Data stewardship and data management skills are essential in research. The lack of consensus on the responsibilities, knowledge, skills, and value of data stewards leads to confusion about the role and hampers building adequate data steward capacity. To our knowledge, a coherent approach and dedicated training for data stewardship on the (inter)national level is lacking as well. This, combined with scarce resources for data stewardship at many institutions, limits vital developments such as defining recruitment procedures and career paths for current and future data stewards.
Eight challenges are identified and will be regularly discussed and updated: a business case for data stewardship, data stewardship terminology, the integration of data stewardship across an organisation, job profiles for data stewards, training for data stewards, career tracks for data stewards, networking and knowledge exchange, and certification. Separate task groups will be formed to work on related deliverables and people will work on these between plenary sessions. These task groups will be coordinated by the co-chairs of the Interest Group. In addition, the group will organise regular webinars to stimulate discussion and practice exchange.
The group will meet virtually, and if possible, in person at RDA Plenaries to exchange new ideas and tactics for facilitating professionalising data stewardship, and also to update each other on the progress of task groups working on specific deliverables. Plenary meetings will also be used as an opportunity to recruit and engage with new members. Between Plenaries, the group will communicate through the formal RDA Interest Group page (posts and events) and Slack.
