Tor Sporsem (29) was driving home for Christmas when he was surprisingly called by SINTEF Digital’s CEO, Morten Dalsmo. He called to deliver some good news: Sporsem is the winner of SINTEF Digital’s communication award for 2021.
- Wow! I was a little moved. It was very nice, exclaimed the winner after Dalsmo revealed that Sporsem had won the prestigious award.
- You have really shown great talent both as a researcher and as a communicator. So this is a very well-deserved prize, said the CEO to the researcher, who had to wipe away a tear in the car.
Tor Sporsem works as a researcher in the Department of Software Engineering, Safety and Security at SINTEF Digital, where he researches how digital technology changes the way we work, and hybrid work methods. In 2021, Sporsem and the research environment he belongs to in SINTEF have made important research results. Thanks to Sporsem’s commitment to dissemination, all of Norway has gained insight into these results.
- This year’s communication prize in SINTEF Digital goes to a person who has impressed with his communication skills and enthusiastic way of promoting SINTEF and his own research. Throughout 2021, the person has been visible in the media with self-initiated chronicles and interviews. The person has also given professional lectures and blogged to convey research and results, said SINTEF Digital’s CEO, Morten Dalsmo, on behalf of the jury - the communications unit and the editorial board in SINTEF Digital, to the winner.
- The research environment I am a part of inspires me to communicate. We are concerned that our research is used by the business community - that is, it has “impact” - so it must reach people. I could never have done this without the team I am in, says a humble prize winner.
Part of the social mission
In 2021, Sporsem wrote, among other things, about how large companies can take a real leap in the innovation race and how blind faith in digitization can stifle important knowledge in chronicles in Dagens Næringsliv. He warned that measuring the productivity of development teams is a risky sport in digi.no and could reveal to tu.no that caretakers sit on a gold mine of information. Sporsem plans to continue sharing his knowledge in 2022.
- Writing is thinking, I have learned. Through communication, I am forced to write so that ordinary people can understand it, which also helps me assess what is relevant to research. I believe that communicating research is part of the social mission of a researcher, so receiving such a prize is an important recognition for me, says the proud award-winning researcher. Sporsem will, among other things, talk about his research on on-boarding in a time when many employees are working from home, during SINTEF’s digital theme day “The Hybrid Workday” on January 11.
During the broadcast, he will share the “stage” with, among others, former Minister of Labor and Social Affairs and now editor of E24, Torbjørn Røe Isaksen, State Secretary Truls Wickholm in the Ministry of Labor and Inclusion, Group Director for People at Storebrand, Tove Selnes, Organizational Director at Sparebank1 Utvikling, Caroline Horn, and Sporsem’s colleague at SINTEF Digital, Chief Researcher Nils Brede Moe. The broadcast is organized in collaboration with Storebrand.
