Scholarly Impact

10 Principles

In 2015, the Leiden Manifesto codified ten principles to inform best practices for the responsible use of research metrics:

1. Quantitative evaluation should support qualitative, expert assessment. 
2. Measure performance against the research missions of the institution, group or researcher. 
3. Protect excellence in locally relevant research. 
4. Keep data collection and analytical processes open, transparent and simple. 
5. Allow those evaluated to verify data and analysis. 
6. Account for variation by field in publication and citation practices. 
7. Base assessment of individual researchers on a qualitative judgement of their portfolio. 
8. Avoid misplaced concreteness and false precision. 
9. Recognize the systemic effects of assessment and indicators. 
10. Scrutinize indicators regularly and update them. 

Source: Hicks, D., Wouters, P., Waltman, L. et al. Bibliometrics: The Leiden Manifesto for research metrics. Nature 520, 429–431 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1038/520429a

Additional Reading

Training Modules

• The Responsible Use of Research Metrics (RURM) module is a self-paced open educational resource that explores the principles and best practices for applying research metrics fairly and transparently, recognizing that no single metric tells the whole story. The module was co-designed by the research communities in a consortium of project partners across Ireland, and it has been evaluated for content and usability by researchers. It is intended to be used by researchers and evaluators, as well as those involved in recruitment, research assessment, promotion decisions and anyone contributing to the broader research ecosystem.
• Elsevier's Research Academy includes a series of modules, that walks users through some of the key players in metrics.