ABC Project 1 - Piloting Auto-upload of Standardized Funding Award Results Judith L. Chadwick Assistant Vice-President, Research Services University of Toronto Bob Dirstein Dirstein Consulting Inc. w/University of Toronto

1. CASRAI / ABC Pilot Project:
Auto-upload of Tri-Agency Competition
Results

2. ABC: the University Perspective
 Financial constraints make business
process optimization essential, not just fun
to do
 Only so much can be achieved
independently; active tri-agency partners
required
 An opportunity for CASRAI to demonstrate
concrete ROI

3. A key, common business process
PI Proposal
Development
Sign-off by
University
(Record in
University
Database)
Submission to
Sponsor
Adjudication by
Sponsor
Communication
of Results to
University
Set-up of
restricted
Research
Funds
Communication
to PIs, Chairs, et
al.
PI spending &
analysis of
results

4. Pothole on the information highway

5. Auto-Upload Project: Recap
Current
 Multiple business
processes and on-line
formats for conveying
competition results
 Manual data entry and
set-up of accounts at
institutions
– inefficiency
– opportunity for errors
Proposed
 Standard (XML) data
format
 Automated upload of
data
– faster account set-up
– reduced admin burden
& staff cost
– elimination of keying
errors

6. Return on Investment - Dollars
 Applications submitted to approximately 650
unique sponsors annually
 Of those only 7 receive in excess of 100
applications annually
 25% - 50% of account set-up could automated
 6 – 12 weeks of staff time could be saved
 More broadly implemented standard potentially
80% of awards could be automated
 Increases the number of institutions for which
automation provides an ROI

7. Return on Investment - Speed
 Account set-up - hours versus weeks
 Automation of notification
– PI
– Chair
– Dean
– VP
 Improved data quality

8. Moving forward on a Pilot Project
Following a lengthy period of concept
development with other universities, CASRAI
and the tri-agencies,
 UofT has volunteered to lead, with tri-agency
partners, on a pilot implementation of a
standard
 Documented “moral support” to date from 18
other universities
 Benefits will accrue to all tri-agency eligible
institutions

9. Next Steps
 Execution of a project charter
 Assignment of resources (i.e. leadership,
subject matter expert and technical
participants)
 Finalization of a standard for stakeholder
review and implementation

10. SSHRC Insight Results

11. NSERC Discovery Results

12. CIHR Foundation Results

13. Communication of Results
No Yes