You have a story to tell about your research. A question I am often posed by researchers is “how do I best tell my research story?”
And my answer? “What do you want to say, why, and who to? Let’s go from there”.
Your research plan, including your goals, is a good place to start in considering the questions I consider. Using your plan, you should then be able answer these more specific considerations:
- What do you want to say?
- Who do you want to tell?
- Why do you want to communicate with these particular people?
- When do you want to tell it? Is there a deadline?
- How did you do it, or how do you want them to do it?
- Where is the story located?
- Importantly, why should these particular people be interested in your story?
These considerations tell the ‘who-how-what-why-when-where-and-so-what’ of your story.
Expanding on these answers will help both develop your story and help plan the communication of your story, particularly locations, the types of communication to use, and the deadlines for production and release.
These answers will also help communication professionals such as media officers, writers and videographers that you might call on to ‘polish’ your story.
When you have answered these questions (and agreed on the answers if you are working in a team or in an organisation), you can then think about the most appropriate medium or mix of media for this story.
To help you develop a better research story, contact The Comms Doctor® via email contact@thecommsdoctor.com.au or visit the Comms Doctor® website.