Collaboration in the Ocean Sciences: best practices and common pitfalls.

Abstract

As collaboration among ocean scientists becomes more necessary and common, those who attempt to plan, organize, and implement joint research projects are discovering that collaboration is more difficult than they first thought. Collaboration is often a trial-and-error methodology that takes time to get right. Ocean scientists can learn from people whose entire careers are built on studying and describing collaboration, its principles and best practices, and what can go wrong. There are books on collaboration, professors of collaboration, and genuine experts on collaboration. This article extracts and distills some of that wisdom on collaboration and puts it into the context of ocean sciences. We need good collaborations in the ocean sciences, and cannot afford—nor should we be satisfied with—homegrown, do-it-yourself efforts when professional and scholarly expertise is available to us.