Sustainable Management and Administration for Research: Training across the project Lifecycle (SMARTLife)

Sustainable Management and Administration for Research: Training across the project Lifecycle (SMARTLife

Project Overview

By bringing together research development and research management expertise this project will address the barriers to conducting north-south and south-south collaborations. Recognising the operational and infrastructural challenges faced by research managers and administrators (RMAs), it will develop their capacity to build and deliver research partnerships professionally and fairly across countries and continents. Primarily focused on competency-based training and resource/best practices identification and development for African RMAs it also targets donor country RMAs, where a better understanding of the local context in which their partners operate is vital in order to strengthen collaboration and impact. Short term outcomes include a knowledge/skills gap scoping study, a staff visit module/framework, a virtual knowledge exchange workshop and a draft training curriculum. Through further development of e.g. curricula, shared resources, improved networks, increased institutional knowledge and evidence-based practices, this will enable the longer-term impact of increased capacity of African institutions to sustainably deliver research programmes.

Team Members

Team Lead: Victoria Nembaware	University of Cape Town, South Africa
Team Lead: Simon Glasser	University of Bristol, UK
External expert facilitator: Annette Hay	Coventry University, UK
Michelle Skelton	University of Cape Town, South Africa
Alecia Naidu	University of Western Cape, South Africa
Collen Masimirembwa	African Institute of Biomedical Science and Technology (AiBST), Zimbabwe
Collet Dandara	University of Cape Town, South Africa
Ailsa Davies	Cardiff University, UK
Anne Priest	University of Bath, UK
Olivia Lelong	University of West England, UK
Sarah Tupper	University of Exeter, UK
Mentee: Tamsin Thomas	University of Exeter, UK
Mentee: Paidamoyo Bodzo	University of Cape Town, South Africa
Mentee: Alice Mutambiranwa	African Institute of Biomedical Science and Technology (AiBST), Zimbabwe

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The project was split into three major objectives:

1) Needs Assessment

An online survey was conducted among research managers and administrators (RMAs) across team members’ networks, designed to identify the skills and resource gaps and the operational and infrastructural challenges that RMAs face in both Africa and the UK.

2) Knowledge Exchange Workshop: Setting up and running an equitable international collaboration

This workshop aimed to provide an introduction for new research managers and administrators on how to set up equitable partnerships for
international research projects.

Learning Outcomes

List key steps required to set up an equitable international collaboration
Discuss challenges and enablers for setting up equitable international collaborations
Describe resources one could use to set up equitable international collaborations

3) Competence based training resources

This objective aimed to created resources for training RMAs based on some key competency thematic areas.

Resources from these activities can be accessed below and here SMARTLife

Output	Format	What it is	Who it is intended for	How to use it
KE Resources Log	PDF report	Aggregation of useful links that provide guidance on running equitable international partnerships	RMAs	Reference document for RMAs working in international partnerships.
RMA survey results (link to follow soon)	Online journal publication	Peer-reviewed published results of SMARTLife survey	RMAs and those interested in RMA skills development	Contribution to evidence around skills needs of RMAs, particularly in Africa, in relation to international partnerships work.
RMA survey results infographic (available on demand)	PDF infographic	Results of the SMARLife survey	RMAs and those interested in RMA skills development	Contribution to evidence around skills needs of RMAs, particularly in Africa, in relation to international partnerships.
Virtual workshop presentations	Videos	Slides plus videos of SMARTLife Knowledge Exchange Workshop presentations	Primarily for reference by workshop attendees	Reference documents for participants in SMARTLife workshops.
Virtual workshop supplementary materials Workshop Notes Narrative Workshop presentation by Barbara Herweg – RM Style and Culture: Setting and running equitable partnerships Workshop presentation by Sarah Tupper – Equitable research partnerships: why they matter? Key principles and examples of best practice	PDF reports	SMARTLife Knowledge Exchange Workshop Report and Q&A and Team case studies	Primarily for reference by workshop attendees	Notes and Q&A stemming from the workshops’ panel discussions, and brief case studies from the SMARTLife team sharing experiences from UK and African RMAs on setting up and running international collaborations.
Virtual workshop reflections	Newsletter	Newsletter article written as a reflection of project members participating in this project	For the SickleInAfrica consortium and general public. Article promotes consortia to support knowledge exchange activities between research managers and coordinators.	General information.
RMA Curriculum Resource	PDF	Includes competences, indicative content, personas, case studies (indicated above) and evaluation tools	Trainers, institutes or organizations that offer training to research managers and administrators	Reference document.

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