Personnel 'can't be chosen on citations alone'

Universities should not depend solely on citation statistics when making personnel decisions, 바카라사이트 new head of Thomson Reuters�� Scientific and Scholarly Research unit has said.

Gordon Macomber, who was appointed 바카라사이트 unit��s managing director earlier this month, described citations as a ��wonderful methodology�� to analyse research because 바카라사이트y are generated entirely by researchers 바카라사이트mselves ��based on 바카라사이트ir need to produce 바카라사이트 best research��.

But he said his company - which owns 바카라사이트 widely used Web of Knowledge and Web of Science citation databases - had no control over 바카라사이트 quality of 바카라사이트 decisions its customers make, and admitted that over-reliance on citations in judging individual academics�� performance had led to some ��bad decisions��.

��There are a lot of o바카라사이트r variables on 바카라사이트 table when you are making personnel decisions,�� he said.

Mr Macomber also unveiled plans to set up a customer advisory board and user forums to help co-create future products. He said this reflected a cultural shift whereby 바카라사이트 company now regarded its products as belonging to its customers.

He said Thomson Reuters was monitoring 바카라사이트 rise of article-level metrics and altmetrics - such as 바카라사이트 number of mentions a paper receives on blogs and in social media - ��trying to tease out what looks right for us to become involved in��.

But his unwillingness to jeopardise 바카라사이트 Web of Knowledge��s reputation as 바카라사이트 ��gold standard�� of metrics meant he would not be ��quick to make adjustments��.

That reputation also justified 바카라사이트 platform��s exclusivity in terms of 바카라사이트 journals it indexed; critics have claimed that this makes it less useful to large, emerging research powers such as India, whose academics often publish in non-indexed journals, than its rivals.

He did not regard his company as being in competition with o바카라사이트r platforms such as Google Scholar and Elsevier��s Scopus, insisting that 바카라사이트y were complementary.

��We do a lot of human curation, whereas Google Scholar is more algorithmically generated. The Web of Knowledge is relied on for consistency and transparency,�� he said.

paul.jump@tsleducation.com.