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New book shares ICOS community engagement lessons for Research Infrastructure managers

08 Oct 2026

A chapter co-authored by Evi-Carita Riikonen, Operations Officer at ICOS ERIC, has been published in the open access book "Research Infrastructure Management: Governance, Strategy Development, and Operations" (Springer, 2026). 

The chapter, "Developing a Data-Driven Community Engagement Plan for Integrated Carbon Observation System Research Infrastructure", is co-authored with Luca Brusati of Udine University. It is based on an ICOS identity study carried out in 2018, which combined an online survey of ICOS community with in-depth interviews. The study looked at how members of national networks and central facilities perceive the purpose of ICOS, why they want to be part of it, and what they expect from it. The findings informed a structured engagement framework, linked to the ICOS strategic goal of fostering a motivated and engaged community.

"The work reflects a specific time in ICOS RI's development: its first five-year operational cycle," says Evi-Carita. "While ICOS RI has continued to develop since then, the chapter offers a valuable snapshot of the foundations on which later community engagement work has been built."

The chapter may also interest other Environmental Research Infrastructures (ENVRIs). "It shows how community perspectives can be collected and translated into practical engagement planning, particularly in distributed, multi-domain infrastructures where members may experience the RI differently depending on their role, scientific domain or national context," Evi-Carita adds.

The book, edited by Enrico Guarini, Markus Pasterk and Marialuisa Lavitrano, is aimed at Research Infrastructure managers. It covers topics such as governance, strategy, finance and leadership, and its case studies come from the Executive Master’s in Management of Research Infrastructures at the University of Milano-Bicocca.

Read the chapter: https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-032-20373-1_10
Read the book: https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-032-20373-1