Abstract

What do you expect in the near future? An increasing complexity

The aim of the presentation is to share solutions and good practices adopted at the University of Bologna to tackle the increasing complexity of research management and to engage participants in a discussion on the effective approach required to face future challenges.

The organization of research support needs continuous adjustments and constant innovation not only to support effectively the wide University of Bologna research community, but also to address the rapidly changing context.

Networking activities, new skills and professional specializations seem to be required, as well as new models to coordinate the research management services vis-à-vis new initiatives, such as European University Alliances and other kinds of network and partnerships.

How to manage internal complexity?

The research managers network was definitively implemented in 2021, after a 7 years refinement process, together with the definition of an action plan aimed to provide coordination between the Research Support Division of the central administration and the research managers working in the Departments, and to facilitate upskilling, promotion of opportunities and community building.

Now we are working on leveraging communications within and through the network.

Research management requires new specialized and crosscutting skills. This enlarges the community of professional profiles involved. To avoid the risk of creating department “super-heroes”, or to duplicate experts/expertise, it is key that each “nodes” of the network mutually recognize their different (but complementary) roles, so as to lay the basis for a “variable connection system” that can be customized to effectively answer researchers’ needs. To achieve this, we have invested effort in communicating new roles (e.g. data steward) and standards, leveraging the interaction between the experts and the research managers, and we have thus started raising RM professionals’ awareness of their key role in the process.

How to manage complexity linked to new initiatives and models of partnerships?

The University of Bologna within the Una Europa Alliance, in the framework of the H2020-Swafs Una.Resin project, faced the need to re-think research support formats and activities at a level that goes beyond the single institution.

The models of collaborations piloted in Una.Resin are different from those developed by other alliances: instead of creating a shared service at the Alliance level, it was decided to focus on best practice sharing and networking/matchmaking activities based on the collaboration among research management working in the member universities.

With the end of the Una.Resin project, a new challenge is emerging: the need to support the R&I dimension of the Alliance in a context where education and research must constantly be in dialogue. And this aspect represents a new form of complexity for research managers and their institutions.

The table will be co-chaired as to combines two complementary research management point of view: Alessia Franchini, PhD, is the responsible of Research Development Sector - Social Sciences and Humanities & Excellent Science and coordinating Una.Resin activities for the University of Bologna and Paola Ragazzini works at the Research Services Coordination Unit.

Participants will be engaged in a lively discussion where they will be able to present their experiences and best practices, based on the level of complexity they face in their institutions both at the internal level (research management organisational models) and at the external level (research management in the context of trans-national R&I ecosystems such as European Alliances).

The expected outcome is to raise the awareness of the participants on the importance of a research management network to address complexity in everyday life and for future challenges.