Daniel Spichtinger is a consultant on open science and EU research policy based in Vienna, Austria. From 2012 to 2018, he was a member of the unit working on open science in the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Research and Innovation.
In this Q&A, Daniel talks about his latest research on Data Management Plans (DMPs) and what we can do to improve their usage.
What inspired you to focus on DMPs and what is their significance?
Although I left the Commission in 2018, I remain very interested in the practical implementation of Data Management Plans (DMPs) in Horizon 2020 and also in the new Horizon Europe programme. The analysis of such DMPs can help to identify good practices but also common challenges for researchers.
DMP analysis is an important resource for a variety of other purposes, for instance training activities but also for further scientific research into data management and re-use practices. I was therefore very glad that I had the opportunity to undertake this study for the University of Vienna Library on behalf of the OpenAIRE-Advance project. In the study we conducted qualitative interviews as well as a quantitative survey with key personnel involved in DMPs.
Hopefully data management practices will further improve with Horizon Europe and eventually become part and parcel of good scientific practice! Your survey found that a significant proportion of people received no support in creating their DMP. What are your thoughts on this?
From the 108 people that filled in our survey, 39% indicated that they received support in creating their DMP from other project partners. But it is indeed worrying that the second largest group, 27%, reporting not receiving any support at all. In the qualitative interviews several people reported initially feeling a bit lost and having to do a significant amount of self-learning. The need for support for was also mentioned at the Open Science Session at the EU R&I Days (23-24 June 2021). I would therefore recommend setting up a “EU one-stop-shop for Horizon research data management”, akin to the already existing IP helpdesk for Horizon projects.
In the survey and the interviews several people also asked for a more tailor-made approach, since one DMP template may not fit all the different kinds of projects funded under Horizon. This could be done through a European Commission’s online system for creating data management plans (and not just a pdf template) or through the endorsement and further development of existing external tools.
Horizon Europe is not asking for a complete DMP when submitting a proposal but is stimulating researchers to think about it. DMPs created before projects get going can become outdated. Do you have any thoughts on the role of researchers in keeping DMPs up to date?
In Horizon 2020 and Horizon Europe, DMPs do not have to be created before the project but within six months after the project start. However, this still means that they can easily become a bit outdated, since it is often not possible to know what kind of research data will be created several years down the line. DMPs should therefore be treated as living documents, that is regularly updated, for instance in time for project reviews but at the very least when the final project reporting is being done. In our study we found that for some projects, such an organic development and updating of DMPs does indeed take place but in other projects DMPs are only marginally updated during the lifetime of the project.
You said you worked in the Commission before. In your new life, why did you choose to publish with Open Research Europe?
It was great to see Open Research Europe, an idea that was several years in the making, come to life this year. Since my research was part of the EU funded OpenAIRE project I was lucky to have the opportunity to publish in ORE. I particularly like the open peer review process. I also noticed that Open Research Europe is being mentioned as part of the European Research Area so I hope that the system can also be made available to national funders.
