An ORCID iD (Open Researcher and Contributor ID) gives you a way to reliably, unambiguously and permanently connect your names(s) with your work throughout your research career, including publications, grants, education, employment and other biographical information, etc.
This can be helpful in a number of ways as it:
Provides a means to distinguish you from other authors with identical or similar names.
Links together your body of work, especially if you have had or used different names during the course of your career.
Makes it easy for others including potential collaborators, funders, prospective employers, conference organizers, publishers to easily find your research output.
Ensures that your work is clearly attributed to you
Researcher names can be ambiguous for a number of reasons. People who have published under common names, maiden names, abbreviations, or names including non-Roman characters may encounter difficulties in being discovered online. ORCIDs clarify this ambiguity by providing unique identifiers for each researcher.
The following example illustrates the number of ways that a single person's name could be rendered in publications and research outputs.(Slide by Mogens Sandfær of DEFF).
ORCIDs have already been integrated into workflows used by a variety of publishers, funders, and research organizations. The result is that citations can be automatically pushed to and from your ORCID profile with minimal effort on your part.
