Universities, as research institutions, are arguably uniquely placed to both access and use external evidence, especially meta-research (research on research) evidence to improve their own research cultures! They have access to lots of literature, resources, and hold advanced research skills among their staff, and they also understand how important it is for the research they produce to have impact e.g. to be used in policy making. Therefore it makes sense that they might draw on academic research in their own policy making.​However, a previous project – METEOR – has indicated that the use of this type of evidence to inform decision-making around research culture is not widely embedded in universities.

This is a mind-bending finding – there is an irony that universities are producing but not using evidence! But, to be clear, we’re not in the business of assigning blame to university decision-makers or to meta-researchers. We found there are some complex and structural reasons for this disconnect which we need to tackle together. As a continuation of the METEOR project, COMET aims to do just this.

The approach we’re taking with COMET is to break the work into two phases. The first phase consisted of research to understand decision-making processes in universities and how evidence is used and valued within these. We’re currently nearing the end of this phase – at the moment we’re writing up our findings. This was from November last year until now.

The second phase, which will take place over the next year until October 2026, will involve using what we have learnt from the research to inform the development of strategies and interventions to improve evidence-informed decision-making around research culture. To do this, we’ll be working with yourselves and other colleagues and stakeholders across the higher education sector to make sure that our work is aligned with sector priorities, and is meaningful and sustainable.