The ARMA Induction Workshop: An introduction to research administration

The opening session will address two areas: what is research, and what is research administration. It will consider the Frascati definition of research, some reasons for undertaking research (including economic benefit and improving quality of life) and who carries out research and in what organisations. It will then consider the nature of research administration - who we are, what we do and where we come from, and look at some typical ways of organising research administration functions. Participants will have an opportunity in small groups to compare their workplaces and their roles.

This session will look at the organisational context for research, especially the national funding environment. Particular attention will be paid to the dual support system and the Research Assessment Exercise (and its successor)

The focus of this session is the funding of individual research projects. We will give an overview of the main groups of funders and the types of research they prefer to fund. Time will also be given to a discussion of funding information systems, both the commercial systems that are available, and the internal systems used to disseminate information effectively.

This session will provide an introduction to financial matters with particular reference to building a project budget on a Full Economic Costing basis. There will be a practical costing exercise as well as consideration of the different costing systems available to assist with this process.

This session provides a basic understanding of the issues relating to research contracts and gives some information on the Lambert model agreements.

The success of research activity is dependent on the people undertaking research, whether they be graduate students, research assistants, early career researchers, newly established independent researchers or current or future research stars. An understanding of some of the key 'people issues' in research is essential for research administrators, and this session provides an overview of issues affecting graduate students, research staff and investigators.

This session covers a number of areas key to successful research management: Financial and Project Management, Systems and Data Management and Managing Your Workload.

This session will look at the increasing importance of having good Research Governance practices and procedures in place within institutions that undertake research, and how they are implemented in practice. Research Governance in this context will cover ethics, research integrity, and quality assurance of all research (both funded and unfunded). The session considers the principles of research ethics, the policy and regulatory environment and the implementation of policies and procedures for managing research ethics in universities, in particular the role of university research ethics committees, and the role of the administrator in relation to such committees.

As a research project reaches its conclusion, there is work to be done in disseminating and exploiting its findings, and it is critically important to manage the research organisation's intellectual property well. This session will introduce a range of 'exploitation' activities and will provide a brief introduction to intellectual property issues.

Review and taking it further    

This final session provides an opportunity to identify what has been learned and how it can be applied in the workplace. We will also present information about future training and support opportunities available to participants.