Victoria Gamerman, Boehringer Ingelheim; John E. Kolassa, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey; Jim Z. Li, Viatris; Fanni Natanegara, Eli Lilly and Company; Kimberly F. Sellers, Georgetown University; Aniketh Talwai, Medidata; and Kelly H. Zou, Viatris
During the 2021 International Chinese Statistical Association (ICSA) Applied Statistics Symposium, several panelists discussed the key elements of forming and sustaining successful collaborations and partnerships, along with challenges and barriers. This is Part 2 of a two-part panel that includes six experts from either academia, industry or consulting, with Kelly Zou as the moderator. Read part one.
What are good practices for setting expectations and making plans before embarking on a collaborative relationship?
Kimberly Sellers advised that one of the best practices throughout a collaborative relationship is to offer clear communication and transparency. This includes open discussion about expectations at the beginning of the project and regular follow-up (both verbally and in writing) to ensure all parties are on the same page with regard to project status, issues or concerns, etc.
John Kolassa elaborated, saying that in reference to ‘challenges,’ we may find unexpected barriers arise during joint projects and we sometimes pay a price for having projects not live up to our initial expectations. We need to be flexible and willing to overlook each other’s failings if we are to make human relationships, including research relationships, work. It’s also important to understand and predict how much flexibility is in our schedules and to not over-promise.
To collaborate, Jim Li suggested beginning with the end in mind after discussing what to do (e.g., a research project) and resource needs (e.g., personnel and budget). The collaborators need to discuss how to carry out the collaboration, including the following:
- What are the deliverables (e.g., reports and publications)?
- How to share the resources (e.g., budget), fruit (e.g., authorship)?
- What governance structure (e.g., steering committee, technical review committee, multiple workgroups) and standards/processes (e.g., guidelines, standard operation procedures, forms, templates) to use?
- How to make decisions, and who makes them, during the planning, implementation, and assessment of the collaboration?
- How to navigate through challenges and barriers (e.g., the role, effort, and urgency of statisticians) via multidisciplinary collaborations?
Fanni Natanegara offered best practices for navigating through challenges and barriers in multidisciplinary collaborations. For the partnership to be successful, each member needs to understand their role and contribution and be accountable for delivering their tasks.
Secondly, it is important to build the right infrastructure and process for the collaboration to sustain over time. This could include understanding and agreeing to the what and why by setting up mission and vision statements, a charter document, or simply an objective statement saying the collaborators will work toward a common goal.
The how includes laying out the steps the team will follow. This could include setting up regular meetings and conference calls, agreeing on a metric to measure success, and making incremental progress toward the common goal.
Finally, Natanegara said she could not overemphasize the importance of communication so everyone is updated on the progress of the project and aware of any new information or ideas that may affect the work. All these points are important to get the project work done efficiently and seamlessly.
Kolassa reflected on cross-institutional collaborations. To him, some of the barriers are process-related but compliance-necessary (e.g., human subjects’ approval; multiple institutions often imply multiple human subjects review committees). Bureaucratic steps that arise from the involvement of multiple sectors appear to be a nuisance, but he said comprehensive checks protect us against important ethical dangers.
Li referred to project management tools and tasks. He has come to appreciate the contribution of a dedicated person for project oversight, because it is critical that someone takes responsibility for keeping the project on schedule.
How to ensure voices and opinions from a diverse community are heard during collaborative relationships?
When considering the possible contributions different collaborators can make, Victoria Gamerman stressed the importance of discussing beyond the qualifications and desired outcomes, though this is a good foundation and a must. It is also important to share the journey along the way so collaborators can actively learn from each other and leverage the strengths of their partners. Some may bring a new data source, a different analytic approach, or a stakeholder perspective, all of which should add value to the overarching goals of the collaboration. Further, it is important to identify sponsors who can be echo chambers and advocates for the collaboration and individuals within it doing the everyday work to make it successful.
Sharing successes and pitfalls throughout the collaborative process is an important step for statisticians and data scientists, so those with a different background can take part in data wrangling and insight generation. To an untrained eye, what statisticians and data scientists do may be simple but we, within this community, know what is under the hood better than others. This gives us the important opportunity and responsibility to contribute to the education of our partners or collaborators by sharing the steps along the way (perhaps summarized), using the data to tell a story of both the end result and intermediate processes.
Sellers suggested collaborators seek out representation from diverse communities and invite those with differing backgrounds and perspectives into the collaborative relationship. It is easy to gather people with similar mindsets and backgrounds because one may perceive this would lend itself to a smooth experience. Such an approach, however, can be problematic because even the most innocent operations can produce adverse effects or have unforeseen/unintended consequences. Thus, it is helpful to gain heterogeneous feedback and insight throughout the collaboration.
Furthermore, Natanegara stressed the importance of finding an ally to make sure your voice is heard in meetings in which key decisions are made. An ally will be able to support your voice or bring you and your ideas to the discussion table. To build an alliance, you could set up one-to-one meetings with key stakeholders to share ideas prior to the team meeting. Based on these one-off meetings, you can refine your ideas and be prepared to bring them to the meeting.
The reverse is true if you are in a senior or leadership position. Be that ally to your junior or newer colleagues. If you see someone struggling to get their opinion heard in a meeting, then be the voice for that person and confirm what they are trying to convey so the rest of the group can hear and understand.
What are the top one or two skills you would suggest for making collaborations and partnerships fruitful?
Aniketh Talwai has found it helpful to think of partners/collaborators as the participating people, not just their respective organizations (e.g., universities, companies, etc.), Identify and proactively enlist the support of your counterparts in partner organizations who have both the ability to and interest in championing and driving the project internally.
Second, while good communication skills help drive the success of nearly every project, those who are managing partnerships and collaborations will likely benefit from being particularly diligent in tailoring communication styles to different audiences.
Kolassa commented that it is interesting to explore the role of ‘service’ in the sciences. Many of us might see ourselves as providing a service but, in many ways, people performing experiments and providing project leadership are also providing a service. It’s also important to primarily engage in projects we see as valuable; it’s particularly important for junior faculty to have the flexibility to avoid taking projects only to fill a support quota.
Finally, Li reemphasized that communication skills are crucial for a collaboration or partnership to be successful. Overall, both technical and soft skills are important to being effective collaborators in a fruitful data science or statistical partnership.
Editor’s Note: The views expressed are the authors’ and do not necessarily represent those of their employers.
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