The importance of research impact
Why research impact matters and the benefits of embedding impact thinking into your research journey.
Understanding the importance of research impact helps ensure that your work not only advances knowledge but also contributes to the world beyond academia.
Impact matters because it connects research to the needs of people, communities, and the environment, and helps ensure that public investment in research delivers tangible, long-lasting benefits.
What is the value of research impact?
Every type of research has the potential to have an impact, from applied to fundamental research. While the outcomes of your research may not be immediately visible, all research contributes to our collective knowledge and understanding and can lead to meaningful change over time.
The value of research impact lies in its ability to connect knowledge with action, thereby improving lives, informing decisions, shifting mindsets, and strengthening communities.
It ensures that research serves a purpose beyond academia, creating benefits that ripple across society, the environment, and the economy. Research impact also plays a vital role in demonstrating accountability for public investment, fostering public trust in research, and unlocking future opportunities.
And when research is developed in partnership with others, it can empower communities, enhance equity, and help build more just and resilient systems.
Understanding your motivations
Knowing what drives your impact goals can help you connect your research with what matters most. As a researcher, you likely have a range of motivations for working towards impact.
Some of these may be driven by personal values – such as a desire to support a community or solve a problem. Others may be influenced by professional goals or external expectations, including funder requirements or institutional expectations.
Often, it’s a combination of both, shaped by personal values, professional goals, and broader societal needs.
Why research impact matters: Seven key reasons
Research impact benefits not only society, but also you as a researcher, your institution, and future collaborators. Here are seven key reasons to embed impact into your research planning.
- Benefiting society and contributing to long-term change: Research can address real-world challenges and make a real difference in people’s lives and in society through informing decisions, shaping policy, improving practices, and contributing to more sustainable and equitable futures.
- Making research more relevant and responsive: When research is co-designed with communities or decision-makers, it becomes more grounded in real-world needs. Engagement throughout the process improves relevance, increases the likelihood of application and uptake, and ensures research is shaped by those it aims to serve.
- Providing justification and support for public research funding: Much research is publicly funded – and with that comes responsibility. Demonstrating how your research addresses societal, environmental, or economic needs helps to justify continued public investment in research projects.
- Securing future funding and opportunities: Funders and governments increasingly expect clear articulation of impact. Showing how your work benefits Aotearoa New Zealand or the wider world strengthens funding applications and opens doors to new collaborations.
- Enhancing institutional reputation and visibility: Impactful research boosts an institution’s ability to attract resources, partnerships, and recognition. When research impact is communicated clearly, institutions and researchers are better positioned to attract funding, forge collaborations, and demonstrate leadership across sectors.
- Strengthen interdisciplinary and cross-sector collaboration: Research designed with impact in mind often requires engagement beyond disciplinary boundaries, encouraging richer partnerships with other researchers, communities, industry, policy-makers, and iwi/Māori organisations.
- Enhanced public trust in research: When research is seen to make a difference in people’s lives, it helps build credibility, trust, and social license – especially when engagement is inclusive, transparent, and culturally grounded. This is particularly important in times of misinformation and declining public trust in institutions.