Despite a large, reported interest significant barriers prevent academics from contributing to decision-making processes, including a lack of knowledge about how to engage, insufficient time to participate, and a lack of acknowledgement of individual contributions beyond citations. For example, engaging with policy decision-making processes is not necessarily rewarded in the same way as other activities, such as publishing in journals or generating press coverage. This acts as a significant barrier to participation for many academics, but particularly early career researchers. But what might solutions look like? Funders can act as agents of change that promote, recognise and reward academic-policy engagement; universities must recognise and reward the varied workload attached to the impact agenda; policy institutions must provide academics the supporting documents which can help them to demonstrate impact. Whatever the solutions are, they require the foundation of new incentive structures, better recognition of engagement, and cultural change. Part of this requires establishing dialogue between academics, funding bodies, and policy institutions.