sc17-software-careers

SC17 Birds of a Feather - Software Engineers: Careers in Research

Tuesday, November 14th, 12:15pm - 1:15pm, Room 603

This website is http://bit.ly/sc17-software-careers

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Collaborative Notes

Agenda

• 12:15 Introduction to goals of session

• 12:20 Lightning Talks (3 minutes each)

  • UK Research Software Engineer Survey results overview: Neil Chue Hong
  • Career profile: Catherine Jones, Software Engineering Group Leader at Science and Technology Facilities Council
  • Career profile: Andy Turner, Project Manager at Edinburgh Parallel Computing Centre
  • Career profile: Lauren Michael, Research Computing Facilitator (RCF) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison
  • RSE in the US National Labs, from ORNL’s Perspective: David Bernholdt, Distinguished R&D Staff Member and Group Leader at Oak Ridge National Laboratory

• 12:35 Discussion Topics

  1. Career paths: how do RSEs want to be hired, promoted and evaluated? (Facilitator: Lauren Michael, Link to Notes)
  2. Research software engineers organization: what can be done to help RSEs (and those supporting RSEs) at international, national, regional, and local levels? (Facilitator: Catherine Jones, Link to Notes)
  3. Making the case for RSEs and RSE groups: business cases, evidence, case studies, tactics? (Facilitator: Neil Chue Hong, Link to Notes)
  4. How do we want funders to support RSE roles and activities? (Facilitator: Daniel S. Katz, Link to Notes)
  5. Building in RSE requirements as part of wider research infrastructure (eg new computing infrastructure, computational research projects, future capability planning) (Facilitator: Andy Turner, Link to Notes)

• 13:05 Highlights from each group

• 13:15 Finish

Goals of session

Many people in research organizations around the world combine expertise in programming with an intricate understanding of research. Although this combination of skills is extremely valuable, these people often lack a formal career path, particularly in the academic system. There is no easy way to recognise their contributions, reward them, or represent their views.

In the UK (and increasingly in Europe), the term Research Software Engineer is often used to describe this important role, while the US does not have a single term. However many alternative job titles exist in this space including: software developer, software specialist, staff programmer, research facilitator, research concierge, cyberinfrastructure concierge, catalyst, applications support engineering, applications support, and of course research associate and postdoc.

This BoF aims to raise awareness of this family of roles and bring the community together to address challenges the recognition of the importance of these roles.

The aims of this session are:

• Give an introduction to the landscape - what is happening now that is different from ten years ago
• Present a number of different examples of career paths and show the diversity of opportunity and barriers
• Discuss challenges and enablers for career paths relating to the development of scientific software

The input from this session will be published in a report co-authored by the group.

Discussion Topics

We will split into five groups, each with a facilitator, to discuss the following topics:

1. Career paths: how do RSEs want to be hired, promoted and evaluated? (Facilitator: Lauren Michael, Link to Notes)
2. Research software engineers organization: what can be done to help RSEs (and those supporting RSEs) at international, national, regional, and local levels? (Facilitator: Catherine Jones, Link to Notes)
3. Making the case for RSEs and RSE groups: business cases, evidence, case studies, tactics? (Facilitator: Neil Chue Hong, Link to Notes)
4. How do we want funders to support RSE roles and activities? (Facilitator: Daniel S. Katz, Link to Notes)
5. Building in RSE requirements as part of wider research infrastructure (eg new computing infrastructure, computational research projects, future capability planning) (Facilitator: Andy Turner, Link to Notes)

Each group should consider the topic, aiming to answer the following questions:

• What would we like to see done/changed to address the topic?
• Who needs to be involved to make change happen?
• What are the timescales?
• What is the highest priority?

The facilitator will take notes in the appropriate Google Doc, finishing by asking the group to agree the two or three most important things to be done, and who needs to do them.

As the time for discussion is limited, we suggest the following schedule:

• 10 minutes going around the group to gather perspectives
• 5 minutes to summarise key challenges that came up
• 10 minutes talking about how the top challenges could be addressed
• 5 minutes to check notes

In the wrap-up session, each facilitator will report each group’s important things.

Related Information

Events at SC17

• BoF on Software Engineering and Reuse in Computational Science and Engineering, Tuesday 14th November, 17:15 - 19:00, Room 601
• BoF on HPC Carpentry - Practical, Hands-On HPC Training, Tuesday 14th November, 17:15 - 19:00, Room 301-303
• BoF on Non-Traditional Paths to HPC and How They Can and Do Enrich the Field, Wednesday 15th November, 12:15 - 13:15, Room 301-303

Related Links:

• RSE State of the Nation 2017: http://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.495360
• UK RSE Association: https://rse.ac.uk/
• International RSE Groups: http://rse.ac.uk/community/international-rse-groups/
• US RSE Survey: http://bit.ly/US-RSE-2017-survey

Session leaders

This Birds of a Feather session was organized by:

• Jay Jay Billings
• Alys Brett
• Jeffrey Carver
• Neil Chue Hong
• Catherine Jones
• Daniel S. Katz
• Lauren Michael
• David Perez-Suarez
• Andrew R. Turner

Code of Conduct

All participants are reminded that their involvement in this session is covered by the SC17 Code of Conduct.