What is a RSE at ASC?
You can find plenty of definitions online: Somewhere between researcher and software developer. A researcher whose output is measured by software (or data), not only journal publications. A computational specialist in a research group. And many more.
These are all true, but not really relevant for this training. You know how to be a researcher (and can learn), and know how to use the tools of software, data, and computing (and can learn). What we need now to go from these to being a good collaborator between groups. If you were just doing the things above, a group would hire you themselves. What a new member of our team needs to learn is how we operate as a team, how it’s similar and different than typical research groups, and how we interact with research groups. It’s a much less individual role than an academic researcher, with different types of skills. It’s challenging to speak in two different languages, a highly technical one with our team and a higher-level one with our customers who often do not need to go as technical.
What does “engineer” even mean? It’s not just someone that knows some tools or practices. It’s someone who can balance the limits of technology, the needs of the customer, and broader costs (to the customer and society. While a researcher can come up with ideas, and a developer can do the development they are asked to do, a RSE critically looks at the needs and comes up with the right solutions, efficiently, taking into account the special needs and uncertainties of research.
You should always keep in mind that we are here to help research and researchers, not technology. This often means adapting the technology to what people actually need, not trying to force people to adapt to the technology when it doesn’t make sense. We should give confidence to our customers to carry on by themselves after we are done. We live and die by how our customers see us.
What makes Aalto RSEs different from academic researches:
We focus on supporting other reserchears, instead of making our own research ideas. (We do come up with plenty of new ideas, but it’s at the tool-layer, rather than the idea-to-publish layer).
Our standards are higher. We are expected to know our stuff, and not just be learning it while we are doing. (this applies collectively, individually we are all learning new things)
What makes Aalto RSE different from RSEs in other places:
We tend to have a wider variety of small projects going on and we have more emphasis on teaching and general support.
We are a research infrastructure organizationally located in an academic school. We aren’t “IT people”, we are research support. Our mission is much wider.
Terminology
This is mainly rkdarst’s convention, but we often say:
Research Engineer as the general concept of someone who is supporting research with technical skills but isn’t focused on academic publishing as their main output.
Academics are researchers who are mainly judged by the conventional academic career system (publications and citations). Most of our customers are academics, but many are interested in far more than just the academic career system.
Researchers are people involved in the research process, both research engineers and academics. We should not undervalue ourselves - in any non-university team, we would definitely be considered researchers.
Still, we often say “researchers” to mean “our customers”, as in the academics who aren’t us.
This is not strict terminology but useful to put us on the right page.
Further reading
Architects, engineers, and other infrastructure staff in universities by rkdarst. A metaphor of RSEs to building construction.
RSE lessons from Civil Engineering by rkdarst (Aalto library book link). This extends the metaphor above by looking in-depth at how civil engineers may work.
Lower priority reading:
What is ‘R’? What is ‘S’? What is ‘E’?. Blog post on a discussion at a Nordic-RSE conference, on a thought experiment with removing each letter from “RSE” to see what changes.
Exercises
What-is-rse-1: General explanation
Goal: Practice the general technical explanation of what we do.
You: Roleplay answering your partner’s question. Explain why they, mostly non-computational, might someday be interested in RSE services.
Your partner: Roleplay a researcher in the School (faculty) of Engineering asks you what our team does. Pretend your research focus is measuring the strengths of various materials in laboratories. (You can make up a different research topic)
What-is-RSE-2: Pitch for a research day
Goal: Refine our pitching of RSEs and see how others
Imagine that you are at a public event such as a research day or academic conference. Gives a 1-3 minute pitch looking for more RSE projects, like you might tell to someone who approaches us at a research day. Compare to others in your group and discuss the different selling points you focused on.
What-is-RSE-2: General audience explanation
Goal: Practice interacting with people who have no idea of research or academics.
You: Roleplay answering the question below.
Your partner: Roleplay a non-technical family member asking “What do you do for work?” and listen to the explanation. Ask some questions and give feedback.