However, we see that a lot of great researchers are being motivated to leave research because the financial markets and large corporations can offer salaries 3-4x those available to people in universities, while working fewer hours. By allowing people to exploit some of their work for commercial gain, you offer an amount of freedom and potential economic gain that corporations cannot. And often, the university gets some of the money from the company that gets ploughed back into research. So the university gets some money, the researchers get some extra benefit from staying in the university system and are usually motivated by the university to share the results of their work in some sense - not the commercial secrets, perhaps, but the pure science behind what has been done. They then continue to produce results that can be shared with the public.
Everyone wins - the university gets more money, the researchers stay in science and produce more results and the public gets the benefit of having the most driven, creative people staying inside the university system producing public gain rather than private gain.
The citation/impact scoring system offers no motivation to do 'great' research, in my experience. Rather, it offers a lot of motivation to do the administrative work that gets your name on papers with little to no risk, rewarding networking skills and knowledge of the system over any great creative insight. In fact, I would say that this requirement to have citations and impact statements actively drives away the people who are most likely to do the research.
I don't think that universities should focus on commercial exploitation, that's for sure. It's not fair to private companies, it's not fair to students and it's not fair to taxpayers who fund the university system. But stereotyping anyone who is good at research as a selfless, socks-and-sandals proto-hippy shows a certain lack of familiarity with a large cross-section of researchers. And to say that the culture of research that we have right now is just fine? Wow. The way I see research right now, the science 'managers' get rewarded and long term research is put at risk by political meddling at the highest levels. Of course, we may come from completely different cultures.
Everyone wins - the university gets more money, the researchers stay in science and produce more results and the public gets the benefit of having the most driven, creative people staying inside the university system producing public gain rather than private gain.
The citation/impact scoring system offers no motivation to do 'great' research, in my experience. Rather, it offers a lot of motivation to do the administrative work that gets your name on papers with little to no risk, rewarding networking skills and knowledge of the system over any great creative insight. In fact, I would say that this requirement to have citations and impact statements actively drives away the people who are most likely to do the research.
I don't think that universities should focus on commercial exploitation, that's for sure. It's not fair to private companies, it's not fair to students and it's not fair to taxpayers who fund the university system. But stereotyping anyone who is good at research as a selfless, socks-and-sandals proto-hippy shows a certain lack of familiarity with a large cross-section of researchers. And to say that the culture of research that we have right now is just fine? Wow. The way I see research right now, the science 'managers' get rewarded and long term research is put at risk by political meddling at the highest levels. Of course, we may come from completely different cultures.