Chapter summary
In this chapter we look at the professionalisation of data stewardship, data steward careers and training opportunities
3.1 Data stewardship career development
Short description
Data stewardship has officially come of age. What began as a niche interest for researchers and librarians has become a formalized, professional pillar of the Dutch research landscape. Driven by the 2021 NPOS report and supported by organizations like NWO and Open Science NL, the role is no longer about working in isolation. Today’s data stewards are part of a visible, funded, and highly collaborative network dedicated to making research data sustainable and reusable. In this section we take you by the hand toward the career development of a Data Steward. We want you to get an overview of what your career might look like in the upcoming years.
Learning Objectives
Navigate the Formal Framework: Identify where your role sits within the Dutch university structure and the standardized job profiles.
Map Your Competency Journey: Move beyond “learning by chance” by identifying the specific technical and soft skills required to master the role.
Harness the Power of the Network: Identify and leverage key Dutch communities (such as RDNL and TDCCs) to collaborate and grow with your peers.
Pro Tip: Keep an eye out for the “Spotlight” stories throughout this section. Hearing how others navigated their first three years can help you map out your own professional milestone
Step 1 Professionalising data stewardship
The NPOS report from 2021 was the first big step towards defining and professionalising the role in the Netherlands. It led to the adoption of a formal job profile at Dutch universities and at some university medical centres. Since then, more attention has been paid to the role and career perspectives of data stewards. Especially in a period of scarcity of experienced data stewards, research organisations see the need to invest in making it an attractive role, to recruit and keep qualified people. Developments such as theEuropean Health Data Space, but also AI, demonstrate the need for high quality and well managed (meta)data, and therefore the importance of having sufficient data stewardship capacity.
As the role is relatively new, and there is no formal education to become a data steward, people often learn by chance about the role while they do research themselves. They get interested in making sure that their data is well kept and reused by others. Others come from a different background, already working as a research supporter or in a library role connected to Open Science. The fact that data stewards are increasingly visible and recognised, contributes to the attractiveness of the job. Also, as the number of data stewards in academia have grown over time, new colleagues join existing teams and networks and can learn from their peers, instead of inventing the wheel themselves as they did in the early years of data stewardship. Being part of a team offers the opportunity to specialize in an area of your choice.
Several parties in the Netherlands work on strengthening data stewardship, by making it more visible (TDCCs), organising training (DCC’s, RDNL), making it required or providing funding (ZonMW, NWO, Open Science NL). You have read about these networks in Chapter 2. In the ‘Spotlight on’ series, Data Stewards explain how they got into the role, what they like about it and what they feel is lacking. See for instance:
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Didi Lamers: https://tdcc.nl/spotlight-on-didi-lamers/
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Maria Vivas Romero: https://tdcc.nl/spotlight-on-maria-vivas-romero/
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Merel Postma: https://tdcc.nl/spotlight-on-merel-postema/
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Kiana Moghaddam: https://tdcc.nl/spotlight-on-kiana-moghaddam/
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Sergi Aguilo Castillo: https://tdcc.nl/spotlight-on-sergi-aguilo-castillo/
Assignment suggestions:
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Which of the following considerations played a role in applying for a data stewards role:
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Being close to research without being a researcher
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Opportunity to have a fixed position
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Motivation to contribute to Open Science
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Being discouraged by the traditional Academic process after having had conducted a PhD
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It just came by…
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All of the above
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Considering your career, could you describe where you would like to be in 5 years?
Step 2 Data stewards job profiles
The Dutch universities (UNL) already adopted an official job profile for data stewards in their job classification system (UFO) in 2021. This profile allows for both recognition and job mobility within the role. The profile distinguishes four types of data stewards with different scope of responsibilities and related salary scales. The profile is not yet public but can be consulted by anyone affiliated at a Dutch university. The five main activities are:
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Policy development
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(Continuous) development of RDM services and products
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Advice and information
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Knowledge, quality and process improvement
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Coordination of work
Some University Medical Centers have also adopted official job profiles for their data stewards, e.g. RadboudUMC. RadboudUMC recognises three data stewards (A, B and C) in three different salary scales, according to the responsibilities and scope of their tasks. The profiles were already established in 2019 and can be found in the 2021 “Professionalising data stewardship” report that was initiated by the National Plan Open Science1. A process of adding the profile to the national job classification system for hospitals (FuWaVaz) is underway.
In practice, not all data stewards are hired in an official data steward function profile. However, we have increasingly witnessed a transition of people from roles like data manager or librarian to Data Steward.
In 2023, two years after the national report on professionalising data stewardship, TDCC LSH [link to ch. 2] organised a workshop to see the status of the recommendations from the Professionalising data stewardship report and of the adoption of official job profiles for the different research organisations. It appeared that, except for Dutch universities, the official job profile was not used in all cases. The audience suggested next steps a number of recommendations.
Table from the blogpost on the workshop ‘Building capacity for Data Stewardship in the Netherlands: formal job profiles and career perspective’2 .
Aside the recognition in terms of competencies and expertise, important stakeholders in the RDM landscape in The Netherlands have recognized the importance of Data Stewards. Funders for example have recognized their importance and imposed the need for a Data Steward to review Data Management Plan and other documentation that is mandatory to release their budget. Other initiatives also recognize Data Stewardship in the Science landscape overall (e.g Open Science Movement and Recognition and Rewards Team Science).
Step 3 Rewarding and recognition for data stewardship
“The UFO profile already improved a lot our visibility and professional paths. However, we need more clear career paths and recognition.” Maria Vivas-Romero, MUMC+ / Health-RI Limburg (https://tdcc.nl/spotlight-on-maria-vivas-romero/)
As you build your career it is also important to see how you can grow and evolve in your role. An important tool is to investigate how the UFO profile for Dutch universities allows you to navigate between different levels of Data Stewardship: Hay Nederlands document extern (liggend). The UFO profile distinguishes three main areas of activities and responsibilities for data stewards. Your ‘level’ (data steward 1 – 4), usually depends on the scope of your activities in these areas: departmental, institutional or (inter)national.
A national Rewards & Recognition programme works towards modernising the traditional way of assessing research. This means that the focus is shifting from publications to other qualities as teaching, creating impact, leadership and, in the case of UMCs, patient care. Open science practices and team science are also aspects that are valued more, which means that data stewards can get recognition for their role as part of a research team or for their efforts to make data FAIR.
Another practical tool to investigate the competencies and career track is the RDA working group Professionalising Data Stewardship -> RDA wg Data Steward Career Tracks. The RDA Data Steward Career Tracks WG proposes to approach data steward career tracks systematically by developing a methodology for data steward persona definition and creating a sample of data steward personas as well as career pathways for the sample personas.
https://www.rd-alliance.org/groups/data-steward-career-tracks-wg/activity/
Newbold, E., Wang, Y., Lehtsalu, L., Zhou, B., & McCutcheon, V. (2024). RDA Professionalising Data Stewardship IG - What does a career track for data stewards look like?. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.15497/RDA00102
EOSC Task force
What’s going on:
National
RDNL training & community platform
LCRDM
Awareness raising activities (e.g. spotlight series, links to talks / presentation on the topic)
International
RDA working group Professionalising Data Stewardship &
EOSC Task force
Kalová, T., Frontini, F., Bracco, L., Legat, D., Meeus, J., & Hasani-Mavriqi, I. (2024). Data Stewardship Career Paths: Recommendations of the EOSC Task Force Data Stewardship Curricula and Career Paths (Versie v1). Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.11077722
3.2 Training & Capacity building
Short description
As a Data Steward you would also need to build the skills discussed in the previous sections. In this section we aim to give you an overview of where to start this journey. In the past 6 years most of the Institutions in The Netherlands have developed their version of an Onboarding Training for Data Stewards. This is particularly true for Data Stewardship in Life Sciences and Medicine.
Learning Objectives
You should be able to recognize where to find your education journey to earn new competencies as a Data Steward
Step 1 Find the Available Training
The offer in Training has grown exponentially over the past 6 years. It is important to strategically plan for training components that are important to build the competencies mentioned in other sections. A good guide to make this process less complex the Metro-line pages created by Health-RI offer a good guidance: Edit - Health-RI data - Confluence
Once you have taken the step to read over this Metroline page, the next step is to contact the training coordinator in your local DCC . Every DCC and or University Hospital, has developed their own Onboarding Training for Data Stewards in the Medical and Life Sciences.
Maastricht University MUMC+: Onboarding Training for Data Professionals Maastricht University provided annually upon demand contact Maria Vivas-Romero: m.vivasromero@maastrichtuniversity.nl. This training provides an overview of services and RDM standards for the Health Life Sciences Data Professionals at the institution. It also equips them with the right tools and technologies to provide RDM services to other researchers, clinicians and other stakeholders.
Radboud University Medical Center (RadboudUMC): Researchers from RadboudUMC have mandatory induction days where they are presented with a variety of services available to them. As part of these sessions, researchers learn to apply the Findability and Acessibility principles within their studies. Furthermore, within the Radboudumc Technology Centers quarterly training FAIR RDM sessions get offered where researchers learn how to introduce the FAIR principles in their Data management practices.
Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC): At the LUMC, central Data Stewards are responsible for promoting data stewardship and FAIR research practices. They develop and maintain training materials for both researchers and support staff. A mandatory e-learning module on data stewardship, currently required for all PhD candidates, has enrolled over 200 participants. Additional in-house courses, such as Writing a Data Management Plan and From Data Export to Analysis, are offered quarterly. A program to train specialized data stewards per department is currently in progress. In collaboration with the BioSemantics group, new training resources on FAIR data are also in development.
National Efforts:
Annual Onboarding Training for Data Stewards provided by Health-RI information is shared via the Health-RI information pages: FAIR Data Stewards Basics Course | National Health Data Portal
RDNL is developing a national Training & Community Platform for data professionals. It has developed a curriculum and competency framework (see chapter 1) and will build a comprehensive training programme with all relevant parties in the Netherlands so that data stewards / data professionals can design the learning path according to their own personal development and their organisations’ needs.
Other national training opportunities for data stewards: Course: Essentials 4 Data Support (English) - Public | DANS
This course is an introductory training for starting data professionals in all research domains. It consists of online materials that touch upon all topics related to data stewardship. The materials are freely available but you can also sign up for the course. In that case you attend two in person days and do assignments together with your peers in the weeks in between. The assignements help you to get a better grip on your role as a data steward.
DCC Spring Training Days, organised by LCRDM and the local DCCs
Other places to find training include:
RDNL training & community platform (domain agnostic) - place to find trainings
Taxila
Step 2 Track your Competencies and Training in your Career
Practical exercise:
Based on what you have seen in this section let’s plan for the upcoming years in your career regarding the training and competencies you want to acquire. In the following years track the competencies and trainings you would like to accomplish in the upcoming 5 years:
| Year | Competencies | Training |
| Navigation: Back to Overview | Next Chapter: Networks, Funding & Communication |
Step 3 Build your professional network as a Data Steward
As you progress in your data stewardship career, you will naturally become familiar with more communities, societies, and cross‑institutional networks.
Many networks offer webinars, events, and knowledge‑exchange opportunities that help data stewards stay informed and build connections.
To become part of these communities and build your network, you can:
Attend community meetings and webinars - Many networks, such as RDA, GO FAIR, Health‑RI, ELIXIR‑NL, DSC‑NL, and Open Science NL, regularly organise online sessions, workshops, or conferences.
Participate in working groups or interest groups - Joining small, topic‑focused groups is a low‑threshold way to gain experience and meet peers.
Follow training offered by related communities -While not about ‘networking’ directly, these programmes like Carpentries workshops, RDM training, FAIR courses, and RSE workshops build skills and help you meet colleagues from the same area of expertise.
Learn from senior colleagues and institutional experts - More experienced colleagues can introduce you to relevant communities and provide guidance on where to find expertise.
Engage with conferences and symposia - Events such as the International FAIR Convergence Symposium, RDA Plenaries, ELIXIR Europe conferences, and national Open Science days often function as informal training on how these networks operate.
Training
Literature used
Jetten, M., Grootveld, M., Mordant, A., Jansen, M., Bloemers, M., Miedema, M., & Van
Gelder, C. W. G. (2021). Professionalising data stewardship in the Netherlands. Competences, training and education. Dutch roadmap towards national implementation of FAIR data stewardship (1.1). Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4320504