Career credit for open research is promised more often than it is delivered - and funder mandates are rarely checked. That was one of the honest conclusions from the session we moderated at the 12th Barcamp Open Science in Berlin.

A barcamp is an un-conference: no fixed agenda, participants propose and lead the sessions themselves. Around 45 people from research institutions, libraries and infrastructure projects took part on 10 June at Wikimedia Deutschland, under the heading of navigating challenging times.

Our session looked at “carrot and stick” approaches to incentivising Open Science across different institutional contexts. Participants described benefits that rarely materialise, mandates that are not enforced, and a reluctance to publish data for fear that imperfections become visible. The conclusion: both carrots and sticks are still needed, but neither works without cultural change - including accepting, in the spirit of George Box, that all data are imperfect but some data are useful.

Other sessions covered open research and democratic values, the attribution of AI-generated data, and open educational resources. The organisers have now published a wrap-up of the whole event, which we contributed to:

https://www.zbw-mediatalk.eu/2026/07/barcamp-open-science-2026-navigating-challenging-times/

If your institution has found an incentive that actually changes everyday practice, we would like to hear about it.

#OpenScience #ResearchDataManagement #FAIRdata #ZALF #ScienceCommunication