How are societies using social media?Social media has given us all new ways to have conversations and share knowledge. For societies and associations, social media has become one of the ways they communicate with their members as well as a way to easily extend communication reach to thousands of people outside their memberships. Importantly, social media enables conversations and members can respond…

Making math and science first class citizens on the web"Without mathematics, there’s nothing you can do. Everything around you is mathematics."  Shakuntala Devi It has always surprised me a little that the web - created at CERN by a trained physicist turned computer scientist - was born without much consideration for math and science. Of course, it isn’t all that surprising since the original…

What you need to know to build an eLearning solution, part 2: requirements mappingIn the first part of this three post series, we recommended some strategies for you to start planning how to go about developing your eLearning platform solution. Today, we will look at how to start mapping out your requirements for your platform. Building piece by piece Consider the various components that make up an eLearning…

Article introductions: more important than you thought!Journal editors and reviewers are looking for novelty, significance and relevance to their readers when they read your submitted article. Your abstract can make claims about these features, but does not provide space for the evidence to back them up. The introduction is the place for that. Guidelines for selecting, ordering and presenting that evidence…

Why has the scholarly journal endured?As you may already know, today marks the 350th anniversary of the first publication of a scholarly journal.  That journal was Philosophical Transactions, edited by Henry Oldenburg, and published then, as now, by the Royal Society.  The motto for the Royal Society is "Nullius in verba" (i.e. Take nobody’s word for it), which seems like a good…

Crowdfunding science: what are the options and opportunities?As belts tighten on federal and foundation funding for research in the US and elsewhere, scientists are increasingly looking to Internet-based crowdfunding to financially support their research. In a webinar hosted by AAAS in February 2013, Dr. Ethan Perlstein described how he was able to raise $25,000 for his research on lysosomal storage diseases. Obviously…

What you need to know to build an eLearning solution part 3: taking stock of your optionsIn part one, we recommended some strategies for you to get you started on developing your eLearning platform solution. And, in part two, we looked at how to begin a requirements mapping exercise. Today, in our final installment in this series, we recommend some strategies to adopt and questions to consider when talking to potential…

How, when and why to say no to a review requestIn his recent post on the editor’s view of peer review best practice, Brian Johnson highlighted the importance of prompt responses to review invitations - particularly if the reviewer is not able to undertake the review.  In today’s post, Andrew Moore, Editor-in-Chief of BioEssays and Inside the Cell explores the decision to decline a review…

Five hot topics from our Copenhagen Executive Seminar 2015This past January, Wiley hosted an Executive Seminar in Copenhagen where society and association representatives met for discussions and presentations on the future of publishing. The theme of the seminar was ‘The Next Big Thing’ and attendees joined us from across Europe representing the health, life and social sciences. With this diverse group of attendees, it…

Speeding up science through peer review: a Q&A with Andrew Preston of PublonsYesterday Wiley announced a new pilot program with Publons, a new peer review information tool which produces comprehensive reviewer profiles with publisher-verified peer reviews, allowing reviewers to get credit for their reviews.  We recently spoke with Publons co-founder Andrew Preston about how Publons got started, what it does, and how it’s been received thus far.…

Early career researchers and librarians swap pain points and share ideas on advancing researchI recently had the privilege of co-hosting a panel discussion with Chris Banks from Imperial College London at the Annual ASA conference  which brought together both early career researchers and librarians. These young professionals shared some of the issues they face-as well as their viewpoints on what would make collaboration easier.This resulted in a lively…

Four tips for planning your careerPlanning your career could be considered to be a contradiction in terms. How can you plan something which is largely out of your control? How can you predict whether and when a job will be advertised by an employer, or influence where it will be located? Furthermore, how can you plan for a career, if…

What’s happening in higher education? Tweets and tacos from SXSWeduView the story "What’s happening in higher education? Tweets and tacos from SXSWedu by Ashley Yazbec" on Storify

What matters to members? We found some surprising answers with our recent membership surveyDid you know that 15% of people don’t join societies or associations because they’ve never been invited, or that 72% of society members actively read the society’s publications?  Would you have guessed that the most valued member benefit is a society’s peer-reviewed journal? Or, that the top reason that people join societies is the quality…

Overcoming apathy: keys to attracting and maintaining society membersI can’t recall the date, exactly, but it was around four or five years ago that I let my membership to a professional society lapse. I’m a member of a couple of societies, so it wasn’t like I was left entirely unaffiliated, but I remember this one in particular because, every couple of months, I…

Three kinds of societiesAs part of our Membership Matters week, we invited Seth Kahan, author, change agent and founder of Association Transformation, to comment on his experience of working with societies and the different business and membership models he has encountered.  Don’t forget to dowload our recent Membership Matters whitepaper for the results of our recent membership survey. …

Publishing partnerships: five tips for a happy "marriage"As the world’s leading publisher for societies with over 900 membership organization partners, Wiley is in a great position to talk about the formula for a successful "marriage" between publisher and association. My first experience of a partnership agreement was signed in 1996 with the International Organization for Migration. This was a whirlwind romance which…

Actions and insights for societies from our membership surveyTo close our Membership Matters week, Lorna Berrett, Director, Society Marketing at Wiley presents some initial thoughts from society executives on how they might apply the results to their organizations. A couple of weeks ago we invited our Society Advisory Board (SAB) members to a preview of the Wiley Membership Survey results.  We were especially…

How can scientists better communicate with the public?At Sense About Science, we see early career researchers - members of the Voice of Young Science (VoYS) network - standing up for science. They take an active role in public debates about science: tackling misconceptions, challenging pseudoscientific product claims and responding to misinformation in all kinds of media. But what about the rest of…

Ask about what doesn't work- a guide for peer reviewers"A negative result is still a result!" is a common, if slightly ironic, utterance that can frequently be heard around the ivory towers. I must say that I agree with this sentiment, and I agree with it to the extent that I think everyone who reviews a scholarly paper should be asking about what doesn’t…

"The Bones of a King": breaking down walls between the Humanities and SciencesThe dramatic story of Richard III, one of England’s most notorious and enigmatic monarchs, captured the world’s attention in February 2013 when the Grey Friars Research Team, led by the University of Leicester, identified "Skeleton 1" as Richard, a King whose remains had been lost for over 500 years. Last week, to coincide with King…

How can I use Google Scholar Citations for scholarly profiling?Google Scholar Citations is one of many scholarly profiling services available,  allowing researchers to easily and conveniently profile their scholarly products, promote their work, connect with potential collaborators and view scholarly metrics. It’s also a great way to keep your scholarly record up to date. Once you are set up with a Google Scholar Citations…

See how Kudos can impact citations of your publicationsAlmost 18 months ago, I wrote a post for this blog about Kudos, then a pilot service to help researchers and their publishers increase the reach and impact of publications. The pilot was a success, with basic analysis indicating that downloads of full text were 19% higher for publications explained and shared using the Kudos…

Career center networks-why are societies and associations still using them?So what is a career center network? Essentially it is a large pool of candidates and job ads ‘owned’ by a third party vendor which can be plugged into a society website with a ‘career center’ interface. As the members of that society start applying for jobs via this system, their details become the property…