Go back

‘Game-changer’ plan for research management roadmap

Image: Craig Nicholson for Research Professional News

Earma 2023: Sector developing plan for greater professional recognition of role

A ‘roadmap’ that is in development to shape the future of research management could be a “game-changer” for the profession, according to its lead organiser.

The RM Roadmap project, which is being led by the European Association of Research Managers and Administrators, has received €1.5 million from the EU research programme and plans to connect existing networks of professionals working in the area.

It also aims to clarify their roles and set out research management’s potential to support European research and innovation systems, Earma managing director Nik Claesen explained at his organisation’s annual conference in Prague on 25 April.

Research managers have been increasingly engaged in pushes to professionalise their jobs in recent years. Many of them have high hopes for the RM Roadmap.

“It’s a plan to create a game-changer in research management,” said Claesen. “We are professionals—we need professional recognition.”

Route planning

Running for three years from September 2022, the project has already gathered 100 “ambassadors” representing national groups of RMAs, said the team behind it.

The project to develop the roadmap is “an amazing opportunity” seeking “targeted results”, said Borana Taraj, head of EU projects at Earma.

Ambassadors will meet for the first time next month, as part of a process in which the organisations participating in the project intend to co-create the roadmap with the sector.

A further group of ambassadors will be sought towards the end of the year and selected at the start of 2024 to further shape the roadmap by working on specific topics, with the final version due to be presented around the middle of 2025.

The roadmap is intended to set out how RMAs can reduce administrative burdens for researchers and improve the efficiency, quality and trustworthiness of the research process.

It is also intended to raise awareness of the profession and what it can do for R&I systems, and to help increase RMAs’ skills.

At the Earma meeting, an online hub designed to support research collaboration and further the development of the roadmap was launched by one of the participants in the project, the company Crowdhelix.

Research Professional News is media partner for the Earma 2023 conference in Prague. Read all of the coverage here.