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ABOUT US

Our Values & Principles

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Openness, transparency, and generosity

Beyond our scientific objectives, the Center for Matter at Atomic Pressures (CMAP) is committed to mentoring a new generation of research scientists while encouraging cross-disciplinary collaboration in an open and supportive environment. We give due credit for others’ help—from ideas and data, to measurement, analysis, and communication—and we take responsibility for our decisions and actions.

CMAP Team Processes

The following guidelines address CMAP’s team processes for Onboarding, Decision-Making, and Conflict Management. The CMAP team is encouraged to provide feedback, concerns, and ideas through our anonymous suggestion box.

Onboarding

The onboarding policy is designed to ensure a smooth and comprehensive integration of new researchers into the CMAP team.

Decision-Making

This structured decision-making process is designed to promote transparency, inclusivity, and strategic alignment within CMAP. It ensures that decisions are well-informed, consider diverse perspectives, and contribute to the successful achievement of CMAP’s mission and objectives.

Conflict Management

Through this action plan, CMAP aims to proactively manage conflicts, foster a positive team environment, and enhance overall collaboration within and beyond the team.

Operating principles

The following guidelines address CMAP’s approaches to co-authorship, awards, proposals, and team projects, as well as how data are used.

Collaboration

Working across institutions and with new colleagues can have advantages and challenges. When collaborating through CMAP, we ask that members:

  • Use the “Golden Rule” serves as guiding principle and treat others in the manner you would wish to be treated
  • Share ideas and results, and include proper authorization and acknowledgment (in writing, as appropriate) when sharing more broadly
  • Be generous with your own ideas and with giving credit for others’ contributions:
    • If you get a new idea from discussions which leads to new directions, include the idea generators in the project or papers (or at least recognize the ideas generators in the acknowledgments)
    • An idea with no follow-through may not have much value, and several people may independently have the same idea; members should use their best judgment when giving credit

Co-authorship and publications

When creating and submitting publications from CMAP collaborations, CMAP members should:

  • Get written consent from the generator when including calculations, observations, data, simulations, or other such ideas in a publication can only happen with the expressed (written) consent of the generator—and the generator is usually a coauthor
  • Authors should be able to define the specific contribution(s) for which they take responsibility, and defend the paper (or at least key parts of a paper)—in this context, responsibility implies taking the lead in responding to any criticism raised
  • Present or distribute papers from our team to team members, and have comments solicited from one or more members;  this adds quality to our papers, and offers the opportunity to discuss potential missed contributions

Credit

Showing up to meetings does not mean you are an author or coauthor of every team member’s papers.

If you feel you haven’t been properly recognized for your contributions, bring the grievance to the CMAP primary investigator or the technical advisory committee. The expectation is that the lead author defines the order and author list on each publication, in consultation with their mentor (if applicable).

Funding and grants

We will bring funding opportunities to the group and expect appropriate subgroups to organize.

While each scientist can define responsibility for different grants, the multidisciplinary nature of our work often suggests multiple grants might be recognized and, with luck, CMAP will leverage other grants.

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