Changing the way we do business: reflecting on collaborative practice

Reflective practice has long been associated with enhancing professional knowledge and practice. This paper considers reflective practice in the context of a collaborative policing research partnership conducted almost 10 years ago using a personal electronic diary kept for the duration of the research project. The paper draws on the notion of 'reflection-in-action' - that is, reflecting tacitly, 'in the moment' as we survey and consider a situation; and 'reflection-on-action' - a process of reflection that takes place after the event. The paper argues that a journal can be a useful tool, not only for documenting events and activity but as a way of critically reflecting on your research experience and acknowledging the assumptions, relationships and influences embedded in that experience. The journal has been transformative in that it has allowed me to actively engage with a previously lived research experience and reinterpret that experience in a new context. This has been the value of the research journal: recognising that new lessons are learned and relearned from old practices.