I'm taking Kelly Morgan's
suggestion from this reply and running with it. Consider this the new thread on whether or not folks would be interested in keeping flags once we're on the new platform and can design our intake forms to capture all the varieties of information we need or want.
Speaking for myself, I'd want to keep them, at least assuming they'd work roughly the same way they do now. One big reason for that stance is their visibility on a proposal list or search screen. When there's a flag, I don't have to delve all the way into the IPF to find the piece of information represented by the flag: just click on the flag and there it is. So that could be one way to mark things that are important to know right away, so folks looking for that information don't have to click through to find it.
Sure, we can ask the relevant questions once we've got smart forms and can build an IPF to capture all the information we need or want - but that comes at an administrative burden cost on the PIs (or whoever is filling out the IPFs - at Oakland, we split that task with the PIs, since we try to keep as much burden off their plates as possible. We could, as we did with our IRB initial submission template (which we built ourselves using the smart forms technology that's about to become available in SP), tailor the form in such a way that certain options are only revealed when the answer to a previous question makes it necessary. (For example, if the PI answers No to the question about human subjects involvement, then we don't need to ask that PI whether there's an IRB-approved protocol in place, or a pending submission.) But we'd still have to build those questions into the form - and there's also no guarantee that the PI will correctly answer the questions. In the context of limited submissions that prompted the original discussion, I'd wager that probably fewer than 30% of our PIs would get that answer correct if we asked it - whereas any of our pre-award staff can answer it in a heartbeat.
Plus, we've deployed some flags that wouldn't be capturable in an IPF. We have one for projects that had to be terminated because of COVID, for example - there'd be no way that a PI would know that at proposal stage, but it's definitely information we want to be able to report on and track. Similarly, we have flags to indicate when a PI submits their first proposal and receives their first award, as we recognize those individuals at our annual research town hall. Again, not something that would be appropriate to ask in an IPF - and while we could find that information through searches and filters, having the flag there makes it much simpler and easier for us to tally that list every year.
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Michael Spires
Research Development Officer
Oakland University
Rochester, MI
(he/him)
mspires@oakland.edu------------------------------