CRISs as a Management Tool: Experiences and Perspectives at the German Research Foundation (DFG)

CRISs as a Management Tool: Experiences and Perspectives at the German Research Foundation (DFG) Presented at the8th international Conference onCurrent Research Information Systems, May 11-13th, 2006 in Bergen, Norway Juergen Guedler, German Research Foundation (DFG), Department of Information Management

Topics • Introduction • Information Management at the German Research Foundation • Products related to the DFG’s CRIS • Further developments

Topics • Introduction • Information Management at the German Research Foundation • Information products related to the DFG’s CRIS • Further developments

Objectives of presentation Main idea of CRISs: To publish information on ongoing research projects in an user-friendly searchable way. But a well established CRIS offers more: • Management Information • Base for statistical analysis • Base for evaluative studies on research programmes • Base for rankings The presentation will exemplarily illustrate these possibilities for the CRIS of the German Research Foundation (DFG). Conclusions will be drawn on the special possibilities for funding agencies, that emerge from a more offensive (and ideally collaborative) use of own data and data from partners.

The German Research Foundation • promote academic excellence on a competitive basis • serve science and the humanities in all fields • advise parliaments and public authorities on research questions • support the advancement and education of young researchers • encourage international research cooperation Who We Are • central public funding organisation for academic research in Germany What We Do

Third party funding income of German universities by source (1999/2000)

Facts and figures disciplines: All research areas in science and humanities programmes: Project funding, coordinated programmes, fellowships, prizes and infrastructure. staff: 700 people (head office in Bonn, dependances in Berlin, Beijing, Washington, Moscow and New Delhi) budget growth: 1985: 500 Mio €, 1995: 900 Mio €, 2005: 1.300 Mio € New: the so-called „Excellence Initiative“ (add. budget of ~ 1.6 Billion Euro (2006-2011))

Consequences of growth I • Public interest: Grown public interest in questions of research and research-funding as well as on the results of DFG-funded research • Accountability: Stakeholders (funds providers and taxpayers) ask for transparency in the use of funds provided • Political advice: demand for data as a base for political decisions (e.g. in the context of the above mentioned “Excellence“-Initiative) • Base for planning purposes: The DFG is increasingly asked to legitimate its strategic decisions on the basis of statistical data and to offer its members (=universities) such a base for the same purpose

Consequences of growth II For these and other reasons the DFG today is asked increasingly • to inform about its own activities and the activities of funded researchers (=„research information“)and • to collect data that allow a fact-driven evaluation of these activities (=„research and funding evaluation“)

„History“ of Data and Information Management at the DFG • Late 70ties till early 90ties: Centralized data management, slow but steadily growing data production by a single unit, based on a system of office-internal data entry forms. Use: “For statistics O N L Y” • Midst of 90ties till 2004: Decentralized data Management, fast growing data-and-documents-production by around 150 staff members within a mainfraim-based software-architecture (All-in-1). Additional use: Data-based production of letters to applicants and reviewers as well as of documentations for the deciding bodies of the DFG. • Since 2005: ElektrA – a web based tool that helps to manage all funding programmes of the DFG. Around 450 staff members are involved now. Additional use: support of workflows and production of far more detailed information on the funding activities and procedures of the DFG.

Base of information services: Process produced data in ElektrA secure quality QV Applicants send proposals and reports put information (data & documents) in database ElektrA- DB rd. 20.000 Persons / year Departments of the DFG copy of data IM more than450 people part. on data based proposal management Evaluative reports / Ranking / statistics ask for reviews information services Reviewers CRISs online (e.g.Inst-DB, GEPRIS) rd. 7.000 Persons / year send reviews further databased information services (e.g. WWW of DFG)

Exemplarily information products based on the DFG’s CRIS • Management Reports • Statistics and Evaluation • GEPRIS • Research Explorer • Funding-Ranking

Management Reports Objective: To offer easy accessible inf. on the process of reviewing and funding (on the base of more than 40.000 applications yearly) Users: Management-Staff of the DFG Mode: Interactive and personalized user-interface via DFG-Intranet Size: More than 100 specialized rep. for different manag. purposes Software: Crystal Reports and Crystal Enterprise Server Object-orientated Link on ElektrA

Statistics and Evaluation Ad-hoc statistics: More than 250 statistical request yearly (2/3 internal, 1/3 external) on funding- and research-related topics Analysis: Detailled DFG-internal studies on the acceptance and user-profile of certain funding-programmes Questionaires: Use of addresses within the database for online-questionaires on funding- and research related topics: e.g. (published on www.dfg.de): - „Publication Strategies in Transformation?“ (acceptance and use of open access publications) (2005) - „Research and Careers - Experiences and Professional Development of Former DFG Fellowship Recipients“ (2004)

German Project Information System (GEPRIS) • GEPRIS is a derivate from the DFG‘s productive data system and • offers „classical“ CRIS-services: • Abstracts on the objectives of funded projects • Classifications (e.g. research areas, funding instruments, institutions, related countries) • A broad set of search-possibilities GEPRIS is the result of a two-step production-process: First step: Preparation of DFG-internal data for publishing purposes (90 % of the presented data) Second step: “Added value” by including feedback of applicants (e.g. key-words, actual addresses) Actually, GEPRIS is „under construction“. The new system will be published next weeks! www.dfg.de/gepris

GEPRIS – Example of a project description • project-title head of project project-partners discipline Abstract Administrative Informations

Research Explorer – Directory of German Research Institutes Base: DFG-internal database (ElektrA) Scope: more than 20.000 institutes at German universities and research organizations Content:- Name (german/english) - Address - Hierarchical information - Disciplinary classification - Type of facility - WWW-Link and others Quality-Assurance: a.) data are productive (e.g. db-based mailing) b.) reg. QS-processes by a central unit of the admin.

Research Explorer: Single Item

The DFG-“Funding-Ranking“ Idea: • To give information about research activity of German universities and other research bodies • To inform about the disciplinary research profile of these institutions and of the regions they are active • To inform about networks in science „History“: • First Ranking in 1997 (database: only DFG-funded money) as a reaction to a demand of the ten biggest German universities (members of DFG) • Second Ranking in 2000 (new: regional aggregation of data) • Third Ranking in 2003 (new: networks in science, several other indicators) • Fourth Ranking (Sep. 2006) (new: more indicators, detailed inf. on research areas)

Visitor’s Statistics: www.dfg.de (1.7.2003 to 20.6.2004) Response to the Funding Ranking Highly publicised in mass media large echo in the scientific community english version: http://www.dfg.de/en/ranking/

Topics • Introduction • Information Management at the German Research Foundation • Products related to the DFG’s CRIS • Further developments

Conclusions I Current situation with respect to the use of DFG’s CRIS-System: • Good progress with respect to quantitative and qualitative information about DFG-grants but • scarce information about the process as well as about the results and success of DFG funded research and • No working unit within or outside the DFG, which could satisfy the described needs in an appropriate way. With respect to actors outside DFG • Low co-operation between different producers and users of research information • Large difficulty to link information from different sources due to missing standards • Absence of a central „network-point“ that offers and coordinates appropriate services

Solution Establishment of a scientific facility, which supports the DFG and other actors involved in science policy with above described services for the purpose of programme and research planning as well as a service of information to the general public.  DFG-Foundation of the “Institute for Research Information and Quality Assurance (IFQ)” (Oct. 2005)

Examples of Future Service of the IFQ • Qualifying information (who is doing research with whom and with which results?) (= General Research Information) • Quantifying information (Input- and output-data on DFG-funded projects) (=monitoring/evaluation) • E.g. establishment of an information system that publishes the final reports of DFG-funded projects. • Empirical based information about process and results of DFG-funded projects (e.g. career of DFG-Fellows, Internationality and Interdisciplinarity of projects, „output“(publications, patents and others)). for details see (german only): www.forschungsinfo.de

Conclusions II • Today most funding agencies run „CRIS“-systems II. Most of the builders (and users) of these systems are not aware of the possibilities their systems offer for „more-than-internal“-services • Try to use your CRIS in more than „one way“: the more products • you offer the better is the quality of your CRIS (the data within)! IV. Get into contact to other CRIS-providers: Exchange Data! V. Even more effectivness is possible – by working together (as the following presentation will show)!

Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft Thank you for your attention! ...and remember: without data you are just another person with an opinion! Dr. Juergen Guedler, Department of Information Management, juergen.guedler@dfg.de More Infos at www.dfg.de/

CRISs as a Management Tool: Experiences and Perspectives at the German Research Foundation (DFG)