Concurrent Sessions and Deep Dives

Working in Research Administration can take a toll on our well-being. The stresses of dealing with difficult personalities, endless deadlines, and constant changes to federal and internal guidelines and policies are sometimes daunting. While we are not licensed mental health practitioners, your co-presenters are Research Administrators who understand the pressure points and the need for self-care. Join us for a fun session where you can vent your frustrations to a sympathetic ear, learn from challenges that others are having, and discuss coping strategies. There may even be a primal scream or two.

This session will focus on how we developed a framework and assessment methodology on behalf of the University of Bristol, to consider its engagement with external third parties. Most UK universities will have existing processes for due diligence assessment of third-party suitability, most of which would require escalation for a decision. The purpose of this Executive Board-approved project that we led was to develop a proposal to them of an aligned process for informed decision-making and recording of decisions reached by key stakeholders. The project aimed to address consistency of the decision-making process, the lack of transparency it generated, and the lack of clarity around who key decision makers are. By implementing this process, we were able to identify tangible and intangible benefits across the institution including, but not limited to, reduced risk of penalties for non-compliance, auditable evidence of transparent and consistent decision-making demonstrating legal/funder compliance, reduced risk of delays and damaged relationships, and clear guidance and process reducing confusion and ambiguity. The purpose of this session will be to provide a forum for sharing the benefits we identified during this process, and most importantly, the lessons we have learned throughout.

All good things must come to an end. And while the science is never finished, the award cycle is always turning. A compliant closeout is fundamental to staying in sponsor and auditor good graces so that they continue to send the money. Join me to learn how the countdown clock starts when the notice of award arrives and continues throughout the course of the project. We will review the regulations that drive closeout and master the varying sponsor requirements. Checklists, why yes! Customize your own and don't miss a beat.

It’s a common joke among research administrators – we fall into this profession and turn it into a career because of our passion for research. But what opportunities exist for research administrators, new and seasoned alike? This session will explore different career paths in research administration across organizations and career stages. We will also share practical tips for building networks and growing relationships with colleagues that benefit continuous learning and professional development.

Research Management and Administration (RMA) has been an evolving profession over several decades. Initially the profession was seen as “a post box” for faculty wishing to submit grant proposals and a financial management or compliance office once faculty had been awarded grant funding. RMA position titles of the time reflected these roles with titles such as Pre-Award Officer and Compliance Officer being common. Over the years, and as the scope of RMA has broadened, position titles have changed to reflect both the increasing specialization and the increasing breadth of roles, for example Research Development Specialist, Navigator. This latter term (Navigator) coming from the health sector where the Navigator position helps clients/patients navigate an increasing complex health system – and is now applied in RMA. This talk by speakers having several decades of shared experience across multiple countries, will look at likely roles for RMAs in the next decade. These roles are likely to be shaped by the changing nature of research itself, moves to increasingly complex legislation around research, and changes to service expectations by faculty, government, and the external community. Such knowledge will assist current RMAs in their professional development, preparing for the future environment and will also assist leaders in recruiting new staff into new roles with skills that will equip their offices to provide high quality service in a changing environment.

This session will discuss issues and tricks related to managing grants from within a department; not a central office. Whether your institution has a central office or not, there are certain things that are just different when you are working on submitting and managing grants from within a department. The session will cover finding funding sources, pre-award submissions and post-award management of grants. The session will also identify additional ways to provide ongoing support for investigators; including trainees, fellows, associates, staff and faculty researchers.

Effective January 25, 2023, the NIH implemented their new Data Management and Sharing (DMS) policy that requires investigators to include a data management plan (DMP) with all grant applications for research that generates scientific data. It is expected that this policy will help strengthen biomedical research by enabling scientific data reproducibility and access to high-quality datasets. The new policy emphasizes the importance of data sharing and thus requires investigators to deposit their scientific data in publicly accessible data repositories at or before publication or at the completion of a research project, whichever comes first. In this regard, institutions have been tasked with preparing their faculty for the new requirements to ensure compliance. We will review our approach to a campus-wide communications campaign, resources established to ensure that investigators and administrators were prepared for this new NIH requirement, and the lessons learned along the way, including the development of an institutional data repository available at no charge to investigators. Since it is anticipated that additional guidance from NIH will be released about data management and sharing in 2023 and 2024, this session will outline steps institutions can take to strengthen investigator understanding of DMS requirements and ensure compliance in the future.

The 2023 revisions to the National Institutes of Health's data management policy required a shift in requirements and compliance. This session will re-visit the new policy and include an interactive session that addresses questions such as: What has changed since the policy launched? What issues are campuses and research institutes encountering? What is the biggest challenge in compliance? What best practices are emerging after almost a year of the new requirements?  We want this to be an interactive session - come share your challenges and experiences with your colleagues!

Grants Management Specialists at the NIH manage funds that are disbursed as grants to universities, small businesses, and other organizations to conduct research. They serve as experts for the planning, implementation and evaluation of grant proposals and provide guidance on a variety of agreements including: cooperative agreements, cost-share agreements, participating agreements, collection agreements, interagency and intra-agency agreements and memoranda of understanding.

Congratulations, new leader! You’re embarking on an incredibly rewarding (but also fundamentally challenging) journey where you can impact the institution on multiple levels. In this session, we’ll help you make that path a little easier by calling upon the hit musical Hamilton! As a new leader finding his way, Alexander struggled with the same challenges we all do – how do you empathetically motivate others while ensuring that work gets done and things stay on track? What do you do if you make a mistake or feel like you’ve hit a wall? How do you prioritize and make decisions when there are multiple stakeholders? We’ll cover all that and more, and by the time this session is over – you’ll have a foundation to start from and songs to reinforce them.

Building and maintaining a culture of ethical behavior in the conduct of research is more than the right thing to do – it is the foundation of a responsible conduct of research, of good science and of being a good community partner. Cutting ethical corners for expedience or in pursuit of research dollars or accolades is risky. Think of your institution’s name under a headline of a multi-million dollar False Claims Act settlement, or in twelve-foot high letters on a screen before a jury, or in a paper retraction. Chances are that this is not a situation you and your institution want to encounter. But the research enterprise if fraught with competing interests, giving rise to conflicting motivators. How can we respond to these divergent interests in a way that enhances rigor and integrity of our science while mitigating risk? One pathway to this balancing point is through the application of conflict management techniques in building an ethical culture of compliance. Whether by giving stake-holders (and rights-holders) a voice in the process, engaging cold cognition rather than responding to emotionally driven decision making, competing interests can be clearly framed and measured against institutional core values, legal and regulatory requirements, with the result that ethical conduct becomes ingrained as an institutional priority and, ultimately, a reality.

Research administration is a constantly evolving and growing industry. Many institutions are expanding their research portfolios as we strive to enhance health globally. In the hustle and bustle of a growing industry, it’s easy to have something fall through the cracks. An overlooked component of 200.430(i) is the stipulation of an internal control environment. This extends beyond certification of effort and/or payroll confirmation. Does your organization have controls in place to monitor effort certification, salary caps, and overcommitted faculty? In this session, we’ll discuss preventative and detective post-award internal controls. The presenters will explore implementing internal controls in a post-award management setting. Additionally, we’ll share best practices for conducting compliance reviews in effort reporting, monitoring salary caps, and managing overcommitted faculty.

Almost every research institution must engage in the process of negotiating federal indirect rates. Non-profits face unique challenges under the Uniform Guidance in preparing, submitting and negotiating indirect rates. As we go through this process, many of us often wonder if we have done everything we can do within the constraints of federal regulations in order to maximize our institution’s negotiated indirect rate and resulting indirect cost recovery. In this session, we will discuss strategies that may be employed to maximize indirect cost recovery, both in the preparation of your indirect rate proposal as well as during the subsequent rate negotiation and budgeting of indirect costs on grants and contracts. Participants will be encouraged to share their experiences concerning the indirect rate process.

Retaining enterprise knowledge in the fast changing world of research administration plays a vital role in achieving our day to day tasks. It takes creative strategic planning to achieve maximum efficiency without the sacrifice of quality within the remote, hybrid, in-person environments we are operating in. In this session, various methods to assist with this process will be reviewed. Additionally, we will aid the understanding of knowledge transfer by adding an audience activity which will give attendees a "walk through" of the process and a template they can tailor for their needs.

The last several years have seen a wave of new requirements related to addressing the risk of foreign influence and the emergence of Research Security as a profession and best compliance and mitigation practice. This presentation will walk attendees through history, evolution and present and pending activity of the U.S. Funding Agencies and Congressional activity to address foreign influence in the U.S. research and development enterprise. Discussion will include agency and community recognition of the problem, internal responses, changes in policy, and legislation to increase compliance and reduce risk of foreign influence to where we are today and where we are headed.

As more sponsors are requiring project and program management methodologies and/or personnel for the management of awards and educational institutions are now recognizing the benefits of project management with limited information/literature available to identify and inform on the benefits and placement within existing organizational structures and roles/responsibilities. This discussion is an opportunity for peers from various roles to share and understand how different institutions view and differentiate between project management and project administration responsibilities as this is one of the most common questions around this topic. The objectives are to facilitate discussion across various sponsored project roles on key differences and similarities between project management and project administration with emphasis on how this is distinguished and managed through responsibilities on various awards at different institutions.

The session will review the requirements for subrecipient monitoring under OMB Uniform Guidance 2 CFR 200. Topics under this session include: subaward vs. contractor determination, institutions policies on UG, risk assessment, risk mitigation, subrecipient monitoring, and more. The session will also briefly discuss FFATA reporting. This session will be interactive and encourages participants to share ideas from their respective institution.

Adhering to the U.S. export controls regulations is an essential component of a strong research compliance program. Supporting internal compliance measures around export controls is particularly challenging when you have broad responsibility for multiple areas of research compliance. In this session, we'll explain why the U.S. export control regulations exist and walk through the three core sets of federal regulations: Department of Commerce Export Administration Regulations (EAR), Department of State International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), and the Department of Treasury Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) regulations. We'll cover the primary aspects of the regulations that intersect with research administration efforts on a weekly basis, such as the fundamental research exclusion (FRE), public information, export control classifications, government licensing requirements, license exceptions, denied parties, and sanctioned and embargoed countries. We’ll also make connections between federal export controls regulations and the latest academic research security guidance and initiatives stemming from National Security Presidential Memorandum 33 (NSPM-33) and the U.S. Department of Defense. The presentation will show linkages between the multiple areas of research compliance to aid you in implementing practical and effective export controls compliance measures at your institution.

Like many institutions post-pandemic, Children’s Hospital Los Angeles (CHLA) felt the pain of trying to manage an expanded research portfolio while managing staff turnover. Simultaneously, as a safety net hospital, CHLA wanted to ensure it was maximizing its investment in research. To address both needs, CHLA underwent an external assessment of its research operating model to inform improvements to its people and systems infrastructure and to validate how it calculated its investment in research. This session will provide a high-level discussion of the background and purpose of CHLA’s review and major findings. The majority of this session will discuss lessons learned along the way, including ways to obtain faculty perspective and willingness to engage in self-governance, strategies for aligning and justifying needs with strategic plans and other institutional missions, and effectively telling the story of research at your institution to garner leadership buy-in.

Collaborating across borders is becoming more and more common, but at the same time more and more complex. From a high-level leadership perspective, we will i) identify barriers toward collaborations between US and Denmark; and ii) offer recommendations toward overcoming them. We will accomplish this by using a framework that compares the following elements between US and Denmark: i) Research leadership structure; ii) external relations; iii) sponsored research services; iv) research ethics and compliance; and v) technology transfer.

While there are challenges to oversight of international research collaborations, they pale in comparison to those faced when participating in international research collaborations - including but not limited to those arising from different cultural, regulatory, and institutional contexts. But, then, so do the opportunities. This session is designed to explore the various challenges that institutions face when conducting collaborative international research. Panelists will address a variety of issues that may arise regarding international research how they have addressed them.

This session proposal will focus on IRB reliance and the impact of mandatory reliance for federally funded studies. It will provide a background of how the current reliance landscape came to be (including information about the FDA Notice of Proposed Rulemaking for IRB Cooperative Research) and will focus on the impact of IRB reliance on agreements/contracts, fees/budgets and institutional responsibility (COI and other ancillary reviews and federal reporting requirements).

In 2023, many research administrators are working in a hybrid or fully remote environment. Managers often need to learn how to keep their team engaged and cultivate culture without the traditional office setup of years past. During this session, we will explore ideas and strategies to help ensure your teams are fully involved in your company’s culture, regardless of location. We will review various electronic communications tools and tips for bridging a generational range of team members. At the same time, we will examine the ongoing pitfalls and challenges of hybrid and remote work.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) Office of Inspector General (OIG) prevents and detects fraud, waste, and abuse in NSF programs and operations. The Research Integrity and Administrative Investigations (RIAI) Division investigates allegations of research misconduct (falsification, fabrication, and plagiarism) relating to NSF proposals and awards and violations of NSF regulations, policy, or directives. When appropriate, RIAI refers investigation results to NSF's Office of the Director for administrative resolution. This presentation will share information on common administrative violation investigations. Several case study examples will be used to demonstrate selected red flags research administrators might be able to detect. Audience discussion will expand on presentation examples of how research administrators and their institutions can decrease the risk of administrative violations.

In the Gambia, like African countries, research ethics and integrity are concepts that are not well known due to the low level of research activities in most academic and state-owned research institutions. The country adopted a skills-based and knowledge economy that prioritized research and so it was necessary to develop national policies that support the implementation of research agenda for universities and research institutions. Since 1947, Medical Research Council Unit, The Gambia at LSHTM was the only research institution in the country conducting biomedical research and the country has one independent research ethics committee that was established in 1980 which is still the only recognized ethics committee. 
The national research policy for the country was established through a consultative process involving various sectors and policy actors. The main objective of the policy is to set the tone for how research should be conducted in the country outlining all the regulatory processes that need to be met before the conduct of research in the country. The policy identified the need to establish a national ethics regulatory framework under which institutions will be authorized to form institutional review boards. 
Findings from the consultative process highlighted the need to strengthen ethical review capacity in the country by providing formal training on research ethics and the role of ethics committees, training of a set of ethics administrators and establishing a national ethics secretariat to drive ethical review processes, design a central system for submission syncing all regulatory reviews under one umbrella. Funding from the EDCTP is supporting these activities under the leadership of MRCG with other international partners including EthiXpert and Pharmalys.

Across the world governments encourage universities to apply their research for social and economic benefits. What are the opportunities for humanities and the social sciences to commercialize, collaborate and influence policy and the public? This talk will use international case studies to develop a ‘roadmap for impact’. We will explore pathways via partners in the business, public and NGO sectors, and the fact that academics often use multiple pathways and funders to achieve their impact goals. We will touch on what funders offer and require, comparing the UK's Arts & Humanities Research Council with the US National Endowment for the Humanities. Attendees will be invited to propose new pathways and partners, sketching alternative histories and futures for our real-life case studies.

This session will compare definitions of research misconduct between the UK and the US and how each wrestle with conduct that goes beyond traditional definitions. It will also provide a background on the current expansion of integrity related compliance issues including Detrimental Research Practices, scientific integrity, research security and the rapidly increasing compliance responsibilities of research integrity and other compliance officers in both countries.

Abbott and Costello. Bonny and Clyde. Batman and Robin. What do these duos all have in common? They are each an example of a successful partnership. Members of the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) and sponsored programs offices can be too! Effective partnerships start with developing a common understanding of the framework that each must operate within, providing a strong base from which to collaborate. This session will help participants build a foundation in the basic laws and regulations that govern the use of animals in research, as well as common IACUC review processes. Participants will also explore how these regulations and processes can intersect with the grant life cycle through didactic discussions and examine strategies to facilitate communication to ensure compliance is achieved and research is not hindered.

As a research administrator, you likely use Excel on a regular basis. Along the way, you have probably encountered pesky calculations that take longer than expected to perform, large amounts of unruly data that need to be prepared prior to analysis, or data from multiple sources that need to be joined together to form a complete dataset for reporting. 

The good news is that you can make your spreadsheets work harder for you, with the use of some time-saving tips and tricks. In this session, we will review intermediate-level tools and functions within Excel using real-life examples of spreadsheets that were made easier to use. Participants should bring their laptops to follow along. 

Over the past two decades, the research funding landscape in the UK (from where we write) and internationally has changed in many ways - particularly in the social sciences and humanities, where imperatives such as ‘collaboration’, ‘transdisciplinarity’ and ‘impact’ increasingly dominate. In this paper we draw upon survey data and interview findings (from across the world) to illustrate the ways in which these changes are impacting research(er) practices.
We reflect particularly on researchers’ views on the interests and logics driving recent changes to the research funding landscape; the nature and shape of current (and emerging) funding structures; and the modes of intellectual enquiry that are encouraged and discouraged through these arrangements.
We also draw attention to researchers’ views on the EDI implications of a research funding landscape emphasising collaborative, open and team-science approaches; and the dominance of research funding conditions in shaping what many consider to be an increasingly competitive and individualistic academic culture.
We conclude with a series of recommendations for those identifying, applying for and administering research funding opportunities.

Using a digital employee experience framework, the study examined how the pandemic impacted the research administration work environment. This dissertation presents perceptions and draws insights from research administration leaders, management, and staff on digital work and digital employee experiences through the pandemic. The dissertation was motivated by three research questions: (1) What challenges did research administrators encounter during the Pandemic? (2) What were the research administrators’ perceptions of digital transformation during their employee journey? and (3) What is the future of research administration as the industry moves forward post-pandemic? Previous literature indicated that the digital employee experience framework comprised eight essential components: technology, physical environment, culture, business strategy, leadership, career, brand, and personal. Since the 2020 pandemic began, various studies of digital work environments, digital employee experiences, and remote work have been conducted. To study the research administration's perceptions of digital work environments and digital employee experiences from a holistic perspective, a sequential mixed methods approach utilizing quantitative and qualitative research methods was selected. The key findings from the research revealed that maintaining team culture in a digital environment is challenging and that leaders must be creative and innovative to maintain the culture of their teams. The Pandemic transformed the landscape of research administration from the team and organizational levels by changing from fully in-person-office models to remote and hybrid models. This transformation created challenges and obstacles for management and staff, prompting them to rethink how to perform research administration business in different environments. The study indicated that leadership should invest in Digital Employee Experience tools and practices as we enter this new research administration world. These tools and practices can provide positive employee experiences in a digital environment.

There is growing recognition of the importance of international research partnerships in addressing contemporary challenges in research, management and society. International partnerships enable researchers to share knowledge and combine expertise to address complex problems that are increasingly interdisciplinary in nature. This session will reflect on how project support activities contribute to the overall success and impact of interdisciplinary international research partnerships. It draws on a small mixed methods sample of survey responses (N=14) and interviews (N=9) of project managers implementing activities that formed part of the Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) Growing Research Capability call launched in 2016 by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI). Three key results emerged from the data which we will present to participants: 1) Organisational capacity was a key determinant of success in creating international partnerships; 2) Building and maintaining partnerships was influenced heavily by UK institutions acting as lead partner and managing finances, alongside creating and designing bid development timelines; and 3) Finally, decisions on the design of project support teams/roles and the resources allocated to this are significant in the development of effective large programmatic consortia. To conclude, we will offer key recommendations for the development and implementation of large-scale international and interdisciplinary research collaborations disaggregated by project phase and roles.

NSPM-33, a National Security Presidential Memorandum focused on US Government-supported R&D, directed federal agencies to establish consistent and coordinated policies and procedures to strengthen protections against foreign government interference. It instructs agencies to implement standardized procedures that leverage digital persistent identifiers (DPIs) to minimize administrative burden. The National Science and Technology Council's (NSTC) Research Security Subcommittee, through the NSF, has solicited public comment on common disclosure forms for the Biographical Sketch and Current and Pending (Other) Support sections of research applications and will publish formal requirements for agencies. ORCID IDs are persistent identifiers (DPIs) for individuals and support the data tracking requirements inherent in these requirements. ORCID profiles can collate much of the information needed to populate these common forms. SciENcv is a web based electronic system provided by the National Library of Medicine that can import information from ORCID profiles and format it as required by agencies for use in applications and reports while also collecting the required investigator certification.

It is the role of Human Research Protection Programs (HRPP) to protect the rights and welfare of human participants in research. Have a knowledge of the background behind the research ethics regulations as well as the principles and requirements that must take place before research studies are executed are essential. In this session, we will take a journey to explore history of ethics board (ie, IRB) and how they have developed into HRPPs to promote a culture of the highest ethical and legal standards for the conduct of human research as well as explore the function and operations of a Human Research Protection program – including the role and responsibility of the IRB, COI, etc.

This session will discuss USDA NIFA's 30% of total federal fund awarded (TFFA) cap on indirect for all agriculture research, education, and extension proposal submission. The first portion of the session will explain basic concepts of direct costs, indirect costs, and total project costs, including the math behind them and how they work together. This foundation is needed to fully understand NIFA's indirect cap. The next portion will explain the math behind calculating TFFA, and will discuss NIFA's rules in depth -- including the fact that both lead and subawardee indirect must meet the 30% TFFA cap when summed together. The final portion will explain best practices in fairly updating the indirect on budgets so both the lead and sub's meet NIFA's rules. An Excel "TFFA calculator" developed by the presenter to aid in making NIFA indirect decisions will be demonstrated and made available for use by attendees.

Research Management and Administration, a growing profession with its roots in the 1950’s is on the move, with the wind in its sails. As SRAI increases its international research and influence, it is important to equip research managers and administrators to navigate the increasingly diverse and complex ecosystem. Common themes and challenges for research administration, such as ethics, research security and research impact, have emerged across many countries, with various jurisdictional responses. Further, as research collaborations have exploded at the international level, research managers and administrators need the requisite skills and understanding to work effectively with international colleagues. This international panel, composed of participants from countries, such as Australia, Canada and the U.S. will discuss these themes and how research administrators are addressing them in their jurisdictions. They will also make observations on tools and training that can promote shared understanding and competency for international collaborations.

Covid-19 has upended the idea of networking for research administrators. Gone are the days of in-person meetings, water cooler chats and lunches with your RA colleagues as remote/hybrid workforces have become the norm across our entire community. How do you “network” both at your institution and beyond in this new reality? Two senior RA’s will guide you through a host of formal, informal, and homegrown networking opportunities they have been involved in at their institution. SRAI & NCURA specific opportunities, local level ideas for low/no budget environments, plus pitfalls and obstacles (along with mitigation suggestions) will be discussed to give attendees a framework for how to integrate “new normal” networking at all levels of research administration.

Do you want to document the societal impacts and benefits of research, engagement, and expertise? Join us for this session where you’ll learn about the Co-produced Pathway to Impact and explore a tool to write impact and engagement case studies. This tool features a stakeholder interview guide and a case study template that reflects contributions of academic and non-academic partners. • Map your pathway from research to impact • Understand contribution analysis and how it informs a semi structured interview guide to collect the evidence of impact retrospectively but also throughout the research to impact journey • Understand what is needed to draft a case study of your research impact The tool is publicly available (link below) and is the subject of a book chapter referenced below. https://researchimpact.ca/kmb_resource/impact-and-engagement-case-study-guidelines/ Phipps, D., Poetz, A., and Johnny, M. (2022) Demonstrating impact - considerations for collecting and communicating the evidence of impact. In, Kelly, W.B. (Ed.). (in press, 2022). The Impactful Academic: being and becoming an impactful researcher throughout your career.

This session will trace the origins, current status, and anticipated trajectories of national scale research impact initiatives in Canada, United Kingdom and United States. Presenters will compare and contrast: 1) US-based ARIS, a loose knit transformative learning network that aims professionalize and support those who work across institutions to build research impact capacity; 2) pan-Canadian RIC, a more formal network of signatory institutions that builds institutional capacity for knowledge mobilization and societal impacts of research; and 3) networks that have arisen in response to the UK’s impact agenda. This panel style discussion will cover the evolution of national policies that drive investment in these initiatives, the role of research administration and leadership in enabling impact, institutional and structural realities that both constrain and enable impact, and the roles and practices of professionals that work to directly create research impacts in society. Systemic change, in terms of how the culture of research is shifting toward centering impact, will be explored. The presenters will share best practices for building and maintaining very different, but cohesive national impact initiatives and how they anticipate these growing or changing over the coming decade. Additionally, they will share progress on international efforts to build connection and capacity for impact.

In response to increased scrutiny regarding conflicts of interest (COI), commitment (COC), reporting of foreign engagement, the University of Maryland implemented a new electronic COI process. The process covers compliance, disclosure, disposition, monitoring, and reporting. This session will discuss best practices UMD has implemented along the way, including: revising the COI Policy, rolling out the process, and dealing with COI-related audit findings. All of this is in service to creating a COI program that is a partnership between the individual, the department, and the COI office.

The Association of Research Managers and Administrators UK has led a consortium to consider 'Efficiency, Equity, Quality and Security in International Research Collaboration'. The research conducted has enabled us to gain significant insights into the sector response to research security issues in the United Kingdom and to make a series of recommendations for how the sector can collaborate to improve its compliance and deliver a security conscious culture. Our research benefited significantly from the insights of international colleagues who are at different stages in their national responses. Our session will explore what we can learn learn from each other as international colleagues, tackling similar challenges in our own environments.

The growing concerns about improper foreign influence on federally funded research at US universities have led to heightened scrutiny and a stricter enforcement of compliance measures. Two critical aspects of foreign influence that have been emphasized by federal funders are transparency and upholding the fundamental principles of scientific integrity. Much of the education at universities around foreign influence is aimed at investigators. Department Research Administrators (DRAs) are an untapped institutional resource on the front line of identifying and appropriately presenting foreign influence when submitting research proposals. This presentation, targeted at DRAs, will define foreign influence and the disclosure requirements of federal sponsors. It will offer guidance on how they can protect the PIs and the institution by recognizing a foreign component, when international travel needs to be disclosed, how to review Other/Current and Pending Support documents with an eye for disclosure, etc.

At some point, every higher education institution (HEI) or organization receiving grant funding will be audited by the sponsor. Therefore, grantee organizations must prepare for those audits and implement best practices to minimize audit findings.

Emotional Intelligence (EI), the ability to control one’s own emotions and to perceive the feelings of others, is an invaluable skill to aid in the collaboration and management of successful research administration teams. Self-awareness and the ability to manage emotion also benefit managers faced with implementing continuous changes in institutional and sponsor guidelines and processes. In this session, we will define the components of EI and provide added focus on discerning emotion in the remote work environment through verbal and non-verbal cues. Developing proficiency in EI gives managers insight into leadership and team members’ moods, well-being, job satisfaction, strengths and limitations, etc. EI awareness allows employees to customize communications, adapt for inclusivity and respond appropriately to the emotions of others. This ability to lead, adapt, perceive and support is especially critical to the retention of skilled research administrators given the current workplace personnel shortage.

Internal Audit can be an institution's first line of defense for understanding and mitigating risks associated with research across an institution. Using data analytics, risk-based sampling, and bringing a detailed understanding and subject matter expertise, research departments can partner with their internal auditors, whether they be co-sourced or internal to the university, to better understand their risk and control universe and streamline and modify processes and controls to mitigate risks and maintain compliant with the many complex standards that affect a large portion of their institutional funding. 

Today many resort to bullying when faced with individuals they don’t understand or seem to not be the norm. As the person being bullied you often don’t know where to turn or how-to speak up in the situation. If you are being bullied by an employee what is your recourse? If you are bullied by a manager, what should you do? This session will explore workplace bullying and using case studies explore workable solutions.

This session will cover new developments related to proposal and award policy at NSF. NSF staff will provide a comprehensive review of upcoming changes to the Proposal and Award Policies and Procedures Guide (PAPPG) (24-1), as well as other new developments at NSF.

On October 5, 2023, OMB published a proposal for a fundamental rewrite the Uniform Guidance 2 CFR 200 (*). The White House announced that “the proposal will materially decrease the burden on recipients of Federal financial assistance, advance equity and job growth across the country, and meaningfully improve the administration of Federal financial assistance.” See links below. Specifically, OMB states that the reasons for the proposed revisions are: “(1) incorporating statutory requirements and administration priorities; (2) reducing agency and recipient burden; (3) clarifying sections that recipients or agencies have interpreted in different ways; and (4) rewriting applicable sections in plain language, improving flow, and addressing inconsistent use of terms.”
This session will dig deep into the following questions:
• What are the major revisions in the proposal?
• When will the revisions become effective?
• How will the revisions impact the administration on your research grants?
ttps://public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2023-21078.pdf
Dollars Delivering Results: Biden-Harris Administration Publishes Proposed Updates to the Uniform Grants Guidance to Improve Impact of Federal Grants and Other Financial Assistance | OMB | The White House
(*) As of 09/28/23, per the public inspection document, the scheduled date for publication of the OMB proposal in the Federal Register is October 5, 2023, which means that the comments are due to OMB by December 5, 2023 (60 days after publication).

This session provides an opportunity to learn what is new and what is being developed within the National Institute of Health's (NIH) programs, policies, and budgets. In this comprehensive review, participants will learn about the newest policy updates and how their respective institutions may be impacted. Participants will also have the opportunity to ask questions about new and existing policies and procedures. Topics include recent and upcoming changes to NIH policy, compliance requirements, and much more.

The new director of the Office of Research Integrity (ORI) will provide a review of the structure and function of ORI including ORI's regulatory authority, divisions, and a review of the current regulations. She will also provide an overview of the institutions' responsibilities with regard to ORI including assurance, annual reports, and review of allegations of research misconduct when PHS funding is involved.

If I had a dime for every time an investigator walked into my office with an exciting opportunity! What tools do you need to predict the financial success or failure of an industry initiated clinical trial? This session will provide an introduction to industry initiated clinical trial budgeting. As we examine a typical clinical trial protocol we will detail several phases of budget development. We will assess protocol feasibility for sites, analyze required tools for budgeting and calculate a basic budget. That was the easy part! This session will also include discussion of successful budget negotiation and sponsor invoicing.

Colleges and universities receiving direct federal awards are typically required to have a federally negotiated facilities and administrative (“F&A”) cost rate in order to receive reimbursement for indirect costs. For most people, however, the process of preparing, submitting, and negotiating the F&A rate proposal under the Uniform Guidance can appear overly technical and painfully detailed. This session is intended for anyone who is new to the F&A process or would simply like to better understand the basic requirements, inputs and objectives that make up this calculation. Discussion session will include a high-level perspective regarding how the regulations, financial and other data inputs, and submission and negotiation processes work together and will provide practical insight into the application of the F&A rate to the organization’s awards. Participants are encouraged to share their role in as well as their experience with the indirect rate process at their institution.

This session will focus on closeouts. How do we find time to complete timely closeouts with too many awards to manage and not enough staff? We will explore the issues of not closing awards on time and discuss how to recover if you find your institution in this situation. We will also discuss in a perfect world tips and tools for closing awards and the appropriate action plans to ensure accurate filing of FFR's.

At many institutions, research administration and research development departments tend to operate in separate spheres, sometimes leading to friction during proposal development and submission. In this discussion-centered session, we will examine how RA and RD can support each other’s work in order to positively impact the research enterprise. Hear from a panel of professionals in RA, RD, and integrated roles and share your experiences and any resources or best practices you have that help support that relationship.

SRAI has brought together a panel of legal and HR experts to discuss the issues that YOU need to consider as our profession moves more positions to remote work. We'll also discuss the impact of the latest current developments in HR/employment law that impact remote work. If an employee is working in another State, are you following that State’s employment laws? Did you even know they’re different? Are taxes being withheld appropriately? What if they’re in another country? Does the institution need to register as a business someplace else? If their home office is hazardous, what’s the institution’s potential liability? What if some employees are in “Right to Work” areas and some aren’t? Join us to hear what they say about some of these issues and more. Bring your own questions for the panel. This session will be informative, helpful and maybe even a little scary.

Proposal preparation services are typically distributed across university campuses and managed within units that are physically and organizationally separate from the central research administration office. The level and quality of support to Principal Investigators (PIs) can vary from unit to unit depending on resources available. Most units have only one person trained to assist with these tasks. Some units have limited or no resources. A single staff departure can create major disturbances in workflow and services. Processes often duplicate work performed in central offices. Training a single staff member to work effectively with the multitude of sponsors from which a department might be funded is challenging. The greatest difficulty is that the distributed structure is costly, duplicative and cannot provide the level of reliability or expertise needed by PIs. Taking a case-study approach, this session will explore the benefits of a consolidated model of pre-award research administration that encompasses proposal preparation services and sponsored programs management.

This session will provide an overview of what an OTA, why it is used instead of a traditional funding mechanism, and who it is used by at NIH.

This session will cover everything that research administrators need to know about ORCID (Open Researcher and Contributor Identifier), especially as it relates to federal funding requirements. ORCID is designed to break barriers related to understanding researcher identity, assessing research activity, and streamlining research application and reporting workflows to save time and reduce administrative burden. We will explore why researchers need to have their own ORCID iD, how they can benefit from using their ORCID iD when working with funders, publishers, and research institutions, and how you and your organization can help to ensure that your researchers are in compliance with any federal or other mandates related to researchers having a digital persistent identifier for disclosures. Join us for this session to learn more!

"In a locked filing cabinet in a locked office." For decades this was the most common and a most acceptable response to the IRB's question: how will you be keeping your data and protecting confidentiality. But, those good old days are gone. Today we are in the midst of an explosion of methods for the storage, management, analysis and securing of digitized data. On the other hand, we are also in the midst of an explosion of methods to hack, steal, freeze, or otherwise breach that same data. This session, from a non-technical perspective, discusses the challenges and obstacles in the protection of data and subjects' confidentiality as well as offers approaches on how institutions have worked with researchers and IRBs to develop and implement best practices.

While State and Local governments provide approximately 5% of all research funding, it is still a substantial revenue for higher education institutions that is often convoluted with challenging terms and conditions. This session will discuss practical steps contract officers can take while negotiating with these sponsors.

This session will address best practices for managing two different kinds of Principal Investigators: PI's who are struggling to obtain adequate research funding, and those who are trying to juggle too much research funding. We will discuss common causes for both underfunded scenarios (e.g. junior researchers who are trying to get started, researchers who are not submitting enough proposals, researchers whose proposals are not scoring well, etc.) and overfunded scenarios (e.g. PI's over-estimating amount of effort required during proposal phase, researchers who need to expand their research team, those who are not completing research on time and therefore have overlapping projects, etc.), and what strategies could be employed to handle these situations. This course will cover areas related to pre- and post-award training and management, human resources involvement, and the creation of tools to help gather and present relevant data to PIs in order to address concerns.

In the last 20 years, tertiary education and research institutions in Africa have taken intentional steps towards adopting research management systems that will address its health needs, create health equity among its population and support economic growth. The promotion of the principles of open science around the globe to facilitate the equitable sharing of the benefits from research is impacting research processes in Africa and aiding its bid for equitable research partnerships. 
The fundamental of open science is to facilitate the open sharing of information for the progress of science and the effective functioning of the research enterprise. These fundamentals are being applied through effective collaboration and partnerships. By increasing the number of collaborative research between south-south partners has resulted in creating the added value of generalisability of research results and enabled effective contribution towards global health. 
To operate research based on these fundamentals, research institutions in Ghana and The Gambia have had to consider their existing research systems and its capacity to comply with open science principles. The review focused on the operational support available to researchers during pre and post award, facilities available to support the implementation of research including science support, governance and legal structures. They looked at ways of strengthening the capacity gaps in legal and compliance, building on existing policies and procedures at institutional level to facilitate the open sharing of information and at the same time protecting new innovations for further exploitations. Early evidence showed that these reviews will result to a strengthened central research support function focused on adding value to the scientific output of the institution. 

In recent years competition for grants has greatly intensified for many reasons, causing investigators at all career levels to become reluctant, discouraged or inactive in seeking support for their research. New investigators face their own challenges in getting that first award. This session will offer describe characteristics that deter these investigators from pursuing grant funding. Then, based on a literature review and best practices, an array of strategies and solutions will be presented, including incentives, mentoring, partnering, targeted workshops, and individual strategic plans for research funding. Participants will be encouraged to share examples and case studies of their own best practices for motivating and working with these investigators. The session will be interactive and partipatory for research administrators/proposal developers from all types of institutions.

The National Science Foundation Office of Inspector General will provide an update on their audit activities. Audience members will learn about the NSF OIG, it's role in the federal research enterprise, updates related to audit activities, and information about whistleblower protections.

Research security and compliance professionals understand what successful risk management requires from a strategic, tactical and operational perspective. Emerging government guidelines and regulations, such as the NSPM-33 and CHIPS Act concerning research security requirements, have pushed universities into implementing research security to enhance compliance programs to counter risks. Unfortunately, the new research security compliance policies and proactive risk management controls were not planned for and have resulted in program funding and knowledge gaps. This presentation will discuss the fundamental baseline controls and tools that every research security and compliance program will need to comply with current and emerging government guidelines, as well as adopt the best practices at peer organizations.

For emerging research universities, finding the right organizational structure for their evolving offices of Sponsored Research Services can be challenging. As our field faces many changes and ever increasing pressures of recruitment and retention, we will discuss how to make the workload among research administrators as equitable as possible and improve the work environment and efficiency of a sponsored research office via a workload-based assignment model. This session will review the strengths and weaknesses of both unit-based and workload-based models for pre-award functions, relay our transition experience, discuss the development and implementation of a workload algorithm to equalize assignments, and demonstrate how project management tools are being used to improve efficiency. Our team will also provide a retrospective analysis of the past two years with the workload model, including faculty feedback on new processes and the transitional period.

Research is an integral part of VCU's mission. Seed funding programs provide the opportunity to conduct research critical for attracting and retaining a high calibre of faculty and to advance VCU as a community of nationally and internationally recognized scholars and researchers in the arts, humanities, and sciences. Small institutions often have to rely on available resources, such as the technology services department and online tools, to facilitate the application process. Large Institutions leverage their eRA systems to support their internal funding competitions. This session will describe steps to establish a seed funding program to support faculty's research, especially for junior faculty or those exploring new areas of inquiry using in-house technology solutions.

This comprehensive review will focus on the NIH Grants Policy Changes, Pre and Post-Award Management, FAQ’s, and Case Studies for Grants involving Foreign Institutions/International Organizations, and Domestic Grants with Foreign Components. We will discuss crucial administrative requirements such as project and budget policy changes, and public policy requirements and financial management topics. We will go over the FAQ’s related to foreign grants. As part of our interactive session, we will offer NIH updates relevant to international institutions and present real-world case studies, engaging the audience and offering practical solutions for managing various scenarios.

This presentation aims to demonstrate, using examples from our own experience at Ponce Research Institute, how a program logic model can be utilized to aid in strategic planning for sponsored research programs, predominantly in small minority institutions, which are entities that receive a total of 10 million or less from sponsors. Additionally, how fomenting cross-functional collaborations aid in successfully developing and initiating a strategic plan.

This panel composed of multiple research administrators from several institutions will discuss what has worked for them to improve post award processes. Each panelist will address some struggles research administrators face and propose solutions they have found effective while navigating the researcher mindset versus the administrative compliance environment. Whether you experience these struggles or have already conquered them, please join us so we can learn together during this interactive and informative session.

Trying to better understand what is project management, how it is different from established sponsored project university roles and responsibilities, and why there is a growing trend in sponsor’s requiring it or universities applying it to your sponsored projects? As more sponsors are requiring project and program management methodologies and/or personnel for the management of awards and educational institutions are now recognizing the benefits of project management with limited information/literature available to identify and inform on the benefits and placement within existing organizational structures and roles/responsibilities. Project Management defined in this session will be focused in the context of higher education sponsored projects presenting its application, benefits, and responsibilities of project management principles and personnel. Project Management is a valuable approach to develop and execute sponsored projects complementing the roles and responsibilities of faculty and administrators. Project Management enhances the organization’s reputation, reduces added burden to faculty and administrator roles, and contributes to an increase in effective and efficient development and execution of sponsored project awards to meet faculty, unit, and organizational research and sponsored project portfolio objectives. This session will focus on defining project management, differentiating between the project manager and other sponsored project roles/responsibilities, and explain the benefits of project management involvement in sponsored projects.

Effective research administration starts before the investigator drafts their proposal. In this session, we will review what structures and processes cultivate a successful proposal at the departmental level. We will begin with an analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of two common departmental structures: all-encompassing pre- and post-award (“cradle to grave”) services, and “split” units with separate teams focused solely on pre-award or post-award. A review of best practices in proposal preparation, including how these practices can be applied to either structure, will be analyzed, with recommendations on how to optimize your unit’s individual functionality, to ensure it can help maximize facilitation to investigators.

The COVID-19 pandemic changed ideas and practices of remote work in research administration, as in most industries. Initial studies are demonstrating that remote work is effective, productive, and offers many benefits to organizations and their employees, it also presents real and new challenges. In this session we will discuss these opportunities and challenges, present recent data on productivity and effectiveness, examine how individual experiences vary and accommodations are made, and how remote work has changed our day-to-day operations. We will cover the development of new or enhanced skill sets and how opportunities for professional development were expanded, and in some cases, closed off. Discussion will also include a look to the future examining the hybrid model and the development and implementation of best practices for organizations and individuals.

Participants will hear our journey for overhauling service center guidance and processes on our campus. This will involve discussing some of the issues we had around our service centers and what processes/guidance we put into place. In addition, participants will learn some best practices for managing service centers from a central and departmental perspective.

The biggest outcry from Principal Investigators (PIs) is the administrative burden experienced when managing their research time. This can often be caused by the rules of their Institution and those of the Sponsor, especially when those rules collide. While there are unavoidable administrative tasks, the NYU Rory Meyers College of Nursing administrative offices, including the Grant Office, Finance, Administration, IT, and HR come together to minimize the work for both sides of the equation. This is done with periodic review of processes and the creation of procedures and workflows that minimize the duplication of efforts by those administrative offices. These synergies result in the reduction of the PI’s frustration and gives them back the time formerly spent vacillating between offices trying to determine “Who can do this for me?” This session will promote the exchange of ideas for those who may experience silos within their school/department highlighting research success as a common goal and fostering inclusivity.

Many research administrators do not have experience with large and long-term projects. This concurrent session will provide tips and suggestions for initial setup and management of multi-million dollar projects with a lifespan of a decade or longer. At the conclusion of this presentation research administrators and research managers will have a clearer idea of issues that can arise and advice to avoid problems in the future. Recommended for advanced beginners/intermediate research administrators and research managers.

Formal training in the Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) began in the late 80s/early 90s when it became increasingly apparent that the apprentice model for RCR wasn’t enough. Several institutions established courses in research ethics and scientific integrity because research trainees appeared to have not learned fundamental issues important to the conduct of science. Mentoring alone was not sufficient and it was now necessary to supplement with formal courses. “Core” topics were defined and through the years these have shifted in focus, especially so in the post- pandemic world. In February 2022 NIH released an updated list of topics with several focused on safe-guarding scientific security and creating safe research environments that are free of harassment and discriminatory practices. Section 10337 of the CHIPs and Science Act calls for NSF to require RECR training on mentor/mentorship, research security threat awareness, and export controls and to expand training to include not only undergraduate/graduate students, but also postdoctoral researchers, faculty, and other senior personnel. This session will cover the topic changes and RCR requirements for different funding mechanisms.

The loss of a faculty member can create shockwaves throughout an entire department and organization. When these departures occur, research administrators are often left with a huge list of tasks, limited guidance, and unclear priorities. Guided by real life case studies (primarily in the NIH realm), we will discuss the practical implications of faculty departures on pre/post award research administration. We will examine considerations for all types of departures, present action plans and checklists to implement in each situation, and discuss pain points and pitfalls in order to give research administrators a road map to success for their own unique departure situations.

The Council on Governmental Relations (COGR) and the Federal Demonstration Partnership (FDP) are important organizations to research administration. The FDP is an association of US federal agencies; academic research institutions, with administrative, faculty and technical representation and research policy organizations that work to streamline the administration of federally sponsored research. FDP members of all sectors cooperate in identifying, testing and implementing new, more effective ways of managing federal research grants, with the goal of improving the productivity of research without compromising its stewardship. COGR is an association of leading research universities, affiliated medical centers and independent research institutes, that provides national expertise on the financial and regulatory infrastructure and the corresponding compliance requirements associated with managing federal research grants and contracts within research institutions. COGR communicates the viewpoint and concerns of its members and fosters productive relationships between the research community and federal policymakers, advocating for innovation and change that avoid unnecessary regulatory burden. This session will include a brief summary of past, current and planned initiatives of both organizations followed by questions and open discussion. 

This session will present a case study about an Interuniversity Call for Research Proposals developed by nine Chilean universities, following every step of the call design process. The session aims to engage the audience in identifying and analyzing the learnings and pitfalls of each feature that involves the creation of a call, including the increased complexity of an inter-university setting. Directors for research (or equivalent positions) of the universities involved in the call will convey the experience with first-hand knowledge about the decisions made — and the decision-making process required for each — leading first to the objective of defining the scope and then developing our First Interuniversity Call for Research Proposals of Early Career Researchers. This process involves different levels of expertise, such as political, institutional, operational, and resources. It is accessible to almost every professional involved in research management.

Department Chairs have a significant role in supporting their faculty in the research enterprise and have specific responsibilities to ensure project success. Providing targeted guidance to department chairs can support collaboration between faculty and research administrators. This session will provide an overview of department chair-specific training opportunities in the pre award and post award processes related to the life cycle of award to assist. Topics addressed will include reviewing research administration terminology and areas of consideration prior to an award as well as insight into key areas including the routing process, cost share, conflict of interest and commitment, confirming resources, grant closeout and overspending.

Many research administrators have moved into new leadership or management roles at the department level and stepped into what sometimes appears to be a disaster by finding non-compliant practices, inefficient workflows and the lack of sound post-award and financial management practices. Gut instinct is to rush to the Director or high-level leadership, but without proper tactics and preparation, this could create unnecessary conflict, tension with team members and could potentially cause the director to have hesitation in building trust with the new incumbent. While the new role may be at mid-management level and can have several years of research administration experience, rushing to judgement without listening to the team and leadership to understand and acknowledge why the ways things are can prevent operations from changing and improving. This session will demonstrate through discussion and role playing the do’s and don’ts of communicating department level business operations issues and how to approach the team and leaders to form a consensus and followership for the desired changes.

Federal funding agencies have recently expanded their policies and requirements in key areas of research security and foreign influence disclosures. First, in January 2022, NSPM-33 Implementation Guidance created entirely new obligations for institutions, such as research organizations, colleges, and universities, to implement a Research Security Program (RSP) if they received more than $50 million in federal funding in the prior two fiscal years and to provide a security compliance certification to remain eligible for federal grants. Second, the SBIR and STTR Extension Act of 2022 made considerable changes pertaining to foreign influence and security risk disclosures.  This session will discuss how small businesses and research institutions can comply with these changing reporting requirements and detail the risks of violations.

The increased complexity and changing nature of research administration led us to evaluate the models we use institutionally to provide services to faculty. This session will look at Yale’s approach to centralizing research administration services for academic and non-academic departments. Our organization, Faculty Research Management Services, seeks to raise the level of service to Principal Investigators while increasing compliance and mitigating risk. During this session, we will discuss how the current model was designed and implemented on our campus, provide examples of Pre and Post-Award services to faculty and provide an opportunity to discuss all aspects of this model.

Both gap and root-cause analysis can be useful in identifying reasons for failures in situations or events. Research also supports another approach. In 1989, a team of researchers discovered that prospective hindsight—imagining failures beforehand—increases the ability to correctly identify reasons for future outcomes by 30 (Mitchell, et al: https://doi.org/10.1002/bdm.3960020103). Prospective hindsight offers advantages in improving the quality of outcomes and preventing mishaps in areas of research. Participants in this session will examine the strategy of using prospective hindsight to spot potential blind spots in areas of research administration and compliance. Using prospective hindsight, participants will assess scenarios to identify potential blind spots that could negatively affect the quality of the outcomes. Then, participants will suggest changes to the scenarios to improve their outcomes. 

Many grant agencies are requiring short preliminary papers before a full proposal can be submitted. These documents serve multiple purposes in funding agencies but often have little detail on preparing them. This session will provide definitions of these papers, their multiple purposes, and which funding agencies require them. Agency-specific formats will be illustrated and a template will be provided for use with agencies that do not offer specific instructions. The speaker will offer strategies to increase the chances of funding success with well-developed short papers that meet agency needs.

One of the great benefits of the Society of Research Administrators International (SRAI) is the incredible knowledge base among the membership. SRAI's Odyssey Program pairs up experienced members (mentors) with members who are new or seeking to learn new skills in the field (mentees) which allows all participants the opportunity to continue their research administration journey. Join a member of the Odyssey Program Committee, a current Mentor and a current Mentee for a lively discussion of program goals and practical application of the Mentor/Mentee relationship. Wherever we are in our research administration journey we all have something to offer! Bring your questions and adventurous spirit!

Session will cover the basics about responding to federal and state agency investigations of research grants, including (a) different types of investigatory mechanisms; (b) different agencies with investigatory authority over grant administration activity; (c) best practices and protocols in complying with agency investigations; (d) different outcomes of agency investigations.

This session will provide a high-level overview of the prior approval requirements as described in the Uniform Guidance (2 CFR Part 200) and the NIH Grants policy statement. It will include 40-minutes of interactive case studies that emphasize the importance of CRA and AOR collaboration to ensure timely and complete prior approval request submissions.

The CUSP Sharing Site is an online repository where institutions can share standard procedures used in animal research protocols with the broader compliance community, offering an opportunity to address administrative burden at the institutional level. This multi-institutional effort is a burden reducing initiative of the 21st Century Cures Act, and is being developed in partnership with the Federal Demonstration Project and the NIH/OLAW. During this session, attendees will learn when and how their institution can join CUSP, discuss strategies for how their institution can utilize this tool, and participate in a demonstration of the site.

Many research administrators are also in research development! This session offers practical methods and tips for supporting your researchers on the road to success grants. You will learn how to employ a scalable "Grant Readiness Checklist" with detailed strategies for assessing researchers and their projects via a 4-step evaluation system. And how to use simple project management concepts to keep proposal preparation organized, less stressful and on schedule - no matter the size of the grant.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) implemented the Support for Research Excellence (SuRE) grant mechanism (R16) in 2021 to support research capacity building at U.S. higher education institutions that receive limited NIH research support and serve students from groups underrepresented in biomedical research. R16 support is designed to increase funding success, promote student research and enrich the campus research environment at eligible institutions. To facilitate skills development among potential faculty applicants and to build institutional research capacity, the SuRE Resource Center established at the University of Kentucky trains faculty and research administrative staff in key areas in writing and managing grant awards using a progressive, comprehensive curriculum. The aims are to expand the number of institutions participating in NIH-funded research and build an interactive SuRE community. For institutions committed to establishing or expanding their research administrative infrastructure, competitive seed grant money is available to facilitate those efforts. In this session, members of the SuRE Resource Center will present on NIH SuRE funding opportunities, showcase resources available through the SuRE Resource Center, and highlight upcoming training opportunities, seed grants, and program offerings. The SuRE Resource Center is funded by the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (1U24GM146576-01).

This session will highlight some of the complex technical and legal issues faced by Non US Universities when the project sponsor is a US entity. In many donor agreements the US Legal framework is incorporated by reference, but how does a private Non-US entity determine which legal rules apply? How does the Private Non-US institution negotiate with a US Government Sponsor versus a Private US Project donor? The answer to these questions are relevant especially in the changing Research Environment, where small quasi-private universities are clamoring for Research Funding from an ever decreasing research funding pool.

This session will focus on the workflows surrounding PI transfers both into and out of institutions. There are many moving pieces that need to be tackled when PIs change institutions and often the PI transfer planning needs to begin well in advance. All angles of PI transfers will be considered, using NIH as the case study. Diverse participation is encouraged from departmental, central and leadership administration. Topics to be considered: new submissions and existing awards transfers, personnel transfers, onboarding and offboarding PIs, and the politics of PI transfers.

Research administration is “research administration” no matter where you work, right? There are similarities between academic medical centers (AMC) versus primarily undergraduate universities (PUI) as well as notable differences. This session will cover how two seasoned research administrators have landed in different places from major AMCs, non-profit healthcare, and PUIs. We will discuss the process of how each institutional model functions, including acting in de-centralized or centralized systems. We will engage the attendees with our real-life experiences and how we have found this to be a way to increase our knowledge, adaptability, and growth within different institutional models.

Conflict of commitment (COC) is an important topic for research compliance, research security, and research risk. Over the past several years, funding agencies and institutions have updated existing guidance, or created new guidance, that has expanded the scope of COC. This session will take a deep dive into the foundations of COC and analyze how the original concept of COC has broadened into several emergent definitions, and become a vital component of research security and foreign influence discussions. The applicability of outside activities, personal ideologies, individual research projects, and research integrity, will be reviewed in light of these emerging COC definitions and expectations. Recommendations for how institutions can best keep up with the changes and meet funding agency expectations will also be provided.

This session will discuss how RAND transitioned from a excel worksheet for tracking their subrecipient entity monitoring activities to using Salesforce. The transition enabled RAND to streamline and modernize how they perform assessments; better track data related to the subrecipient entity monitoring and management requirements in 2 CFR 200; and store the data in a more stable platform.

Institutions around the world pursue various strategies to build research capacity. This can include components such as the recruitment and retention of professors and students; building the physical and regulatory infrastructure; building relationships and partnerships; securing research funding; producing research results and impacts; building brand and institutional reputation and protecting and commercializing intellectual property. Research administrators and managers play a key role in implementing institution-specific strategies and research priorities. The panel is comprised research administrators from around the world that will share their expertise and informed perspectives on the building research capacity from an operational and strategic lens. will address keys topics such as setting up the structure for a research office and support services; developing relationships and skill development that supports success; and producing research results.

This session will detail what effort is, why it's vital to track, and best practices for tracking it. We will explore how to work with your PI to propose accurate effort for all new submissions. Once the award comes in , how do you incorporate the new effort into effort that is already established? We will demonstrate some best tracking tools as well as good communications to have with the PI and other departments, institutions as applicable. This will also include how to maintain Other Support/Current & Pending updates. Keeping effort managed, tracked, and up to date will aid in making the life cycle of award management flawless and easy!

This session will discuss the evolution of research security (arguably the newest area of research compliance) and how institutions can make sense of its history now that NSPM-33 implementation seems to be taking its final form and the dust has settled from various enforcement actions. From some of the initial FBI outreach to research institutions in 2017, to the November 2018 announcement of the China Initiative, to the current form of NSPM-33, and the aftermath – some of which has involved cases of misconduct on the part of Federal investigators as well as prosecutorial overreach (involving professors at Temple University, University of Tennessee, and University of Kansas). There have also been instances of clear wrongdoing at Harvard, Emory, and WVU, and instances where institutions have been subject to large false claims settlements for failure to perform their due diligence on required disclosures. And while some of the cases have been thrown out, the impact of the regulatory focus has had a chilling effect which has turned scientists away from Federal funding and caused alarm among faculty members. In the forward to NSPM-33 written by Eric Lander, he states: “if our policies to address those actions significantly diminish our superpower of attracting global scientific talent — or if they fuel xenophobia against Asian Americans — we will have done more damage to ourselves than any competitor or adversary could.” This session will provide an update on the current state of research security compliance, and strategies for building research security programs, and thoughtfully communicating with and educating faculty in a manor which is inclusive, and protects both researchers and their institutions.

Does your institution have an internal proposal routing process with defined internal routing deadlines? If so, let's discuss how implementation of those deadlines works in your department and consequences for when those deadlines are missed. If your institution has no process, let's discuss how you can advocate with your researchers for real-world results. Participants will leave with email templates and proven strategies for this often tricky negotiation with researchers.

This session will review new cases, laws and happenings in intellectual property of importance to research administrators and managers. It is a quick overview of significant items related to patents, copyrights, trade secrets, and all things related to IP.

This session will cover contractual and employment Issues arising from international relationships between PIs and foreign entities. 

In the first several months after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, many research institutions found themselves hurled into a fully remote environment despite varying levels of preparation and readiness. Simultaneously, many research administrators embraced the opportunity to reflect on their current roles and career goals and set out on different paths – creating a disruptive environment for the business of sponsored research across the country. This session will provide an overview of how UMass Lowell capitalized on this disruption to transform its Grants and Contracts Administration unit by reevaluating roles and responsibilities, recruiting top-talent from other leading research universities, and leveraging its interim support from Huron to not only maintain operations, but to redesign key legacy business processes (from Proposal Intake/Submission, to Award Setup) and do an assessment of its business performance (using data from Huron’s RADIUS Benchmarking Survey) to make data-based decisions on its future state.

The FDP Expanded Clearinghouse (EC) contains a wealth of information on several hundred research organizations and is a helpful tool for subrecipient monitoring. But have you ever wondered how all that information gets into the EC and how the data is vetted behind the scenes? In this session, you’ll hear from an FDP EC Subcommittee co-chair, and learn how information is entered into the EC, reviewed for accuracy, and eventually published. We will walk through the profile data fields and review common errors. We will pay special attention to the sections on Single Audit and how to read and understand the information contained therein.

So, you need to add cost share to the proposal? Do you need to add cost share, or do you want to add cost share? Perhaps the funding agency requires a percent commitment from your institution. Maybe, your principal investigator is over the salary cap. A little bump in available funding will make the scope feasible? The team thinks that providing tuition through cost share will make the training grant more attractive. You’re thinking is that it is just a little cost share. It’s just a harmless little bunny, isn’t it? But, is it? In this session, we will differentiate mandatory versus voluntary committed cost share. What are items you can include in a cost-share package? We will also evaluate the cost-benefit ratio for including these types of commitments in a proposal budget as well as the impact to the institution.

This session will provide definitions of research security and research integrity. It will outline current issues in these areas as well as the requirements for institutions for disclosures when applying for federal research, the establishment of research security programs, and research security training. It will explain the rationale behind these requirements and outline the envisioned future state of research security and integrity efforts.

Implementing new electronic research administration systems can be a challenge even for large research enterprises with plentiful resources. For smaller institutions, and especially PUIs and HBCUs, the process may seem overwhelming. But with good planning and little foresight, a successful implementation doesn't need to leave you pulling your hair out. In this session, Senior Solutions Consultant, Matthew Kingore from Cayuse is joined by Jennifer Hanlon Patterson, Director of Sponsored Programs at Stephen F. Austin State University to discuss the lessons learned from a recent eRA software implementation at a PUI and help you plan for a smooth transition at your institution. Additional panelists who adopted previous Cayuse eRA software will provide further insight into what it takes to plan and implement successfully - Beverly Kemp, eRA - Research Coordinator of Research and Sponsored Programs at Lamar University

The Veterans Affairs (VA) Cooperative Studies Program (CSP) is a division of the VA Office of Research and Development (ORD) that is responsible for the planning and conduct of clinical trials and epidemiological studies within the VA’s integrated healthcare system. The CSP “Advancing Capacity for Clinical Research through Engagement with Strategic Sites (ACCESS)” initiative is a 3-year pilot program that aims to identify and partner with rural/lower complexity VA Medical Centers (strategic sites) that have a desire to institute/strengthen/improve their overall clinical research enterprise to conduct CSP and other VA multi-site research. Its primary aim is to improve access to opportunities to participate in clinical research for Veterans that reside in rural areas of the United States. This topic is both relevant and provides value to the field of research administration because the generalizability of a study's findings to the broader society is greatly enhanced by and correlated to the diversity of its participants (rural/urban, race/ethnicity, gender, etc.).

Rigorous scientific research associated with cannabis in all its forms is critically needed to keep pace with legalized cannabis consumption, but currently, university researchers face a daunting maze of regulatory requirements. Researchers seeking to conduct cannabis research must navigate the arduous, sometimes unclear regulatory process that includes the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, Food and Drug Administration, offices or departments in state government, and the researchers’ home institution among others. Additionally, researchers must obtain cannabis from a federally authorized manufacturer with limited access to real-world cannabis for research use. Lastly, given the legal status of cannabis on the federal level, many activities of the cannabis industry located in states that have legalized adult use cannabis are prohibited under federal law, creating concerns about accepting funding from and engaging with the cannabis industry. This presentation will share approaches that the University of California has considered to support the varied and complex research interests in the cannabis space given these complicated regulatory requirements.

The results of this Study urgently calls for current costing practices and Research Management at the three IHL in Tanzania to be strengthened in order to ensure sustainability of the research enterprise. Future intervention will support the development of research costing standards and policies that enhance capabilities of these institutions to negotiate for actual cost of research. Institutions of Higher learning needs appropriate infrastructure in order to establish more accurate unaccounted costs and further uncover budget items from which institutions in Low and Middle Income Countries to cover the unaccounted costs.

Research administration departments across the globe are implementing internship programs to help train the future workforce and support their full-time employees. If you ever thought you could use an intern to help you accomplish your work or catch up on projects, this is the session for you. Participants will learn the different components of building an internship program, including: recruitment tools, project identification, and how to incorporate enrichment activities to create a robust program. Since internships can be a bridge to full-time employment, internship programs must ensure participants are ready to join the research administration workforce. Participants will be able to walk away with information to start their own internship program.

Grants and agreements systems can provide a treasure trove of insight into sponsored activity at an institution, but it is impossible to take advantage of this information unless there is a powerful tool in place to leverage that data. In this case study we will tell the story of Northwestern University’s implementation of a datamart to support our new grants and agreements system called CERES. We will outline key lessons we learned along the way about how to structure the datamart, what data fields to include, how to provide access to the data, and how analytics based on the data can be used to inform operations and strategy. We will also discuss how the project was organized as a partnership between Sponsored Research and Information Technology and how we engaged stakeholders in the process to ensure we were designing a product that meets the needs of the community.

The study through a survey will collect feedback from seasoned researchers from a developing country (Pakistan) and a developed country (Canada) on how can research administrator help researchers do a better job. What aspects do researchers suggest we as administrators should develop or improve that helps in giving better services to PIs. The study will showcase important findings and will help research administrators use those in their own institutions to enhance faculty satisfaction and hence improve their own performances.

Research intelligence, generally referred to as the ability to effectively gather, analyse, and interpret information for research purposes, is positioning itself as an essential tool for prioritisation in academic planning. Research intelligence involves various skills, including information retrieval, trends evaluation, data analysis and visualisation, challenges-solving orientation, research design, ethical considerations, and effective communication.
Research intelligence enables scientists to understand public research policy better, navigate a vast amount of data to meaningful insights, and contribute to influencing policymaking and knowledge creation and innovation to benefit society.
Science agencies and legislators highly scrutinise science’s impact and contribution to advance society. This session will discuss the growing need for academia to place science policy and research intelligence as part of its administration and planning process to increase its capacity to make an impact and continue to attract funding.
Saudi Arabia is going through a massive transformation of its economy and society. Academia and research are at the core of this transformation. They are requested to align to four Research, Innovation and Development (RDI) Priorities: Health and Well-being, Sustainability and Essential Needs, Energy and Industrial Leadership, and Economies of the Future.
To align with the RDI, KAUST is embarking on a transformative process to ensure its research expertise and innovation capacity can benefit the Kingdom’s economy and society. The University is adopting a strategy plan affecting all departments, academic programs, core labs, and research centres. Research intelligence is becoming embedded in the academic review processes and translated into action plans for implementation, following specific KPIs and impact assessment indicators.
For example, the climate emergency and the complexity of geopolitics in a much more unstable and volatile world are calling for countries to review their energy policies and improve energy security. They are step-up investments in renewables, cleaner power and storage solutions such as green and blue hydrogen, and advanced carbon capture and storage technologies. Research intelligence can help researchers and institutions through data-driven decision-making, research and academic program evaluations and redesign for future planning supporting policymaking, prioritisation in technological advancement, risks assessment and mitigation, multi-stakeholder engagement processes, and international collaborations for joint approaches.
By combining research expertise with comprehensive data gathering, analysis and easy-to-access violations, scientists and institutions can inform decision-making for impactful policies and new legislations. Research intelligence, therefore, contributes early stage to creating larger-scale sustainable and resilient energy systems that meet the evolving needs of countries and their citizens.

This session will identify and describe the benefits and important differences in securing and using philanthropic gifts to support research. Hear from an experienced fundraiser, and research administrator, how to secure millions in gifts to support important research. We will review simple steps to foster an environment of gift-supported research at your institution; large or small. Learn how to cultivate new and existing donors and how to partner philanthropic funding opportunities with research priorities. We will discuss engaging your faculty, physicians and other staff in philanthropy. Guidelines for distinguishing between gifts and grants will also be shared. Unless your research program is blessed with a fully-funded endowment producing perpetual income sufficient to sustain and grow your research or you’re 100% confident you will be fully funded by the government, then you need to attend this session. This practical session will provide tips to use right away and in the long-term.

Excellent research requires excellent Decolonization, Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Accessibility (DEDIA) considerations for both the research team and the conduct of the research. Grant administrators are increasingly being asked to support DEDIA strategies in grant applications.This session asks: What more can we do? Examples of supporting the early research careers of Black medical researchers (Miami) and respectful engagement with Indigenous communities (Toronto), this session will encourage the attendees to share DEDIA practices from their institutions that research administrators use during the grant lifecycle.

We have the most age-diverse workforce in modern history, spanning four (occasionally even five) different generations. But whether this multi-generational workplace feels happy and productive or challenging and stressful is, in large part, up to you. As a leader, it is important to learn how to harness the capabilities of all generations, enabling them to work together toward the goals of your organization. During this session we will discuss how you can relate to co-workers of different age groups, how to motivate someone much older or much younger than you, and how to encourage co-workers of different generations to share their knowledge.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is the largest funding of biomedical research in the world. NIH is also a leader in grants policy and procedures that are sometimes "borrowed" by other sponsors. As such, an in-depth understanding of this agency is a fundamental part of any research administrator's tool-kit. This deep dive will explore the NIH from finding the funding to final closeout, touching nearly all of the key pre-award and post-award topics in between.  New administrators all the way through advanced learners are sure to learn something you didn't know before about NIH.

The Facilities and Administrative (F&A) cost rate provides research institutions the opportunity to recover some of the cost of supporting research. A higher F&A cost rate can mean a larger dollar amount of F&A cost recovery flowing into the institution. The Facilities Cost Projection Proposal (FCPP) and 2 CFR 200.414(g) one-time extension of the rates are two tools that institutions may use to negotiate the most advantageous F&A cost rate for the institution. There are strategic decisions that must be made in order to maximize the recovery of F&A costs. The timing of the base year that will be used to calculate the F&A cost rate is a key part of the F&A rate strategy. When to use the one-time extension of the rates, and when not to use it, are strategic decisions that have a long-term impact. This session will examine the factors to consider in developing a strong F&A rate strategy.

The objectives of this session include providing:
* Understanding of the 2 CFR 200.414(g) F&A rate extension
* Description of two major factors affecting future F&A rates
* Description of five parts of a Facilities Cost Projection Proposal

Research strategy development is becoming a critical component in the research administrator’s skill set. This specialized area presents great possibilities for setting organizational directions to achieve more innovative and impactful research, expand institutional capacity for research, and create inclusive research environments. This session will draw on the insights research administrators bring to strategy development, such as understanding local context and external agendas and seizing these opportunities to drive change. This session will help identify a simplified approach for developing institutional research strategies that work (i.e. they are effective and achieve their intended outcomes.) This interactive session takes an international case study approach from the perspective of a U.S. and Canadian institution and will focus on lessons learned and best practices. Session attendees will be invited to share their own experiences.

Confidentiality agreements are often the first step in establishing a relationship with a pharmaceutical or biotech company for a research project. The company wants to ensure that any of its confidential or proprietary information that is disclosed to an academic institution is kept confidential. It is critical that academic institutions understand the intent of the confidentiality agreements that they enter into with industry sponsors and negotiate terms that are reasonable and not overly broad. This session will introduce basic information about negotiating confidentiality agreements, including what terms are appropriate and why, as well as recommendations on how to effectively and efficiently negotiate mutually acceptable confidentiality agreements.

Federal agencies fund research through various mechanisms, most commonly grants, cooperative agreements, FAR-based contracts, and "other transactions" (commonly referred to as "OTAs"). The nature of the legal instrument the agency uses to fund research impacts institutional obligations, from deliverables to background compliance regimes. While many requirements are the same or highly similar under each regime, other requirements differ. Moreover, an institution's ability to negotiate terms of any particular agreement differs under the various legal regimes applicable to each type of agreement. In this session, FTLF attorney Scott S. Sheffler will explain the background legal frameworks, key differences in the basic terms of the agreements, and key distinctions in areas of compliance emphasis relevant to each agreement type, and will analyze the practical impact of those distinctions on compliance systems and the structure of prime-sub relationships in collaborative research.

Are you new to research administration and SRAI? Are you still navigating this strange new world and career? Join other newcomers (<5 years) as we share our journeys in research administration and the endless possibilities open to us. In this session, we will compare notes, share best practices, and discuss next steps in our joint evolution. A fun hour with no adults in the room, with an opportunity to share our new sandboxes.

This panel discussion will provide many perspectives on submission and non-financial transactions from the Recipient Organization (Department, School and Central Administration) and the NIH. We will cover topics from Other Faculty Support, Data Management and Sharing Plans in proposals, Relinquishments and Faculty Transfer applications, Prior Approval requests, and Reporting (annual and final RPPRs) and Close-out from the viewpoints of the Institution and the NIH. In this interactive panel discussion, we will also discuss strategies for effective engagement among the PI, the NIH and the Institution.

Though thankfully not commonly invoked, federal awarding agencies have broad authority to terminate federal grants and cooperative agreements. Some of the consequences are plain, others are less certain. Understanding the possible effects of termination is important to best navigating the unfortunate event. In this presentation, FTLF attorneys Scott S. Sheffler and Phillip A. Escoriaza will discuss agency enforcement authorities, bases for termination, appeal rights, authority for grantees to elect to withdraw from performance of awards, and the potential secondary effects of a termination – from collateral damage on other current awards to potential impact to competitiveness for future funding.

This session will look at "ChatGPT". The prototype for ChatGPT was launched less than a year ago. Artificial intelligence has become so integral in our daily lives that sometimes we don't even realize it. This session will look at the issues such as the pros/cons, ethical issues, legal issues, and the like of ChatGPT and how it influences the outcome of the task an individual may be working on.

AI (Artificial Intelligence) is a hot topic these days. Folks across the world are learning how to utilize programs like ChatGPT to enhance and improve their communication and to provide new and innovative ideas across all sectors. As Research Administrators, our job is to ensure that what we submit to sponsors on behalf of our researchers is ethical and uses original thoughts and ideas. So, with the emergence of easy-to-access forms of AI, what is the RA's role in understanding how and when researchers utilize AI for their submissions and to facilitate their research? Join this diverse team to talk about this topic and understand AI's impact on Research Administration.

SBIR and STTR projects can provide valuable research and financial opportunities to small businesses and the universities with whom they collaborate, but they also present a unique set of challenges. From Conflicts of Interest, IP and Data Rights to invoicing and payment; these projects, which are designed to promote research, have a very real potential to hinder it. This session will highlight the important Program requirements often overlooked by the Small Businesses and shed light on the challenges of partnering with Research Institutions. We will discuss the proposal process, the contract terms, flow down clauses, and various risk mitigation methods available.

Session will cover multi-dimensional role of indemnification in (1) research contracts, including best practices for negotiating and drafting indemnification clauses; (2) employment contracts and HR policies viz. research staff; and (3) responding to agency audits and investigations.

Given all the changes in our profession over the last few years, now might be the best time for us to rethink how your institution provides sponsored projects services to its clientele. Many of us have been handling increased volumes of proposal and awards as our staffing and level of services remained constant or perhaps decreased even while offering localized concierge services to our investigators has become an expected part of our services. To handle the increased volume of work, respond to demand for true work-life balance for research administration staff, and properly act in accordance with a continual layering of compliance requirements on top of everything compels us to assess (and likely revise) the grants administration structure to better align our capacity with those needs. A successful reorganization of grants administration would be based on viable recommendations for a structure that consistently provides personalized services needed by investigators as their funding grows and offers research administration staff a positive working environment while ensuring everyone is compliant.
This session will consider grants administration reorganization from the perspectives of an AVP and director of a sponsored projects office who has partnered within their organization and with an outside consulting firm and a senior research administrator who has felt the impact of over fifteen reorganizations at six different organizations. The presenters will present scenarios from four pillars (Preparing for the Engagement, Building Relationships and Trust, Communication, and Managing Expectations) as they discuss challenges and success stories, and provide practical tips to ensure success based on our experiences. Attendees of the session are welcome to share their experiences.

Public speaking is one of the hardest things to do. Mentoring is one of the most valuable ways to set someone up for success. So why not use mentoring as a ways to develop and improve public speaking skills.  
During the session, the panel will offer useful insights and hands-on advice gained from their own mentoring experience. What sets this panel apart is its focus on not just the technical aspects of the job, but also on the confidence-building that comes from mentorship. This serves as a live example of the transformative power of mentoring in professional development.
Through this experience the mentor and mentees found comradery, motivation, inspiration and a safe place to practice and get feedback about their public speaking skills.  

We are proposing a foundational presentation on strategies and tools research administrators can implement to promote the overall competitiveness of faculty grant proposals. This presentation will address the space beyond submitting an application focusing on small changes a research administrator can implement to make a high impact on the overall quality and fundability of the application. This will include streamlining the proposal development process for RAs to decrease inefficiencies and the potential for errors through a tool-driven and standardized process. The presentation will conclude with strategies research administrators can take to promote the competitiveness of applications including the development of institution and project-specific tools to assist faculty. Tools will include project management checklists, self-scouting analysis forms to identify team and institutional strengths, scoring matrices for unfunded submissions, and templates for supplemental documents. With the fundamentals of proposal submission in hand, experienced research administrators are in position to add skills for career growth, enhance the research development support available at their institution, and help their team win more proposals.

Working alongside PIs, proposal developers, research administrators, graphic designers, project managers, advocates and others to develop and submit proposals can be complicated – especially when those proposals are large, complex, and strategic in nature. What is each team member’s role in the project? What value do they provide? What processes and resources are in place to monitor proposal progress and keep things on track? How can duplication of effort be reduced or eliminated? What are the best methods to share files and communicate as a team? What can teams do post-submission to evaluate their processes and increase efficiency moving forward? In this presentation, we’ll aim to answer these questions by sharing processes and resources developed by the Strategic Interdisciplinary Research Office (SIRO) at The Pennsylvania State University to successfully manage diverse proposal development teams and submit strong applications.

This presentation will provide tips and tools for research administrators managing a post-award portfolio at both the departmental and central office level. Participants can expect to learn ways to manage and organize their portfolio more efficiently, while providing more transparency to others.

We start out discussing how to make a smooth transition from pre-award to post-award management. Next, we will dive into active post award monitoring exploring compliant ways to correct errors, complete cost transfers, document cost share and more. Finally, we will consider approaches to make close-out efficient and effective. How can the PI, department and central office all work together during close-out. We will also talk about weaving compliance to your everyday work.

The National Science Foundation (NSF), through the Growing Research Access for Nationally Transformative Equity and Diversity (GRANTED) initiative is investing in innovative and ambitious ideas to strengthen institutional research support infrastructure in support of the National research enterprise. Like other types of infrastructure, research support infrastructure facilitates discovery and innovation, creates jobs, makes the practice (including the submission of proposals and management of externally sponsored awards), administration, and governance of academic research more effective and efficient and provides the scaffold upon which community and partnerships are established within and across academic institutions, industry, and government agencies. Significant disparity exists however, in access to, and provisioning of, the core resources that constitute effective institutional research support infrastructure. This disparity sets up structural barriers that dampen competitive participation by all academic institutions in the Nation’s research and discovery opportunities. GRANTED was created to catalyze sharing, collaboration, and partnership building across research and training communities, colleges and universities, and professional societies that leads to national transformation by 1) increasing access to resources that support competitive research and training programs and projects and 2) by developing and improving research infrastructure functions, services, and the workforce. We’ll present information about the current and future GRANTED funding opportunities and discuss paths that SRAI and its members can take to provide leadership to innovatively grow, develop, sustain, and enhance the competitiveness of the academic research enterprise, particularly at emerging research and minority-serving institutions.

In this session, the presenter will provide valuable insights into the strategies implemented by the business team at the Ben Towne Center in Seattle Children's to enhance communication and engagement with their Investigators and system stakeholders. These efforts aim to drive progress in the clinical, population, and bench cancer and blood disorder research initiatives of the health system. Attendees will have the opportunity to learn about both successful and unsuccessful experiences encountered during the development of best practices for tracking research projects and personnel. Furthermore, they will gain an understanding of how the data derived from these endeavors leads to transformative changes in the structure of research investigations within the center.

When the Uniform Guidance (UG) went into effect on December 26, 2014, the requirements for subrecipient monitoring to be performed by the Pass Thru Entity (PTE) increased significantly and were very prescriptive. UG requires documenting the determination between subrecipient vs. contractor and performing a risk assessment of the entity, and regular monitoring of the subrecipient to ensure they are using funds appropriately and meeting performance goals (2 CFR 200.332(d)). The UG also allowed for the use of fixed amount subawards with written approval from the Federal awarding agency up to the single acquisition threshold AND the subaward meet the requirements outlined in 2 CFR 200.201(b). IHEs usually reserve the use of fixed amount awards for international, high-risk sub-recipients who may not be able to meet the detailed invoicing requirements due to different standards/systems, etc. This begs the question of why would IHEs only take advantage of fixed amount subaward in the riskiest of situations vs. using it with low risk subrecipients as well.

“… the word “silo” does not just refer to a physical structure or organization (such as a department). It can also be a state of mind. Silos exist in structures. But they exist in our minds and social groups too … they can also go hand in hand with tunnel vision.” - Gillian Tett, The Silo Effect: The Peril of Expertise and the Promise of Breaking Down Barriers. Research administration, it is easy to get lost in our own day to day and moving documents, reviews, and processes through to completion. The entire research lifecycle including pre-/post- award, compliance, resources, and research outcomes require several processes and workflows, often guided by administrators specializing in their subject matter expertise—rarely interacting with one another even though such interactions are essential for successful grant submission and awarding. Without a configurable system in place to manage and centralize these various workflows with an intuitive user interface, research may be hindered or delayed. There are several electronic research administration (eRA) tools in the market today developed to promote cross-departmental collaboration. These tools also increase transparency and empower researchers and research administration teams to ensure the right eyes are on the right documents at the right time.

Research leaders understand that employee engagement is a key factor in an individual’s performance and in the creation of top-performing teams. However, even in the best of times, employees can become disengaged in the work and their employment. This session seeks to identify the signs of disengagement, root causes, means from both the employee and employer side to mitigate, and tools to help employees make meaningful contributions to their work. This session is an international case study from two research-intensive organizations, in the U.S. and Canada, which describes their experiences with employee disengagement and the impacts on strengthening team performance.