They Are the Champions: Identifying and Supporting Champions in eHealth Action Research Projects

Within Action Research (AR), champions are committed people in a project or organization who drive change and enthuse their peers to participate in AR activities. More specifically, in AR projects about eHealth such champions can play a big role in implementing a new service or technology in practice. This study investigates the perceived and self-described role of champions in a large-scale eHealth project, as well as how their involvement changed over time. To do so, we asked researchers to identify champions in their AR eHealth project and rate their champion characteristics. Then 18 champions were interviewed, and a follow-up interview was conducted with four of them. We found that enthusiasm and the ability to connect people are important champion characteristics, both from the survey and the interviews. Additionally, interviews with champions showed that they valued freedom to decide upon their role, and maybe change it in the process. This gave them the chance to make a positive impact both in the project and in the organization they work in. We draw some recommendations on how future projects should facilitate the champions to benefit most from their involvement.