What is the Research Management Program?
The Research Management Program (RMP) is a joint business improvement initiative, run by ICT in partnership with the University’s Research portfolio. The overall objective of the program is to formulate and deliver efficient and effective research management and administration capability for the University.
Program components
An important component of the program is the acquisition and implementation of a new Research Information Management System (RIMS), to provide the infrastructure for a broad program of system-enabled change. InfoEd, a US-based software company specialising in electronic research administration, has been selected as the RIMS software provider.
The Research Management Program needs to deliver more than a new system however to achieve real and lasting improvements. Apart from RIMS, the program comprises three other linked components – processes, culture/behaviour and organisation design – all of which are essential to the delivery of enhanced University-wide research management capability.
Timelines
The program is expected to deliver progressive improvements in research management capability over a three year period from 2008-2010. Given the complexity and organisational span of the initiative, the program implementation is staged over three horizons.
Horizon 1 focuses on the initial system setup and improvement of grants management processes, both pre-award and post-award. Horizon 2 will focus on managing the HERDC publication collection and research quality assessments such as the Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) initiative. Horizon 3 concentrates on ethics and biosafety clearance processes.
Who will be affected by the changes?
The rollouts in 2008 will have most impact on staff in the Research Office, who will begin using RIMS to manage existing grants and new grant applications. Business units closely associated with the Research Office will have predominantly view only access, with the ability to add or amend data in particular fields.
Academic and administrative staff involved in research management in faculties and affiliated institutions should get immediate benefits from the ability to view data and access reports. It is not expected that individual researchers will be using RIMS until 2009, although some researchers will be involved in a 2008 pilot of online submission/electronic sign-off of research proposal clearances.