Innovation through diverse approaches: How we adapt and evolve

NeSI has evolved its ways of working and transformed through rich partnerships for collaboratively developing solutions for various research communities. NeSI has embraced diversity in its team culture to address equally diverse challenges facing the eResearch communities. This talk showcases some of the key projects as case studies, highlighting different ways of working and how NeSI has applied product management and product engineering practices. These include both embedding them into the team and sharing the practices with the partners to enable a collaborative journey that is user focussed, iterative and transparent.

With Rebase, NeSI's new infrastructure provisioning, we have had the opportunity to apply and improve all of these practices, as the new infrastructure brings complexity to power the ever-growing diversity of the research communities. Much of the infrastructure provisioning journey has also been learnt from NeSI's ongoing partnership with AgResearch, where we have collaborated to set up the eResearch Infrastructure for the researchers in AgResearch.

As far back as 2018, NeSI embarked on development of new services, a step away from its core HPC service. These include the National Data Transfer Platform and JupyterHub. NeSI has then embarked on a partnership with Genomics Aotearoa for developing the Aotearoa Genomic Data Repository. Here, the journey started off as discovery-oriented putting NeSI onto a path of learning Kaitiakitanga, Māori Data sovereignty, and data standards for genomics, alongside cross institutional agile processes. The partnership continues to this day, where the shape of the collaboration has transitioned from pioneering into more increased maturity.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Jun Huh is a Product Manager at NeSI. Jun brings his experience from start-up industries into the field of eResearch. He has been involved in genomic data management related projects for the past 2-3 years, to help build a data repository system in partnership with Genomics Aotearoa, and more recently, prototyping for Rakeiora Pathfinder project, which focuses on enabling research while retaining full visibility and control of data to the indigenous communities.

Claire Rye is a Product Manager at New Zealand eScience Infrastructure (NeSI) based out of the University of Auckland. She is responsible for the National Data Transfer Service and works across the Aotearoa Genomics Data Repository and Rakeiora Pathfinder projects and looking at research data management and data lifecycle more generally across NeSI, and is a co-chair for the World Data System Early Career Researchers network. Claire holds a PhD in organic chemistry and has spent the last 11 years working in the UK in a variety of research settings.

Thomas Berger is a Product Manager at NeSI. Thomas has been focused on improving the user experience of NeSI services by continuously improving my.nesi, a researcher-facing portal, and also the NeSI JupyterHub. Thomas brings to NeSI over a decade of experience in product management skills with strong user focus and value driven approach.

Nathalie Giraudon holds an electrical engineering degree from ENSEEIHT, École nationale supérieure d'électrotechnique, d'électronique, d'informatique, d'hydraulique et des télécommunications (French engineering school based in Toulouse). After an exchange year to McGill University, Montreal, Canada, Nathalie has worked more than 30 years in telecommunications industry (Nortel Networks, Tait Communications). She is passionate about system design and business analysis. With her knowledge in product research and development, she is now the product engineering lead of the Collaboration and Integration team at NeSI.

Georgina Rae is the Science Engagement Manager at NeSI where she ensures that NeSI is supporting NZ's researchers and research priorities through meaningful partnerships and user-driven approaches. Prior to NeSI she has worked in molecular biology and intellectual property.

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For more information about the eResearch NZ / eRangahau Aotearoa conference, visit:
https://eresearchnz.co.nz/