1. Purpose:
This policy outlines the extensive research administration, financial and project management support available exclusively to members through the Geary Institute. It explains what types of supports are provided, how they are allocated, and how their provision is managed.
2. Background Information:
The Geary Institute offers members pre- and post-award support for funded research projects. This support is dedicated solely to research administration and financial and project management. It does not include the scientific or technical aspects of research project design or implementation - these are the responsibility of the principal investigator (PI) and the research project staff.
The Institute Manager oversees the provision of this support and also manages the administrative staff who provide it.
3. Pre Award Support:
- Budget Compilation Advice: Guidance through UCD institutional approval processes, overhead analysis, and financial advisory.
- Budget Calculation Support: Assisting in precise budget cost estimations.
- Partner Liaison: Coordinating with project partners for budget alignment in multi-partner projects.
- Advice Regarding Funder Guidelines: Assistance with UCD and funder guidelines and facilitating relevant contacts.
- UCD Research Funded Solution (RFS) Support: Guidance and support for utilising UCD's RFS system.
4. Post Award support:
4.1 Project Administration:
- Administrative Assistance: Managing project mailing lists, selecting and implementing project management tools.
- Project Partner Coordination: Liaison for financial and technical reporting in extensive multi-partner projects - where UCD is the Coordinator.
- Internal Project Management Meetings: Secretariat support for internal project management meetings, encompassing organisation, minute-taking, and action tracking.
4.2 Facilities and Space
- Desk space: Providing dedicated desk space for research staff, PhD students, and visiting fellows (who are not assigned with UCD desk space already).
- Access to meeting and seminar rooms: Access to meeting, common, seminar, and online meeting rooms within the Institute’s premises.
4.3 Events Organisation
- Event Management: Support for organising seminars, conferences, and webinars, including venue logistics, speaker coordination, publicity, and webinar management/editing. (Please note that requests for events must be submitted to the Geary administrative team with sufficient notice).
4.4 Financial Management
- UCD Finance Office Liaison: Coordinating with UCD Research Finance Office for research account establishment, funder coordination, procurement, and invoice processing.
- Financial Reporting: Reviewing staff timesheets and financial reports before submission to funders, and implementing necessary edits.
- Processing invoices and expenses.
4.5 IT and Website Support
- Software and Hardware Procurement and Troubleshooting: Advising on hardware and software procurement, providing IT troubleshooting and support.
- Website Assistance: Setting up project websites, uploading content supplied by the project team.
4.6 Reporting to Funders
- Funder Report Production: Assisting in the submission of technical reports to project funders.
4.7 Recruitment Support
- HR Assistance: Completing and submitting post-approval forms to UCD HR, offering job description guidance, coordinating job interviews where necessary, and serving as the primary contact for interviewees.
5. Allocation of support:
If resources allow, pre award support will be provided to all members who request it. Post award support for events organisation, access to Institute facilities and space, recruitment and IT support will also be provided to all members who request it, resources allowing.
Resources may not allow for the provision of post-award support for project administration, financial management and reporting for all members’ research projects. The following will be prioritised in decisions regarding the allocation of these types of post award support:
- Large multi-partner projects.
- Members who lack access to requisite project management support within their school.
- Members who have not hired a project manager for the grant.
- Interdisciplinary projects and projects closely related to the Institute’s core mission.
6. Expectations for Members Who Avail of Support
All members availing of pre- or post-award support from the Geary Institute for Public Policy are expected to:
- Contribute to Institute events, including seminars, working paper series, and the publicpolicy.ie research impact platform.
- Acknowledge the Institute's contribution in all project publications and publicity.
- Support Geary Institute online visibility and promoting its initiatives.
- Incorporate a financial contribution to the cost of post-award project management by the Geary Institute in their project budget at the proposal stage.
- Grant system accesses (Infohub, Eproc, RMS) to the Institute’s administrative team.