CGIAR Recipe:
Assess FAIR potential

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What is FAIR potential?

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FAIR potential reflects the best level of FAIR that can be achieved based on:

 

• investment resource plan
• existing metadata assets, and
• data publishing goals.

The FAIR Potential Assessment tool benchmarks the FAIR potential of an investment by highlighting strengths and risks at the “Invest” stage of the CGIAR investment process.

 

The output informs the investment’s initial data management and access plan and serves as a record of their FAIR commitment.

 

Download – FAIR Potential Assessment Tool v1 MVP

 

Key concepts

Read more about the themes and structure of the FAIR Potential Assessment:

Themes

• Key blockers to FAIR are largely influenced by the environment individuals are operating it. These have been separated into five recurring themes that can be used as a focus for understanding and improving a FAIR maturity score.

   

  Support

   

  • Better support for metadata and vocabulary development leads to more efficient and sustainable data practices.

  Technology

   

  • Focuses on appropriate tools, skills and knowledge needed for analysis, standardization and vocabulary development.

  Culture

   

  • Shifting to prioritizing good FAIR data practices ensures better FAIR data from the start. This leads to enhanced data quality, longevity and reusability.

  Policy

   

  • Policies across different CGIAR institutes for data management may not always align with practical needs or be well-informed by the researchers and data practitioners responsible for achieving investment outcomes within their specific contexts.

  Resourcing

   

  • Adequate resource planning from a data perspective should be integrated during proposal development stages. e.g. Limited skillsets for metadata and ontology development lead to inefficient practices.

Business features

• The other dimension to consider alongside the above themes is the business features. These are seen in the answers within the assessment.

   

  People

   

  • This covers human resourcing, skills and training needs.

  Process

   

  • Involves established procedures for activities like project delivery, organizational engagement or resource acquisition.

  Technology

   

  • Refers to specific tools used within the data lifecycle e.g. data collection and analysis tools, or services such as data catalogs and data marketplaces.

  Content

   

  • Content includes shared vocabularies or ontologies, and supporting documentation such as standards definitions or recipes.

This video depicts how the themes and business features are combined to provide a questionnaire where an investment can assess the potential to achieve FAIR data.

 

 

Overview

Investment lifecycle

Recipe overview

Purpose:

 

This recipe provides a step-by-step guide to completing the FAIR Potential Assessment tool and understanding the results.

 

Objectives:

 

• Establish an unbiased view of the FAIR potential of the grantee organizations
• Understand how the results can be used to inform content in the Data Management and Access Plan (DMAP)

Prerequisites:

 

• The questions should be answered by someone familiar with their organization’s data management practices.
• The FAIR Potential Assessment tool is designed for use with Microsoft Excel 2021 or higher; data validation (answer drop-down choices) will not work with Google Sheets.

Outputs:

 

• A FAIR Potential percentage score for each theme; Culture, Policy, Strategy, Technical, Resourcing and Support.
• An overall FAIR potential score for the investment, which is a combination of the individual scores for each theme.
• A set of capability levels that the investment is currently at, a set of goal capability levels (usually the next level up) and some recommendations on how to achieve the next level.

Outcomes:

 

• The results of the FAIR Potential Assessment provide grantees and project officers with a clear starting points for their goal setting. These insights feed directly into the DMAP, a living document, to capture goals for the investment. With this approach investments can plan their continuous improvement journey to build and maintain capabilities to achieve exceptional FAIR data outcomes.

When should I do this?

When should I complete this step?:

 

• During the proposal development, ahead of the project start. It is used to inform content in the initial version of the DMAP (a living document).

Who is accountable?:

 

• Lead Organization of the Investment

Who is consulted?:

• CGIAR Data Office would guide the grantee through the process.

Who is informed?:

 

• Project Officer is informed of the FAIR Potential Assessment results to better understand the risks.

NB.

 

At the Invest stage there are likely to be many unknowns, particularly if the grantee is working with new partners/research centers.

 

• They should respond to the questions to the best of their knowledge at the time.
• They may decide to engage with and incorporate responses from other partners though ultimately, the Lead Grantee would lead the work and be accountable for producing the initial assessment.

Instructions

Follow the tasks below to complete the FAIR Potential Assessment and discover some areas for potential improvement.

Task 1

Review any guidelines

 

• Review the guidelines and policies provided by your funding agency and/or parent organization regarding FAIR data and data sharing.

Task 2

Review outputs from FAIR Process Framework

 

• Review the outputs from the FAIR Process Framework (if the framework has been started), in particularly Country Data Profile, FAIR Aligning Principles and Comms Plan, Data Governance Framework, and any Data Sharing Agreement.

Task 3

Access FAIR Potential Tool

 

• Download the FAIR Potential Assessment tool using the link in the top section of this page, or from the link below this text. Open the file up and follow the directions within.
• Download – FAIR Potential Assessment tool v1 MVP

Task 4

Complete the assessment

 

• Answer all questions to get a complete set of FAIR Potential Assessment results.

Task 5

Review results

 

• Select the “results” tab in the tool.
• The chart will indicate where the project’s FAIR maturity levels are in the five thematic areas: Support, Resourcing, Technical, Policy and Culture, alongside an overall FAIR maturity score. The overall FAIR maturity score is based on the lowest scoring theme.

 

 

• Below the chart and summary table, you will find 10 tables, one for each question.
• Each table outlines your answer to the corresponding question and explains its implications for your current maturity level in terms of People, Process, Technology, and Content. These details are formatted using a maturity scale, ranging from dark red (low maturity) to dark green (high maturity).
• Additionally, each table includes suggested goals to consider setting to achieve the next level.

Task 6

Identify areas to improve

 

• For each area identified to improve, identify goals to be recorded in the DMAP- these are your FAIR commitments.
• This is explained in detail in the recipe ‘How to complete the Direction Setting section’

Workflows: What's next?

Quick reference Guided FAIR Foundational FAIR Independent FAIR FAIR data assessment

Workflows: What's next?

Quick reference

Next activity for the Guided FAIR workflow: Activity G3

 

• How to complete the Direction Setting section
• This section takes you through the process of setting goals and recording an overarching direction to increase the FAIR maturity of the investment
• Alternatively select the workflow tab in this section to see the full list of workflow activities.

Next activity for the Foundational FAIR workflow:

 

• This recipe isn’t part of the Foundational FAIR workflow.

Next activity for the Independent FAIR workflow:

 

• This recipe isn’t part of the Independent FAIR workflow.

Next activity for the FAIR data assessment workflow:

 

• This recipe isn’t part of the FAIR data assessment workflow.

Back to CGIAR workflows page

Guided FAIR workflow

Activity G1

 

• How to complete the Getting Started section.
• Answer core questions to provide a basic description of the investment’s proposed data management practices.
• Once approved by a PO, proceed to the next activity.

Activity G2

 

• How to assess FAIR potential
• Benchmark the project’s level of FAIR maturity using the FAIR Potential Assessment tool.

Activity G3

 

• How to complete the Direction Setting section
• Set goals to increase the FAIR maturity of the investment.
• If your investment has not been approved, send the completed Direction Setting section within the DMAP to the PO for approval.
• If your investment has been approved, we recommend sharing the DMAP with your FAIR advisor (email:fair@cabi.org) to update them and receive feedback.
• If you have been asked to make edits, proceed to Activity G4
• If no edits are needed, go to Activity G5

Activity G4

 

• How to document changes after review
• Create a change log to keep track of edits to your DMAP.

Activity G5

 

• How to complete the Implementation section
• Document the data management practicalities of the investment.

Activity G6

 

• How to document changes after review
• Regularly review your DMAP to ensure goals are being achieved and create a change log for any edits made.

Foundational FAIR workflow

This page is not part of the Foundational FAIR workflow.  Visit the workflow homepage for the list of included activities.

Independent FAIR workflow

This page is not part of the Foundational FAIR workflow.  Visit the workflow homepage for the list of included activities.

FAIR data assessment workflow

This page is not part of the Foundational FAIR workflow.  Visit the workflow homepage for the list of included activities.