What the  REF?!

A new podcast to demystify the REF

What the REF?! is a new podcast that will investigate issues around research culture, recognition for success in research and all things and everything to do with the REF. The REF is an amazing driver of research culture change. The goal of this podcast is to get more people to engage with it. Every fortnight we will discuss new subjects and talk with experts on the REF, research culture, hidden roles and non-traditional outputs.

Our hosts are all members of the Hidden REF committee based at the universities of Southampton and Bristol: James Baker, Gemma Derrick – a self-confessed REF junkie – and Simon Hettrick, and our producer is Ben Thomas.

If you have a question about the REF that you would like us to answer, or an idea for the podcast, let us know at WTreF@hidden-ref.org, BlueSky or Linkedin.

Listen to What the REF?! on YouTube or wherever you usually find your podcasts.

Episodes

1. What the REF is this podcast all about?

The first ever episode of What the REF?! In this episode, we discuss the REF as an amazing driver of research culture change and our hopes for increasing engagement with the exercise so that we can build a research environment that is more equitable and more effective. We talk about our dream guests for future episodes, the difficulties in running an assessment that gets to the heart of what is important to research, REF myth busting, Gemma tests our knowledge of REF output categories, and we even look into how long it would take the average person to read through all of the REF guidance (spoiler: it’s about 11 days).