Legacy Isn’t Enough: Show You’re Still Making a Difference

In the evolving landscape of recent NHMRC Investigator Grant successes and emerging emphasis on impact in the revised assessment criteria, one message is becoming increasingly clear: impact is no longer defined by a single breakthrough, but by sustained contribution to health outcomes over time.

For Investigator Grant applicants, the shift in score descriptors for the Impact Track Record section presents both an opportunity and a challenge to think differently about how we define success across a research career. It encourages us to think beyond publications and discovery shifting the focus from what you discovered to what continues to change because of your work. But it also raises a difficult question, particularly for more senior researchers: What happens when your most influential work was done decades ago?

Academic culture has long celebrated the breakthrough moment: the high-impact paper, the landmark discovery, the first demonstration of a new concept, theory or methodology. These achievements matter and cement your pioneering contributions to the field. In many cases, they have transformed health, increasing survival and quality of life for millions worldwide.

But breakthroughs, by their nature, are moments in time. Their true value is only realised through what happens next, and how they are translated, implemented, adapted, and sustained within real-world systems.

From discovery to stewardship – the hidden work of sustained impact

Much of what sustains impact is, paradoxically, the least visible and is challenging to describe when foundational work was done decades ago. A useful way to frame evolving expectations from the NHMRC is to think about research careers in phases. Early career researchers (ECRs) may focus more on knowledge creation, mid-career researchers (MCRs) may expand into translation and scale, and senior researchers increasingly take on ‘stewardship of impact’. This shift reflects a move away from valuing single breakthrough moments toward recognising responsibility for how research continues to shape outcomes over time. Stewardship should be understood as active leadership, owning the long-term trajectory of impact, influencing systems, and ensuring that earlier discoveries remain relevant and effective.

Stewardship may not be as visible as discovery but is more than just passive maintenance, being critical to delivering measurable outcomes. It is dynamic, ongoing work that is often strengthened by your established reputation in the field. It is continuously updating clinical guidelines over 15 years as new evidence evolves and ongoing engagement with clinicians to ensure it is used correctly. It is adapting interventions as new data emerge to new contexts and priority populations in need. It is the persistence required to embed a new program across multiple health services, and importantly it is building capacity by mentoring the teams, infrastructure, and partnerships that carry on the research.

In this context, stewardship becomes the mechanism that connects past discovery to present and future benefit, ensuring that impact is not a moment in time, but something actively maintained, adapted, and extended. For funding bodies like the NHMRC, recognising this ‘hidden work’ is essential. And for applicants, articulating it clearly is becoming a critical skill required to maximise your Investigator Track Record assessment.

Avoiding 'impact amnesia'

A narrow emphasis on recent outputs and contributions can lead to what might be called ‘impact amnesia’, overlooking the enduring influence of earlier work. This can undervalue foundational contributions, incentivise short-term thinking, and discourage investment in implementation and maintenance. However, relying solely on past achievements is equally problematic. Health systems evolve, evidence shifts, and new challenges emerge. The goal is not to choose between past or present impact, but to demonstrate a continuous thread between them. To show that you are making a proactive, deliberate, targeted and effective contribution to the conceptualisation, design execution, analysis, translation across the research lifecycle. Some of these contributions sit outside traditional academic metrics, requiring a broader narrative that connects past discoveries to current outcomes and future potential. Framed effectively, they show that impact is not a one-off achievement, but an evolving process; actively maintained, adapted, and amplified over time.

For those preparing NHMRC Investigator Grant applications, and for the broader research community, the task ahead is clear: not just to demonstrate that our work has mattered, but to show that it continues to matter. Ultimately, demonstrating sustained impact strengthens the credibility of your future research, signalling that new knowledge generated will not only be discovered, but delivered.