Mainstreaming the gender dimension in research activities and outcomes is a topical challenge related to excellence. The gender dimension in research activities requires an ethically sound process in creating high-quality results. Major research funding organisations are increasingly interested in analyses of the gender dimension in research, thereby challenging researchers to review their research plans accordingly. The Gender Impact Assessment (GIA) aims to tackle this challenge. The GIA is not a strict methodology but rather an approach to be further co-designed by local GIA communities of practitioners (CoPs) to ensure its fit into each academic research setting in aiming to improve equality and quality of the knowledge produced. The GIA approach also effectively supports Horizon Europe’s mission-oriented work, in which European research and innovation missions have the objective of delivering solutions to some of the greatest challenges that our world is facing, all of them having gender impact.
The GIA guidelines introduce the approach as an institutional and operational set-up. They describe the institutional structures, processes, and resources needed for successful application of the GIA approach, and identify the key stakeholders within a university that are central for its institutionalization and operationalization — the GIA CoPs. Further, the guidelines propose institutional structures needed for gender impact assessment operations to make them standard procedures in an institution. Local GIA CoPs are in a central position to ensure a perfect fit of the GIA within a particular institutional setting as well as its sustainability.