19 Aug 2025
The NIHR Applied Research Collaboration North Thames Early Career Researcher (ECR) Network is an opportunity for peer support and knowledge sharing for those who are in the early stages of their applied health research career.
The Network offers members a chance to come together and learn new skills to support their career development and to network with others who are engaged in and with healthcare research.
The annual ECR Showcase is a chance for researchers to share their work and their insights into being a researcher. Here, Helena Sainz de Vicuna and Elena Ivany reflect on this year’s Showcase, which was held in July 2025.
This year’s ECR Showcase was a wonderful reminder about the meaning of research.
Many of us became researchers because we want to affect positive change for healthcare service users and staff. Events like the Showcase gave attendees the chance to consider what really matters to researchers and to those who we hope will benefit from our work.
As Rob Molloy, an occupational therapist who came to the event, reflected: “We should seek to bring benefit to those we are working with in a way that is meaningful to them.”
Watch back the full recording of the event
“Sharing stories, connecting with emotions.”
The overarching theme from the ECR Showcase, for us, was that storytelling is at the heart of impactful research.
Research has the power to highlight the stories of those who may not otherwise have a voice, thus affecting important and meaningful changes in the way that health and social care are delivered.
Speakers described the importance of placing patients and the public at the heart of the research process: as expert by experience Charlotte Crowl said: “If we can’t be seen, how can we be heard?” Early and meaningful engagement with those who benefit from research is a cornerstone of effective research that brings positive change to patients and service users, and to researchers.
Below, we offer a summary of our key takeaways from the day.
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Start with engagement: find your tribe
Use your purpose and motivation as a researcher to connect with those you want to impact. This means tapping into emotions (the real why behind your research project) and practice active listening to build genuine connections.
This way, you can create your network of community facilitators, multidisciplinary collaborators and allies who will transform your project from a solo journey into a dynamic, supportive community.
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Share the power: make research a true partnership
Make space for co-authoring and equal partnership. Be realistic and open about your goals and create room for ethical and emotional safety, where everyone feels respected an able to contribute.
If you are interested in deepening your approach to collaborative thinking and patients and public involvement, keynote speaker Alison Thomson suggests exploring books by Diane Rose.
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Start small and build trust
Set realistic expectations, be transparent about timelines (especially if you’re waiting on funding), and don’t be afraid to start small and iteratively.
Keep consistent communication and momentum by checking with your community regularly.
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Get creative: let research participants share their stories their way
Approaching research participants with a checklist of questions won’t work. Instead, start with a simple invitation: ‘What’s your story?’.
You can bring these stories to life using creative arts — from animations and storyboards to videos, installations, games, digital visualisations, and even theatre pieces. Small, bite-sized pieces of information can make an immediate impact.
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Document your journey: turn process into data
When impact isn’t instant or easy to measure, documenting your work can be tricky. Ambiguity can be challenging within academia and research.
By embracing thorough documentation, you bring clarity and create a valuable source of data that can inform future work.
“We’re all in this together”.
The words of Zach Howarth, a Mental Health Research for All Fellow at the NIHR ARC North Thames who presented at the ECR Showcase 2025, eloquently sum up the spirit of the event.
Unity of purpose brings together researchers and those who benefit from our work to jointly ask meaningful questions and look for impactful solutions through research. Unity of purpose also brings together fellow researchers, who can benefit from the peer support and camaraderie that communities such as the ARC North Thames’s ECR Network offers.
As speech and language therapist Rosie McLean shared on the day: “Great to connect with so many people passionate about engagement and creativity in research. What a supportive network!”
- A recording of this year’s ECR Showcase is available on YouTube.
- If you would like to join the ECR Network, please sign up to the mailing list and come along to our future events.
- The NIHR ARC North Thames also provides researchers with a chance to engage with learning opportunities through the Academy.
- Members of the public and patients who would like to engage with research can also join the ARC’s PPIE panel to have a direct and meaningful contribution to health and care research.