Five Approaches to Producing A ctionable Science in Conservation

The knowledge produced by conservation scientists must be actionable in order to address
urgent conservation challenges. To understand the process of creating actionable science,
we interviewed 71 conservation scientists who had participated in 1 of 3 fellowship programs
focused on training scientists to become agents of change. Using a grounded theory
approach, we identified 16 activities that these researchers employed to make their scientific
products more actionable. Some activities were more common than others and, arguably,
more foundational. We organized these activities into 3 nested categories (motivations,
strategies, and tactics). Using a co-occurrence matrix, we found that most activities were
positively correlated. These correlations allowed us to identify 5 approaches, framed as profiles,
to actionable science: the discloser, focused on open access; the educator, focused on
science communication; the networker, focused on user needs and building relationships;
the collaborator, focused on boundary spanning; and the pluralist, focused on knowledge
coproduction resulting in valuable outcomes for all parties. These profiles build on one
another in a hierarchy determined by their complexity and level of engagement, their
potential to support actionable science, and their proximity to ideal coproduction with
knowledge users. Our results provide clear guidance for conservation scientists to generate
actionable science to address the global biodiversity conservation challenge.