester). James will share his experience of opening up his PhD research, how the use of an electronic research notebook (ERN) enabled that, and the ongoing project within The Research Lifecycle Programme which aims to centrally implement ERNs at the University.

Date: Wednesday, 12 February

Time: 12pm-2pm. These events are catered from 1pm, giving attendees the opportunity to continue the conversation and make connections over lunch.

12-1pm: Presentation and discussion.

1-2pm: Optional lunch and further conversations.

Venue: University Place: 6.206

Led by: Dr James Bird, Technical Specialist (Research IT, University of Manchester).

This hands-on session will introduce you to EndNote desktop reference management software, a tool to help with collecting, managing and organising your references and creating citations and bibliographies in different formats. You will reflect throughout on how reference management software can fit into your existing research workflows.

In the session you will gain practical experience of managing an EndNote Library including using the Cite While You Write function to insert and format in-text citations and bibliographies within Microsoft Word documents, and an introduction to using EndNote with Overleaf.

How to book on

Due to popularity, booking onto the event is essential to ensure a place.

Further support

Talk to us online via Library Chat now, or send us an email: tls@manchester-uk.libanswers.com.

In this workshop you will explore three of the most common challenges identified by PhD candidates: managing your relationship with your supervisor; time management and procrastination; and dealing with setbacks during research.

You will explore the context around these issues and how they affect the research process, before working with other postgraduate researchers to help develop the necessary skills and approaches for dealing with them.

Finally, you will be introduced to established models and strategies for working effectively with your supervisory team, beating the procrastination cycle and maintaining resilience in the face of setbacks.

Further support

Can't make this session? Talk to us online via Library Chat now, or send us an email: tls@manchester-uk.libanswers.com.

Ensuring connections between you and your research, ORCIDs are being adopted across all elements of the research community (ie. universities, publishers, funders) as the universal method for uniquely identifying researchers.

They are free to create and link researchers to their research activities.

At this session you can:

• Learn more about the benefits of ORCIDs
• Find out how to create your own ORCID
• Discover how to easily manage your ORCID account

This session will take place on the online video conferencing app Zoom. Booking onto the session is essential in order to receive the link to join.

All University of Manchester students and staff should register at Zoom.us using their University of Manchester email address, only authenticated users can join this event. Help and support with using Zoom is provided by Media Services. Updates are posted to the Media Services website, and you can contact the team by emailing mediaservices@manchester.ac.uk.

Further support

Talk to us online via the 24-hour Library Chat service. Alternatively, you can email us for advice or to book one-to-one appointments at uml.teachingandlearning@manchester.ac.uk.

Find out more about the workshops and online resources offered by My Research Essentials on the library webpage. Online resources related to this workshop include:

• 7 steps to maximise the profile of your next paper

Shut Up and Write is an event for researchers to come together for a fixed amount of time and write. The aim is not to put pressure on you to be productive, rather, to help you carve out some dedicated time to write and to present a chance to connect with other researchers. It is a great way make progress on those thesis chapters, journal articles, or grant applications.

Whilst two hours doesn't sound like much, it is amazing what you can get done if you really focus. There will be short, scheduled breaks in between writing sessions of 30 minutes, to help keep you motivated and on-task. During the breaks there will also be time to reflect on some of the challenges we are facing as a research community and how we might support one another.

Booking on

Due to popularity, booking onto the event is essential to ensure a place.

Further support

Talk to us online via the 24-hour Library Chat service. Alternatively, you can email us for advice or to book one-to-one appointments at tls@manchester-uk.libanswers.com.

Find out more about the workshops and online resources offered by My Research Essentials on the library webpage. Online resources related to this workshop include:

• Start to finish: writing
• Start to finish: dissertations
• My Research Essentials Medium: writing strategies
• My Learning Essentials: writing online resources

Researchers collect, receive and manage research data in many forms. Managing your data can be complex, but a little planning at the beginning can save you time, raise your research profile and help you work more effectively. This session aims to provide you with confidence in data and information management and introduce you to resources and services to help with Research Data Management.

How to book on

This event will take place on the online video conferencing app Zoom.us. Booking onto the event is essential to receive the link and passcode to join.

Further support

Talk to us online via the 24-hour Library Chat service. Alternatively, you can email us for advice or to book one-to-one appointments at uml.teachingandlearning@manchester.ac.uk.

Find out more about the workshops and online resources offered by My Research Essentials on the library webpage. Online resources related to this workshop include:

• Research data management
• Research data explained

Zoom guidance and support

All University of Manchester students and staff should register at Zoom.us using their University of Manchester email address, only authenticated users can join this event. Help and support with using Zoom is provided by Media Services. Updates are posted to the Media Services website, and you can contact the team by emailing mediaservices@manchester.ac.uk.

Sharing research data has numerous benefits including facilitating new collaborations and allowing new research questions to be answered. Data sharing is also mandated by many research, funders and publishers. This session aims to provide you with confidence in sharing your data and introducing you to using our institutional research repository, Figshare, to make data discoverable and increase research impact.

How to book on

This event will take place on the online video conferencing app Zoom.us. Booking onto the event is essential to receive the link and passcode to join.

Further support

Can't make this session? Talk to us online via Library Chat now, or send us an email: uml.teachingandlearning@manchester.ac.uk.

Zoom guidance and support

All University of Manchester students and staff should register at Zoom.us using their University of Manchester email address, only authenticated users can join this event. Help and support with using Zoom is provided by Media Services. Updates are posted to the Media Services website, and you can contact the team by emailing mediaservices@manchester.ac.uk.

Shut Up and Write is an event for researchers to come together for a fixed amount of time and write. The aim is not to put pressure on you to be productive, rather, to help you carve out some dedicated time to write and to present a chance to connect with other researchers. It is a great way make progress on those thesis chapters, journal articles, or grant applications.

Whilst two hours doesn't sound like much, it is amazing what you can get done if you really focus. There will be short, scheduled breaks in between writing sessions of 30 minutes, to help keep you motivated and on-task. During the breaks there will also be time to reflect on some of the challenges we are facing as a research community and how we might support one another.

How to book on

This event will take place on the online video conferencing app Zoom.us. Booking onto the event is essential to receive the link and passcode to join.

Find out more about the workshops and online resources offered by My Research Essentials on the library webpage. Online resources related to this workshop include:

• Start to finish: writing
• Start to finish: dissertations
• My Research Essentials Medium: writing strategies
• My Learning Essentials: writing online resources

The aim of this one-day writing retreat is to provide a quiet space where staff and researchers can make progress with their writing. It is a great way to carve out dedicated time to get on with those journal articles, thesis chapters, HEA Fellowships or grant applications.

The majority of the day will be spent in concentrated writing sessions where there should be no talking, no internet, no research - just writing! There will be short, scheduled breaks (with free tea, coffee and snacks) in between these blocks of concentrated writing time, to help keep you motivated and on-task.

Don't forget your laptop!

Programme for the day:

9.00-9.20 Tea, coffee and registration

9.20-9.50 Set your writing goals for the day, and learn some useful writing strategies

9.50-12.00 Concentrated writing time

12.00-13.00 Lunch and optional wellbeing activity

13.00-13.10 Reflect on your progress so far, re-evaluate your goals

13.10-15.20 Concentrated writing time

15.20-15.35 Coffee break

15.35-16.50 Concentrated writing time

16.50-17.00 Reflection

Join us for an introduction to protocols.io and learn how it can be used to simplify protocol management, streamline collaboration, tie in with research article publication, and give you credit for your methods through citable DOIs. The University of Manchester has a Premium license for protocols.io, an open-access platform designed to help you develop, optimize and share reproducible research methods, enhancing the credibility, discoverability and reliability of your research. Whether you're documenting methods, troubleshooting with colleagues, or sharing with the scientific community, protocols.io makes it simple and efficient.

Learn how to access and make the most of your premium account to streamline your workflows and increase the impact of your research. This session will guide you through creating and publishing protocols and creating workspaces for collaboration, we will cover:

1. The University of Manchester premium account: How to sign up or upgrade to access premium features

2. Discover public protocols and share your own with colleagues or the community.

3. Join or create workspaces to collaborate easily.

4. Import existing protocols, create new ones, share, and publish them to enhance visibility.

5. Monitor the impact of published protocols and endorse others protocols to foster research reproducibility.

This webinar explores a variety of use cases highlighting how OSF can support your Open Research practices at the University of Manchester and solve common problems many researchers face throughout the research lifecycle, while also providing a guided tour through key workflows and features. The OSF tool improves research collaboration by enabling effective sharing of the research process. It facilitates open, reproducible research pipelines from preregistration through to data collection and analysis. OSF serves as a centralised project platform seamlessly integrating with existing workflows and external storage systems.

Overton provides access to over 14 million full text policy documents and grey literature from 32,000 organisations in 190 countries. This session would benefit anyone looking for policy documents, guidelines, think tank publications and working papers to use in their own research or to understand and evidence their researches' influence in the policy landscape.

In this interactive workshop you will reflect upon and discuss ways to improve your public speaking skills, helping you to present your work more effectively. Using some improvisation techniques we will look at ways we can become more relaxed about public speaking, and practice responding to unexpected questions with confidence, which will support you when at academic conferences or presenting your research to peers. We will provide you with practical exercises to help you build confidence in communicating with a variety of audiences.

Researchers collect, receive, and manage data in many ways. Making sure this data is well-managed and reusable can be complex, but the FAIR Principles are here to help. The concepts underlying the FAIR principles are grounded in good scientific practice and aim to guide people to maximise the Findability, Accessibility, Interoperability, and Reuse of digital assets. Making your data FAIR can help you work more effectively, raise your research profile, and engage with open research initiatives.

This workshop is for people in academia with little or no experience of FAIR. This course aims to be succinct in introducing FAIR, its concepts and terminology, and supplements all material with introducing and signposting to useful FAIR resources.

Participant information

This session will take place on Teams. We will send you the Teams link for the workshop a day before the workshop is to take place, booking onto this workshop is essential.

Please note: This event is bookable by all staff and PGRs, simply follow the 'Book on this event' button below to register.