Blog

With due consideration to the late writer Maya Angelou’s paraphrased sentiment that “you can’t really know where you’re going until you know where you’ve been,” Signature Series panelists who gathered at ACRP 2026 in Orlando on Saturday (April 25) weighed in on the theme of “Embrace the Now, Ignite What’s Next” for the clinical research enterprise.

Advocating for awareness of clinical research, with all of its possible career options, in public and policy-making circles is an often quiet but mighty endeavor, but one lately being taken on at ever greater volume by a variety of cheerleaders. Some of the most vocal boosters are part of ACRP’s Partners Advancing the Clinical Research Workforce, a multi-stakeholder collaborative of industry leaders who are committed to building a diverse, research-ready workforce for the enterprise and who met to present updates on their initiatives during ACRP 2026 in Orlando.

Many organizations face financial strain as they are asked to support investigator-initiated clinical trials with little or no budget or to absorb hidden costs arising in sponsor studies. Practical strategies are needed to identify and manage this risk at sites, using tools to evaluate feasibility, recover costs and make decisions at the portfolio level. This will enable continued innovation, while building mission-driven research efforts that are likely to gain funding in future.

ACRP Fellow David J. Morin, MD, FACP, CPI, FACRP, reflects on how bringing stakeholders together around a shared purpose can reduce inefficiencies, improve collaboration, and help clinical research better serve patients.

I first became a CRC in 2004, and I love my job. But there is a part of being a CRC that no one talks about enough: the mental weight of always having so much in motion.