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Short abstract

When participation requires facilitation techniques (to bring people together, generate interest, translate, hybridize, formalize, and disseminate newly acquired knowledge) as well as reflective observation to avoid the “in-group” effect, precisely in order to continue hybridizing diverse knowledge.

Long abstract

Three years ago, the University of Toulouse adopted a policy of “Science with and for Society” aimed at promoting exchanges and comparisons of knowledge between researchers from different scientific disciplines (focusing on disciplinary issues as well as multi- and interdisciplinarity) and a wide variety of non-academic actors (companies, associations, local authorities, media, educational and cultural institutions, etc.). Various funded initiatives have been set up (calls for collaborative research projects, science shops, laboratories with local authorities to influence public policy, etc.). The research analyzed all these forms of collaboration and showed that developing participatory and collaborative dynamics between actors with different profiles in order to enable the sharing and comparison of knowledge (knowledge from all scientific disciplines, but also the experiential knowledge of beneficiaries, stakeholders, and decision-makers from civil society) requires the development of facilitation skills and techniques (in particular the ability to bring together, engage, translate, hybridize, formalize, and disseminate new knowledge) as well as observation skills. The latter focus in particular on avoiding the “in-group” effect in order to always enable the hybridization of knowledge from diverse profiles and areas of expertise. This paper aims to describe how these skills pave the way for new engineering and therefore new professions in a world of higher education and research seeking to develop a policy of impact (academic and societal) in conjunction with a policy of partnerships.