Administration of ERC Starting Grant CHOBOTIX. Hana Štěpánková VŠCHT Praha

Transcription

1 Administration of ERC Starting Grant CHOBOTIX Hana Štěpánková VŠCHT Praha 1

2 Who is Ing. Hana Štěpánková (HŠ)? MSc. World Economy, Business and Finance (1997) Financial Manager + Chief Accountant (Sulzer Medica) Research Services Administrator Imperial College London ( ) CHOBOTIX Administrator (2008-now) part time 2

3 Why Administrator? To free the PI s time so he/she can focus the maximum possible time on research and teaching Some scientists, successful with their grant proposals, become managers and administrators and stop with their own scientific work THREAT - lost for science due to excess admin 3

4 KAMPUŠ+ How is the admin work organized at VSCHT Praha? Office supporting researcher s participation in EU funded projects, team leader Ing. Anna Mittnerova First place of contact when preparing grant proposal Checks the budget, organizes all necessary internal approvals at VSCHT Deals with the Grant Agreement Searches for project administrator Coordinates legal, financial and administrative issues of EU funded projects Anna Mittnerova - LEAR, participant contact 4

5 KAMPUŠ+ support of EU funded projects Organizes workshops for administrators from other Czech universities to spread the good practice Feed back of acquired experiences towards the Czech Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports Dissemination of scientific successful stories to media MUCH MORE One person, who leads a group of administrators, mostly part time working mums with university education, who, if not recruited by KAMPUŠ+, would probably be at home with small kids. 5

6 Before start of the project : Administrator s Tasks: Grant Agreement negotiations and approval Bank Account opening Preparation of first public tenders for equipment Reconstruction and refurbishment of the labs to comply with the project requirements (stable floor, for example) HR / new team members recruitment 6

7 Every day administration HR recruiting researchers, employment contracts, researcher s visa Equipment purchasing + public tenders 7

8 Every day administration Recording working time - Time Sheets Travel Claims Control (VAT not charged to the project, spending budget vs. reality) Periodic and final financial statements Dealing with auditors 8

9 Imperial College London vs. VSCHT Praha Comparison of the experience (1) Long history of participation in the EU funded projects all the admin departments involved are used and trained in the EU requirements Many grant proposals (pre-contracts office), many running grants (research services office), research administrators mostly have portfolio of +/- 200 grants, individual approach due to this large number of projects is almost impossible Administrators are usually only responsible for financial reconciliations and final financial statements, investigators have to deal with several admin departments themselves (HR, purchasing, travel claims etc.) 9

10 Imperial College London vs. VSCHT Praha Comparison of the experience (2) Czech researchers are less used to compete for funding due to large proportion of national and institutional funding Only few academics have the courage to apply usually those, who have some scientific experience from abroad Administrators individual approach, support to the PI s 10

11 How can a Czech institution help researchers (to be successful)? 1. Introduce uniquely determined system of evaluating academics and USE it for remuneration etc. Note to explain: At the moment, there is not clear system for not only remuneration, but also for dividing lab and office space, for identification which labs deserve to be refurbished (internal bids) and that is decreasing motivation of the staff, sometimes creates frustration 2. Modernize HR Introduce flexible salary tables to be able to attract top researchers Allow PI s to recruit their team as they like (to be able to offer a competitive salary) 11

12 How can a Czech institution help researchers (to be successful)? 3. Administrative support Each research group over 5 people should have a dedicated administrator More groups can share 1 administrator HŠ: 30% of full time for Chobotix 4. Reduce administrative requirements in Travel Claims and Public Tenders 12

13 How the ERC can help researchers? Compared to other grant schemes I have administered, the ERC grant is relatively easy and straightforward (low bureaucracy) Possible improvements : Time sheets and depreciation of equipment Time Sheets reality: 15 people, 5 years 900 monthly timesheets. As a base for the TS we use card entry system. For most of the members of the team and for most days every day has to be corrected (hours reduced) to show only the official amount of working hours. At IC London as well as at VSCHT, the researchers are asking WHY do we have to sign less hours then we actually work?? They do not want to be paid extra money for the extra hours, they only do not like this nonsense system, some are even offended by it as they usually work 10 hours a day, often nights and weekends 13

14 Time Sheets.. Grant holders are very carefully chosen people doing frontier research who can be trusted. They are passionate about their work and they work long hours. Character of work is definitely NOT ONLY 5 days a week, 8 hours a day, but that is what we can report, as TS is an official document and officially the working week has 40 hours In my opinion the Time Sheets could be dispensed with as they do not reflect reality (not only in Czech Rep. but as far as I know, nowhere) Equipment Allow total purchase price to be allocated to the direct costs of the project or at least allow this approach in reasonable cases 14

15 What do I like about the ERC grants scheme? Individual Grant holder means a more straightforward communication (no duplication of activities and/or miscommunication between the coordinator and other partners). Work packages are not required in other EU grant schemes the administrator s task is usually also to control the division of hours into tasks and packages, which is often purely formal due to the nature of the research. 15

16 Summary From the administration point of view, the ERC grants are relatively easy to look after. It is evident that they have been created with the research first philosophy. This approach should serve as example of good practice for other grant schemes, both national and EU If there is excess admin, it tends to be due to various internal rules and procedures of the Host Institution, not due to ERC The role of the administrator is important for freeing up the PI s time for what should they be focusing on research. 16

17 Thank you for your attention Ing. Hana Štěpánková Department for Research and Development VŠCHT Praha Financed by KAMPUŠ+ OK 09003, program MŠMT EUPRO 17