Responsive, inclusive, and reactive: Going behind the scenes at Discover

Author: Deidre Hudson Reuss

Senior Marketing Manager

As a young and progressive imprint, Discover has rapidly evolved into a broad and diverse brand, with a clear aim to publish all high-quality research. With over 60 journals already launched and more to follow, Discover is vibrant, ambitious, and future-focused, thanks to the hard work and passion of several people who have worked tirelessly on establishing the new imprint. In the third of our series of blogs, we take you into the Discover family to reveal what went into launching this new, open access imprint at Springer Nature.   

A clear vision 

As discussed in the previous two blogs in this series – authored by Dylan Parker, Publishing Director, and Samuel Winthrop, Executive Publisher, at Discover – Discover has a clear, serious, and ambitious vision to publish all high-quality and relevant research, including research that often falls outside the remit of more established journals. Discover builds upon Springer Nature’s reputation as a trusted and valued publisher of scientific research, bringing these values to the world of inclusive and open-access research. 

“Within the Springer Nature family of brands, each part of the portfolio offers something different to our community of researchers. The Discover journals play an important role within our fully open access portfolio, welcoming all valid research, regardless of its perceived impact, with the reassurance of rigour and quality that Springer Nature is known for.” 

Claire Jones, Senior Marketing Manager, Brand Marketing Strategy at Springer Nature 

Global voices 

As an inclusive and global brand, Discover welcomes research from every corner of the world. We believe that the scientific record cannot be complete without input from every community. With our foundations in a global name like Springer Nature, from the start we were able to have “feet on the ground” in multiple countries – and our worldwide team is growing. To inform our strategy, it was imperative to have that local knowledge to find out what authors and research institutions are looking for in a new imprint like Discover. 

Research Integrity  

We need research that is reliable, trustworthy, and can be developed and built upon by scientists and innovators. Science is increasingly under threat from fraud and misconduct, and therefore safeguarding integrity is our highest priority. The Springer Nature Research Integrity Group supports the Discover brand by implementing tools, training, and processes to ensure the scientific research we publish is real, useful and trustworthy.

“To solve the world’s biggest challenges, we all need research that’s reliable, trustworthy and can be built on by scientists and innovators. At a time when science is increasingly under threat from fraud and misconduct, safeguarding integrity is our highest priority. The Research Integrity team at Springer Nature has been involved in setting up the Discover brand from the start, ensuring that Springer Nature’s strict standards in research integrity are upheld across all imprints.” 

Chris Graf, Research Integrity Director, Springer Nature 

Springer Nature and its journals are members of COPE (the Committee On Publication Ethics) and Springer Nature’s Research Integrity Director, Chris Graf, was one of the first co-chairs of COPE. 

Acting on feedback

With such an ambitious remit, our strategy from the start was to listen to the needs of the worldwide scientific community and react quickly to their comments and feedback. So an important part of the work that went into establishing the brand – and is ongoing today – is encouraging feedback from our authors. 

Across Springer Nature, and particularly at new journal launches like Discover, it is imperative that we actively listen to and act on feedback from the communities we serve. 

Upon publishing in a Springer Nature journal, authors are invited to complete a survey about their experience of publishing that article with us.  

“The feedback we receive from authors recognises where we add value to the research community and verifies where progress has been made. More importantly, they also identify pain points that require problem -solving and innovation to address. Researchers must be put first if we wish to be a trusted and inclusive publisher, and using their feedback to drive continuous improvement is just one of the pillars we rely on." 

Chloe O’Donnell, Senior Research Analyst, Market Intelligence at Springer Nature 

Endless ambition 

Discover is only a few years old, but we are growing rapidly, and we are excited to see where the imprint will take us. We believe that inclusive, open access research is the future of science and will bring us the type of breakthroughs and discoveries that the world urgently needs.  

“There is a lot of work still to do and we've only really scratched the surface of what we want to do – but we’re only four years into the journey. We've learnt a lot already, but we've got a long way to go. It’ll be really exciting to see how the brand grows and develops.” 

Samuel Winthrop, Executive Publisher, Discover at Springer Nature 

Why not submit your next paper to a Discover journal? Find out more at Discover.

Catch up on the earlier posts in this blog series: 

• Discover: A portfolio of inclusive, open access journals with community in mind, by Dylan Parker, Publishing Director, Discover 

Introducing Discover, the new open access imprint at Springer Nature developed with community needs in mind. Dylan expands on what’s new and exciting across these titles, answers questions about this young imprint, and discusses why Discover is an ideal choice for every author, from seasoned researchers to first-time submitters. 

• Inclusive, global and interdisciplinary: Discover journals break with tradition, by Samuel Winthrop, Executive Publisher, Discover 

Delve deeper into the purpose of Discover. Samuel explains why Discover is committed to publishing all valid research – and how this can contribute greatly to creating a fuller, more robust, and more inclusive scientific record. This blog also highlights feedback from several authors who report back on their experience of publishing in a Discover journal.