Managing your research

Managing your research effectively requires a number of different skills, including time management, collaborative working and intrapreneurship!  It also involves effective project management and data management.    

Project management tools

There are also a number of project management tools that can help you to manage your research more effectively. The most commonly used is a Gantt chart.

A Gantt chart is made up of a series of bars, one for each of the project tasks. The project tasks are plotted against the project timeline. The length and location of each bar represents the start and finish date of each project task. This can be helpful because at a glance it is possible to see:

• which project tasks need to be preceded or followed by which other project tasks
• which project tasks are running concurrently
• what should be happening in any particular month of the project.

Some project plans also use critical path analysis. Critical path analyses are project models showing the project tasks, time duration and task dependencies. They can be used to calculate the longest path of planned activities to the end of the project, and the earliest and latest date that each activity can start and finish without making the project longer.

Data management

Requirements

Some universities now have codes of practice relating to research management. These are intended to help to:

• minimise the possibility of allegations of malpractice
• ensure that data isn't lost
• protect intellectual property.

Researchers are asked to:

• keep records of the procedures followed and results obtained
• store data for an appropriate time period
• make sure that data is stored in a durable format and that if it is stored electronically files are backed up.

Your research manager will be able to advise on the relevant data storage mechanism and time period for your particular project.

Data protection

If you collect and store personal information as part of your research project, you are bound by the requirements of the Data Protection Act. The key principles are:

• data may only be used for the specific purposes for which it was collected
• data must not be disclosed to other parties without the consent of the individual whom it relates to
• individuals have a right of access to the information held about them
• personal information must not be kept for longer than is necessary.

Digital repositories

Universities are increasingly being encouraged to establish digital repositories (like big databases) to store, curate, disseminate and preserve research outputs. However, this is a complex area and progress is slow as there is little agreement between disciplines about the tags or metadata to be used to code the data for retrieval.