Over my 20-year career as a research administrator, I am still met with the question “So what is it exactly that you do?” The reply I most often provide is “What is it that I don’t do?” and I believe this response applies to many of my colleagues in the BSD.
Research administrators are the backbone of the research ecosystem, intersecting at all levels of the institution with faculty, leadership, and our university counterparts. From proposal submission and award management to expense monitoring, human resources, proposal development, and award close out, research administrators are a jack of all trades.
Research administration staff in the BSD not only submit proposals and manage the awards—they are collaborative, communicative, resourceful, problem solvers, multitaskers, adaptable, flexible, and strive to provide an environment of a customer driven approach. On any given day, our staff are asked to route grant submissions, identify funding opportunities, contact subcontract sites, draft budgets, collect documents, invoice and track payments, provide balance reports, investigate errors, allocate salary, track effort, and submit progress reports and many other tasks in between—sometimes with very short notice.
Many of us fell into this path by accident. Some enjoyed working in finance, while others were trained on the job, and some took an unknown opportunity. In the end, one thing remains constant: to stay in research administration, you truly must enjoy the work. For me, knowing I play a small part in the success of a grant makes me proud. The notion of helping research translate from the bench to bedside has always stuck with me, and I want to be a part of the future of discovery, innovation, cures, and prevention. Everyone in this community takes pride in knowing we collectively push the needle forward by supporting the research ecosystem.
