2022 Pre-Forum Community Webinars

Faculty and research are two of the most important assets for an institution of higher education, and identifying, promoting, and highlighting the achievements in these areas are critical to promoting an institution's reputation. As universities evolve in this new post-COVID era, new horizons in research and innovation are needed to continue to answer the numerous challenges facing higher education. With many institutions reporting an emphasis on growing and diversifying their networks, collaborations, and interdisciplinary research, administrators and faculty themselves are in need of the right information to make strategic long term decisions. As a result, universities are now looking across silos attempting to bridge the gap between systems to create more efficiencies and ultimately, to understand their institutional landscapes more fully. One-way universities are seeking to do this is by connecting and integrating faculty information systems (FIS) and research information systems (RIMS) in new, and more robust ways to generate effective workflows, new data, and insights.

During this webinar, stakeholders from Office of the Provost, Office of Personnel, and the Library at a number of research-intensive institutions, will discuss the use cases of their systems, how their adoption of these systems is supporting their strategy, and what they envision the future holds for them.

*The event is free, but registration is required.

Faculty Information Systems (FIS) have a strong focus on internal faculty data, including sensitive and confidential personnel data unique to faculty activities, and include workflows necessary for activities like faculty activity reporting, accreditation, and annual reviews for reappointment, promotion, and tenure appointment. These systems allow institutions to electronically collect, store, showcase, analyze, and report on faculty activities and accomplishments using a single system of record.

Research Information Management Systems (RIMS) focus on aggregating, curating, and storing data and metadata about institutional research and scholarly activities in a single system of record. RIMS are multi-faceted solutions that showcase research, both at the institutional level and at the researcher level. RIMS are strategic to an institution as they provide insights into the performance and competitiveness of institutional research, which is essential to sound decision-making and planning.

Both are solutions that are typically used in conjunction across research intensive institutions.