Inventory of Best Practice
D2.2 Inventory of Best Practice for DOWNLOAD (PDF)
This deliverable, issued in January 2019, created an inventory of best practice across the ten Alliance4Life institutions for the following topics, which reflect the Alliance4Life Focus Groups: science evaluation, ethics, human resources and mobility, grant offices and proposal preparation, core facilities and big data, technology transfer, and science communication. The deliverable shows that valuable good practices exist among the Alliance4Life members, which are to be shared amongst the community and beyond. Therefore, identified best practices will be used for Alliance4Life recommendations at institutional, national, and EU levels, and for future development of Alliance4Life trainings and strategies.
The table below summarizes best practices across the Alliance4Life Focus Groups:
| The Procedure of Science Evaluation and Benchmarking: transparent, reproducible, regular, and expectable; regular and long-term information collection to provide data about development of the institutional performance; bonus system for high impact publications and attracted competitive funding; bibliometric indicators that are preferable at the institutional level, and a peer-review process at the national level; and procedures in place to avoid conflicts of interest. |
| Ethics and Integrity in Health and Life Sciences: institutional guidelines in order to secure compliance with the EU regulations and respective national legislations; courses and trainings on research ethics/research integrity; clear set of rules for financing; avoiding institutional and personal conflict of interest; provide consultancy for ethical issues for grant writing; and dedicated research integrity officers/consultants. |
| Grant Support and Funding Opportunities Dissemination: dissemination via mailing list; travel grants for participation in brokerage events and information days; pre-award services to increase grant capture capabilities; clear split of pre-award and post-award support; dedicated support for European Research Council (ERC) grant applications, including acquisition of ERC grant awardees; and motivational scheme for resubmission of promising proposals. |
| Progressive Career and Human Resources (HR) Policies: open vacancies published internationally; guidelines for new employees on how to navigate the organization; information about employee rights and duties, possibilities for career development; courses and trainings; English-speaking working environment; and social events for international staff. |
| Defined Principles for Core Facilities: budgeting, pricing and invoicing, regular reporting, and evaluations and internal reviews; dedicated funding (both institutional and national) for research infrastructures to ensure long-term sustainability; and participation in European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI) , with ELIXIR expertise that is applied for data management enhancement. |
| Dedicated Funds for Intellectual Property (IP) Protection and IP Protection Policy: institutional committee on IP evaluation and commercialization; nationwide support to tech-transfer offices through networking and lobbying; courses on IP rights and management; support program for institutional staff starting spin-off companies; development of entrepreneurship skills; fostering science and business collaborations; and royalties to inventors. |
| Strategy for Effective Dissemination and Exploitation of Research Results: structure the communication plan as an integral part of the institutional framework of Public Relations and Communication; internal communication tools; toolbox (collection) for effective communication – experience of each Alliance4Life partner institution; and media communication with focus on scientific media on the EU level. |