Social Mapping

This project aims to transform the way that the UK understands how networks and hubs of creativity and Knowledge Exchange (KE) work.

Policymakers and funders looking to drive growth in the creative industries have identified a problem with current data. A key research paper by Frontier Economics for DCMS says "_There are significant challenges in gathering detailed data on the (_5 indicators of Cluster innovation) _that are specific to the creative industries. Obtaining more data ...for robust, reliable analysis at local level should be a priority for the government."_

Universities don't have the resources to effectively track their impact across complex networks of collaborations over time - and it is becoming imperative that they do as the Knowledge Excellence Framework gains traction alongside the Research Excellence Framework.

This problem is financially significant: £267 million was spent by the Government on Knowledge Exchange (KE) programmes in 21/22\. £120 million was spent on Creative Clusters between 2018 -2023\. And £38.3 million is being spent on Creative People and Places (just one ACE programme) between 2022-2025\.

This is a large market whose success pivots on its ability to effectively set up, maintain and evaluate networks as it attempts to monitor collaborations, innovations and commercialisation. The current state of play is that often each faculty or school of a University is hiring Early Stage Researchers to work full time on desk based secondary research and laboriously construct reports - at untold cost to the government (a cost we will seek to quantify under this project).

With our Social Mapping toolkit we plan to have a real impact on how these networks are set up and evaluated. The toolkit can help maintain communities of practice, foster new collaborations and track complex systems of people and innovations over time, in turn informing how they are designed and financed.