Abstract

In the pre-award phase, what is the support provided by RMs?
A structured and organized pre-award support service facilitates sustainable management and organization of the work and keeps up the submission of sustainable and consistent proposals.
Can we talk of one single organizational model as an inspiration for building better RMA services?
The 15-minute table moves from the experience of the moderators, coming from a big university which has a consolidated and multi-level support system, and aims to brainstorm different approaches and the RM’s skills needed to manage the pre-award phase:
The discussion will be moderated according to the following guiding points with the goal of summarizing some useful tips and collecting different meanings for sustainable professional services. The final considerations will be shared with participants afterwards.
1. Services & Procedures: according to the structure of an organization, researchers could be supported by specialist RMs working in a pre-award central unit, and/or by more generalist RMs working in a departmental/decentralized structure where the main task is often managing the post-award phase. How and when do these different support services intervene (according to the programmes, topics and/or number of proposals under submission)? What are the main peculiarities of the support provided by the different kinds of services?
2. Competences & Skills: What are the core skills for the pre-award support? What are the different competencies for specialized and/or generalist RMs for better support services? Are they technical or disciplinary? What are (or should be) training opportunities provided to the RMs by the institution?
Learning outcome: the strengths and weaknesses of several methods will be considered when comparing practices among participants. The aim is to pick up some useful tips to reinforce the RM profile and thus enhance more consolidated and sustainable professional RM pre-award services.