TOTALLY True Tales of Research Administrators
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
Thank you to everyone who shared their stories. A special thank you to the volunteers who championed this project.
When I first started in research administration many years ago, I had only one or two applications under my belt when I was asked to assist with a large NIH grant that included a subcontractor in Africa. I was worried at first, but they seemed to be responsive and provide everything we asked on time despite the time difference and need to do everything by email. About a week before the application was due, I received a frantic email from them regarding the budget. They had forgotten to ask me in which category they should allot funds for government bribes. After much back and forth regarding what was allowable on the grant, I'm happy to say that the bribes were not included on the final budget that was submitted.
A new PI was sending me partially answered responses or entirely blank emails about proposal revisions. He also wouldn't answer his phone so we could clear things up. It took me a while to realize he wasn't sending me blank emails or ignoring me. In what I presume was a panic-induced error on the morning of a deadline, he was responding to my emails in pale yellow font.
In my first position as a research administrator, I worked primarily with a wonderful, seasoned PI who had served on review committees for both NIH and NSF. He was well aware of what was needed for a successful proposal submission. He would let me know well in advance when he had an upcoming proposal (usually at least 3 months ahead). He read each solicitation, knew exactly what was needed, reached out to his subawardees to introduce me, and had all of his materials ready for submission at least two weeks before the sponsor deadline. In my naivety, I thought his actions reflected the standard practice for PIs.
My story comes from the days when individuals could hand deliver proposal packages, along with all the required copies, to the NIH Center for Scientific Review. I worked with a PI who usually cut it close on timing, so we always had contingency plans to ensure the proposal made it to NIH in time. This was a very large, center-type proposal, so the PI purchased a plane ticket for me to hand deliver the package in case we didn't make it in time for Federal Express to ship overnight. The PI and our whole team carpooled to the local Kinkos where the proposal was being copied and bound (which was not recommended, but PI was sure it made a difference in his prior success). Our team went through every page of each bound copy – at least 20 so that NIH would not have to make reviewer copies –to ensure all pages were included and looked good. It took many hours, but we were able to complete the task, box up the lot, do a sort of good luck blessing over it, and send it by FedEx. Sadly, that meant I didn't get to take a quick trip to the DC area, and I don’t even remember if it got funded, but made for a lifelong memory.
"I am a research grant specialist with 25 years of experience in research administration and work at a private hospital. I recently worked on a DoD Focused Award full-application submission which included 20 key personnel and 9 subawards (8 domestic and 1 foreign). This was a special funding opportunity announcement that was emailed to the investigator, but of course the PDF attachment was NOT user-friendly and was very difficult to scroll through the 117-page document to find information and the FIND button was not an option either. The clinical research specialist and I tried different options to make it more userfriendly, such as trying to copy the text (which was not an option), tried to use the ""save-as"" option, but that failed and was not able to locate the original FOA online or in the DoD website. To make it even more interesting, this was a clinical trial AND non-clinical trial proposal PLUS the FOA asked that the grant application include two separate Statements of Work and budgets. You could imagine how much fun I had creating the budget with a $5 MIL direct cost limit and 9 subawards. In the middle of it all, we receive a notification that DoD's Previous, Current and Pending Support page was now implementing NIH's certification verbiage and digital signature requirement. We had to notify all 20 key personnel to resubmit their revised other support pages, as well. The last 2 days before the deadline, the investigator, the clinical research specialist and I worked late into the evening hours and sometimes chatting via MS Teams with questions we had at 2 AM. The very last day, I was awake for 24 hours straight working on completing our internal process via our online software and linking the SF-424 to it. However, for some reason our internal system was not accepting the R&R subaward budgets, so I had to manually enter all 9 subawards x 4 budget periods each into the SF424. Plus, one of the subawards had both clinical and non-clinical expenses so I had to separate that one budget into two, as well. I finished all of the budgets by 9 AM the day of the deadline and we successfully submitted by 3 PM. What a whirlwind that was! Of course, my manager gave me two extra off days to recover from it all and the investigator took the clinical research specialist and I for a THANK YOU FOR ALL YOUR HARD WORK lunch! Research Administration is a unique and exciting profession indeed!"
Years ago, I accepted a position in a small, yet well established research and teaching department. I was the Business Manager, Life Cycle Research Administrator, Human Resources Manager - I wore many hats. I was assisting a PI with a proposal (the first one we had worked on together). The PI walks into my office, hands me a sheet of notebook paper. It read: "A little salary for me, a little salary for my research assistant, we'll travel some, publish a few papers, and we'll need minimal supplies". That was the budget and budget justification! Needless to say, I asked him to sit down, and we had a very informative and lengthy discussion about proposals.
Years ago and prior to the invention of electronic proposal submission systems, our PI was working on a very large proposal involving many subrecipients. The proposal was not fully compiled until the last minute. We then had to make multiple copies and ensure each packet was in the correct order required by the sponsor. This all took time and we missed the last FEDEX pickup that would have ensured our proposal arrived at the sponsor's office on time. So, an airlline ticket was purchased. The PI drove me to the airport. I had a briefcase with wheels and carried on the proposal as I headed to DC. I raced off the plane, through the airport, and waited in line for the next available cab. I gave the cab driver the address of the sponsor, endured rush hour traffic, arrived, went through security, and delivered the proposal in person with minutes to spare. I called the PI to tell him it was delivered, grabbed a coffee, headed back to the airport and flew back home. Those were the days!!!
On June 5, 2020, with the pandemic in fully swing, we had our first, large NIH deadline for submissions to be completed remotely. All of our submissions were going into our organization's ERA system when the unthinkable happened, the system shutdown and went completely offline at 2:30 PM, with submissions due by 5 PM. Several of my colleagues and I banded together, dropped everything, and went into the ASSIST System to enter in the remaining seven submissions. The last proposal was put through at 4:59 PM, just in time for the NIH deadline.
While working on a proposal with a professor from the Math Department, a research administrator came across several errors in the budget. When asked about the errors, the professor snapped back, "I have a PhD in advanced mathematics, not arithmetic."
While working with a faculty member on a letter of intent, I noticed that he had not included the required abstract and informed the PI to which I received the response...“An abstract of the project…hmmm… we have no idea at this point, but I will try to come up with something."
Once upon a time in an institution not too far away, there was an experienced and well-funded PI who thought their work was more important than that of others. One day, they felt that our office was not responding fast enough and emailed the Research Officer saying, "I am the king of my kingdom and you all are not responding as I need".
While working on a proposal budget, I had a PI tell me, "I am going to fudge the numbers to get the total the sponsor wants. It's ok if they aren't accurate." Being the dedicated research administrator, I explained that budgets are based upon estimates but that we need to be as accurate as possible. Uncertain where to go from there, the PI asked, "So, what do I do?" Together, we took another look at the budget, as I had already recommended...six times!
On a beautiful summer day, there was a proposal due at 5 PM. Sadly, the PI did not have their documents ready as directed, and one documented required the signature of the Vice President of Research for submission. As luck would have it, the Vice President had the afternoon off and was golfing at a local golf course that day. Being a highly committed research officer and ready to get this proposal submitted, I went to the golf course and walked all around the course until I found the VP and got the signature. Thankfully, the proposal submitted on-time!
A number of years ago, the NIH had emailed a faculty member about late progress reports (earlier days of eSNAPs, so that tells ya it has been a hot minute). I had reached out to the PI to see what I can do to help and he indicated he'd contact NIH directly and copy me. Great, no problem! Fast-forward to the email that hit my inbox the next day... This PI told the NIH program officer and the grant manager that he'd get the progress reports done as soon as possible, but that if he spent any more time in the lab/office and away from his wife, he'd "have another divorce/ex-wife and more alimony to pay-- two ex-wives were enough."
Thankfully, the NIH PO and GMS replied simply and professionally saying that while they understand his predicament, he'd be looking at a delay in the next round of funds and possibly loss of the award. Ultimately, the PI got everything submitted a week later and we never lost funding- thankfully!
After working with a PI late one Friday night on the day of the deadline in an office all by ourselves, I teaser him saying that he was lucky I was such a nice person to stick around on a Friday night to get this proposal in for him. Rather than a response of thanks, I received, "I don't see what the big deal is. The deadline wasn't until midnight!" Needless to say, I never stayed that late again to get something in for him.
Governing law language found in a CDA: "...we will flip a quarter to decide which law will govern and where disputes will be lodged. If it comes up heads, this Agreement will be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the United States and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, without regard to its conflict of laws principles, and the venue will be Boston, Massachusetts. If it comes up tails, the Agreement will be governed by the laws of the state/locality where your headquarters are located, without regard to its conflict of laws principles, and the venue will be the city/town where you are located. If you just want to stipulate Massachusetts law and venue upfront, check this box. If both coin flips and Massachusetts makes you uncomfortable, we are also okay with Delaware law and venue, as a neutral solution – check this box if you want to stipulate Delaware law and venue."
I worked with a PI who submitted 6 unsolicited R01s for the same deadline, 1 as a sub and 5 as the prime. He waited until the day of the deadline to submit final documents to me and the two other departmental administrators who had been assigned to these proposals, despite repeated promises that he'd submit them all long before the deadline. He actually had the nerve to complain when he was told to stop making changes to documents in Dropbox at 3:15 PM so that we'd have time to submit by the 5:00 PM deadline. It took 5 departmental administrators and 3 OSP submitters to finish all 6 proposals, but we actually got them all in by the deadline. None of them were awarded.
When I was on a very busy proposal team for a large R1 university, our "favorite" time of year was always the October R01 deadline. We would review and submit over 100 applications for the deadline, with all the stress, punchy laughter, and bad jokes that entails. I'll never forget the time that, during one of these deadlines, a PI's mother called to make sure his proposal was submitted.
At the time, I was sure I had seen everything!
We were rushing to finish a proposal for an NIH deadline - back in the old days of paper copies. We missed the last FedEx truck pickup leaving town so I drove to the small airport 35 miles away to try and catch the plane. I missed that too, by mere minutes. I drove back to campus and the PI grabbed the box and drove to the nearest large airport 80 miles away and booked himself a red-eye overnight ticket to Bethesda. He was able to get there and deliver it in person just in time. You would think that this would be a good learning experience for the PI, but no. To this day, he is still notorious for submitting proposals in ASSIST or Grants.gov within an hour of the agency deadline. The scary part is he is successful with these last minute applications so there is no chance of making him change his ways.
At one time, I worked for a university who submitted one third of their annual submissions during a two-month timeframe due to these special state-sponsored grant programs. This time of year for the office was always very overwhelming for the small staff, but we worked through it together. Right in the midst of the busiest season, we were all huddled in my office taking a brain break when we realized that one member of our pre-award team had two different shoes on and another had her pants of backwards! Times get tough but research administrators are tougher!
"A stellar, nationally known researcher transferred to our small, growing university from a well-known and well-respected institution. Our VP for Research told us to take special care in working with him to ensure that he had a great experience with our pre-award office. One of his first submissions to included over 18 subawards, tons of required documentation, and a hardcopy/mailed delivery (this was pre-online submissions).
Putting the proposal together with
the team took MONTHS! When we were finally finished, the PI came to our office to look over the required printed copies to be sure we didn't miss anything. Months went by and we hadn't heard anything about the outcome of the submission. We tried contacting the agency but no response. One day, we got a call from the post office saying that they thought they had some paperwork for us. Our university name was included on some of the pages but possibly there had been an error in delivery. One of our staff members ran down to pick it up, and it turned out to be something we never expected. Our original submission had gotten damaged during the routing and delivery process and the delivery address, part of the box it was in, and multiple pages of the submission had been lost. It was difficult for us to even decipher which proposal this had been, until...we saw that there were 18 subawards included in the budget. Our massive proposal had never been delivered. From that day forward, any hardcopy/mailed submissions were tracked."
My first introduction to research administration came in late 2006 when I was the front office administrative assistant for a department. A researcher was yelling in the hallway outside the assistant director's office because they had a research proposal due that day and their assigned administrative assistant had JUST started and didn't know anything about research proposals. Oops. Despite my lack of experience in this area, I very calmly and insistently asked them to calm down and stop shouting. I said that we would do everything we could to get their proposal in. After calming down, we were able to work together to get the proposal out on time that day. A few days later, we all received Dixie Chicks "Taking The Long Way" CDs in our mailboxes (yes, we still had physical mailboxes!) along with an apology.
As a very young research administrator, I was working on a file for annual review/audit and encountered a charge that had only "Belly Dancer" in the descriptor field. Being a recent hire from public industry and working in a predominately male field, I was immediately on the alert. I called my department administrator and told her I needed copies of backup documentation and a detailed description of this charge. She laughingly told me it was a piece of equipment in the lab that was used to "shake" samples and they referred to it as a "belly dancer".
I applied for the position of Transaction Award Specialist because I wanted to work at the University for the tuition discount and my background was in administrative support. I had no idea what this position was but the description sounded like what I had experience in. Imagine my surprise when the very first thing I was asked to order was...cow eyes! Thank God, the PI sent a link. I would have been completely lost trying to figure out how to order cow eyes. (And, yes, it was allowable on this grant in the field of low vision study.)
It was November 2014 and I was newly hired (without any former knowledge) to establish an office of sponsored programs at a small teaching institution. I felt very unprepared, especially for the implementation of the new Uniform Guidance. I gathered as much information as I could and reached out to the Accounting Services department that had previously managed all post award activity on grants to see if they would like to meet to discuss implementation of the new guidance. The response I received back was, "We don't have any grants that pay for uniforms, so the Uniform Guidance doesn't apply."
After a good roll-on-the-floor type of laugh, I realized that as unprepared as I felt, there was a lot of work to do and that I better just claim my space as "the expert" on grants management on campus.
I was a departmental administrator for a large physics lab. The PI was a well-known and successful pioneer in his field. One day, he asked me to purchase some equipment from his brother’s business with grant money that he intended to give to colleagues in another country. He did not provide a budget, a sole source justification, nothing. I couldn’t believe my ears, but I should have known better. Needless to say, I nipped that in the bud and kept us all out of jail!
I denied a voucher request that would post to a project fund that had ended. The PI asserted he was still working on the project and could still use funding. After going back and forth and citating UG and sponsor policy, the PI forwarded this exchange to his sponsor contact and asked if my decision could be overridden because he was still working on the project. He also included denigrating interpretations I had provided of relevant policies.
Thankfully, the sponsor's response was beautiful - it referred the PI back to my references! It was the first time in my career I understood how important my role as an RA is to compliance. We are all on the same side of the struggle to be good stewards.
As part of the Single Audit, some of our PIs are interviewed by the auditors. The auditors asked how COVID impacted the work on the project. The PI said there was significant impact due to lab closures and reduced staffing. The PI told the auditors if it [COVID shutdown] happened again, they would "get trailers and move the equipment into the trailers and have people do work anyway." Luckily, our institution has enough controls in place to prevent that from happening!
A faculty member asked if he could charge the cost of putting air conditioning in his car on his research grant. His reseasoning? He discussed his research via cell phone while driving to and from campus every day.
After considering it multiple times, the PI decided against a second no-cost extension for a project. Two weeks after the award ends and a grant manager is inquiring about the final costs, the PI determined that they'd like to to hire an RA with the remaining funds!
"During a Fundamentals training, participants engaged in an exercise about cost principles that they will never forget.
Instructors displayed a type of cost on the screen and participants had to choose one of two colored cards on the table to hold up: red – to indicate it cannot be charged to the federal government, or, green – to indicated it can be charged to the grant.
The screen flashed “animals” and a whole room full of green cards went up.
The screen flashed “books” and most participants held up green cards; participants who held up red cards qualified their answers, specifying that the books had to relate to the project.
The screen flashed “alcohol” and participants held their red cards high. An instructor challenged participants, saying “It depends.” Further clarification differentiated between alcohol at a social event, which is not an allowable expense, and alcohol necessary for a research study, which may be allowable. Participants nodded their heads in agreement, understanding the nuance.
Seizing the teachable moment, the instructor added, “Not long ago, I charged cocaine to a federal grant as an allowable expense.”
The room went silent. Eyes opened wide. Jaws dropped. Participants almost fell out of their chairs in disbelief.
The discussion then took a humorous turn, participants questioning: “How exactly does that work? Does the PI get a receipt from a dealer? Does the PI use their own dealer or are there university-specific dealers? Does the budget allow the PI to get the ‘good stuff’? The room filled with laughter – and learning.
More broadly, participants understood clearly that context matters when considering allowability."
A biostatistician once told me that he was "not a numbers person" when I tried to explain a budget.
I had a PI (whose hobby was oil painting) submit receipts for artist paint supplies for reimbursement on a grant. When I questioned the expenditures, he said that they were for a poster. Of course he could not produce that hand-painted scientific poster, so the grant didn't reimburse the charge.
I had a PI who came in one time with a stack of credit card receipts. Our office had been trying to contact him because he'd received a small grant from a large insurance company a year before to study the use of cell phones while driving. We were trying to get him to spend his funds. This was the gentleman's first grant. At the time he came in, his grant had expired, he had done the project, and all his expenses were on his credit card. He wanted to be reimbursed. Suprisingly, we were able to reimburse him from his grant funds but it took a lot of time and effort.
I once had a PI who took his family on a multiple week vacation in the family van. In the middle of the vacation, the van broke down. The PI traded in the broken down van and bought a new one. He then came into the office with his van's new paperwork wanting his grants (he had more than one) to reimburse him for the price of his new van! That was quite the conversation!
I always smile when I remember explaining to our Property Officer why he could not put inventory tags on the Ocean Bottom Seismometers a PI had fabricated. Because, of course, they were on the bottom of the ocean!
I received an expense report where the sole expense was a thousand dollar espresso machine. The finance center analyst forwarded the report to me for approval with a great comment, "This report requires approval and also wondering how it's allowable. Is the machined going to be used in research or for making espresso?! When it comes to research I never assume!"
In the end, the machine was being used for making espresso and was allowable on this non-federal grant. It was a great ice breaker conversation and created additional collaboration between two teams with a fun topic!
Many, many years ago, a junior faculty approached me and asked what he needed to do to add one of Dr. O’s technicians' salary to his grant. I asked him to write a brief budget justification describing the role or function the technician would play on the grant and what percent of his effort, etc. After a few moments of silence he said, actually he won’t do anything on my grant, he will continue to work on Dr. O’s research. When asked why then the technician is being added to his grant the answer was something like “I was talking to Dr. O about an article my group is writing for publication in this really important journal and asked him if he has any tips to ensure success to get it published. Dr. O told me that he was a past editor of the journal, and he is more than happy to add his name to our paper as an author which would almost certainly guarantee the article’s publication. Dr. O also told me that he is short of funding and is trying to find some short-term funding to support a technician while he is waiting to hear about his new grant applications. He also asked if I had any funding that could be used for temporarily covering his technician’s salary. I told him that I have an open position budgeted in my grant that I have not filled yet and as he was generous enough to lend his name as an author, I am happy to add the technicians salary to my grant. Dr. O thought it was a wonderful idea!” Time has faded memories of my exact words or expressions, but what I remember was the firmest "No."
Our institution had a large, international grant that involved multiple data collection sites around the world. One such site was on a remote island in the Southern Pacific containing an indigenous population. The research involved measuring impacts of erosion control and required the researchers to access many remote areas of the island. To secure their safety when operating in the field, the researchers would typically gain favor with the local population by engaging the tribal elders and offering a feast. However, their arrival to this one specific research site coincided with the death of the village leader. The local population felt it was only right the researchers offer a feast and assist in paying for the burial of their leader to ensure their safety while conducting their research. Upon return from the field, the cost of a casket was found upon reconciliation of the expenditures. While the allowability of the cost was debated, it was ultimately determined to be unallowable with the cost being transferred to a gift account. So, the next time you overhear a research administrator say they manage the accounting from cradle to grave, in this instance it was literally true!
A PI tried to put through the cost of luggage for his travel. The justification was that the travel was work related, to present research at conferences and to meet with collaborators. The luggage was required for the travel, so the institution should pay for the luggage.
Reading a true crime book on my commute to work, a character in the book that DEFENDED the terrible actions of the criminal that shared the same name of a PI (not the lawyer, but someone who said that the crash diet on the part of the murderer contributed to the bad decision-making done prior to the murder). I got into work and pulled the biosketch and, sure enough, that character was the same person.
I found that a faculty member was charging weekly pizza lunches to a grant. Confused, I explained to the faculty member that this was an unallowable cost to which they replied, "they served pizza at the lab meetings, so it was justifiable."
Needless to say, my response was to ask everyone to pitch in $2 for pizza and to stop charging the grant and to move the prior pizza costs off to a discretionary account.
A faculty member with a new office furnished the office and the kitchen with expensive items charged on their pcard and then attempted to place these costs on grant funding. When confronted, the PI expressed that if purchases had been made from a lab supply company and not Crate & Barrel, it wouldn't have been found and that the faculty member was being punished for having good taste.
I was reviewing a travel reimbursement, and the PI had rented a car for just one day. Knowing the conference she was presenting at was over several days, I asked her about it. Come to find out, she had rented a car to take herself and some colleagues to see a waterfall and was charging the cost to her project. Sounds reasonable, right?
A faculty member once used his Pcard to purchase mascara, neon nylon stockings, and a personal trimmer. Uncertain how this might tie to a sponsored project, I asked him if he may have used his Pcard for personal purchases by mistake. Turns out, these were legitimate research expenses. The trimmer was used to shave mouse tails, the mascara was used to mark the mouse for waterproof identification, and the nylons were to strain a solution.
We had a professor who worked with zebrafish and refused to submit an IACUC protocol. He said "they didn't count as animals!"
It took more than a month and involved animal resources, his dean, and the VPR of research before he could be convinced that he had to submit a protocol for the research.
I received a call from our Purchasing Department about a requisition for an expensive custom fish tank. One of our faculty, who had assured me they were only going to use fixed specimens (preserved in a life-like state), was trying to place the order. The planned animal research, also involving students, was on freshwater stingrays from the Amazon. They’re known as the "wish-you-were-dead fish" because their sting is so painful. The researcher gladly shared a 10-page document they had signed with the state's department of environmental resources guaranteeing that no eggs would escape or the institution could be fined hundreds of thousands of dollars. We are not a research intensive institution. We did not have an animal facility. There was not a suitable space for the humidity created by a large tropical tank, and the campus is in the southeast. What could possibly go wrong? I contacted my boss, who put a stop to the process. We reached out to the department chair and the faculty member to explain why. As a result, the waterways near campus remain free of this potentially invasive species.
When a researcher asked to purchase a refrigerator, I wasn't too surprised. When they asked to purchase a breakroom refrigerator for a clinical group, I was. Why? Because it was a way to reimburse the clinical group for collecting patient samples for the research study.
I had a call from my procurement office about a strange request for payment on Professor Smartone’s Corporate Credit Card. The Professor Smartone has purchased a $2000 sleeper number daybed which has been delivered to the Professor’s home. As the compliance officer, I asked for additional justification for the purchase. Professor Smartone said that the daybed is being used for research. The Professor revealed that students in the Professor’s lab are sleeping on the bed in order to obtain data points on sleep patterns. After digging further about whether or not IRB approval was obtained, Professor Smartone states that the student research hasn’t begun yet. Meanwhile, they are using cats to collect data points. Needless to say, this raised cost allowability, IRB, AND IACUC red flags all at once...
When I was new to research administration and to the department, I was making my rounds and attending the division meetings (a total of 14) to give my spiel. Towards the end of my whirlwind tour of divisions, a kind division chief approached me and asked if I would allow him to introduce me as I must be tired of this pony show. I said yes. He seemed nice, and I was tired of telling my story. The division chief began the meeting, announcing to everyone that "typically the Dean's office gets new carpet each year, but instead, this year they've introduced another layer of bureaucracy we'll have to navigate to get our work done. Please welcome our newest administrative layer to the department." I nearly choked on my water. That was it, that was his introduction. I knew were I stood. In the end, he learned I was an effective advocate for the department. He eventually became one of my favorite PIs to work with and I learned about leadership and mentoring from him. I taught him a few things about trial negotiations. And I learned to narrate my own story.
1992, pre-internet, pre-cell phones: the Chief Administrator, my boss, was unreachable on vacation, leaving me in charge. That week, radioactivity was detected in one of our labs, a file cabinet full of unlabeled chemicals was discovered in a retired professor’s office, a student group asked for permission to throw things off our 18 story building, and someone complained about the humidity making the paper in her printer curl at the edges and jam up. I was so happy when my boss returned and I could get back to the “simple” world of research administration! (BTW-the radioactivity was relatively harmless Alpha particles, and remediated by swathing the lab bench with diapers.)
Many years ago at my university, we implemented a new system that required faculty to enter the system and approve information. There had recently been another system implementation that did not go well and had left the campus community raw. For this reason, the buy-in for our system was hindered. The deadline for the faculty's actions loomed...With only a couple short weeks left, we had only a fraction of the approvals received. One day, my email suddenly blew up with incoming messages, and multiple phone calls started coming through all at once. Oh no... I thought, something bad must have happened! I could hardly scroll fast enough to get to the first unread message. It was a harshly worded email from the head of our organization. Paraphrased, it said: "Faculty: Complete your tasks in the new system or else your lack of compliance will be reported to your Chair and your Dean. Questions? Call or Email... followed by MY contact information!! Argh! Needless to say, that day, and that following week, were nothing short of a major challenge. However, there was some lemonade to be squeezed from those lemons. 500 or so emails, and hundreds of phone calls later, I had met many more faculty than I would have had the chance to otherwise. By being patient and calm with them, we ended up earning their buy-in for the new system and built goodwill within the research community that lasted for years. When I left that position, I received many emails thanking me again for my patience at that time and how I went above and beyond, and that it was noticed. So, sometimes what looks like a disaster, can be an opportunity for important outreach to the Research Community! Hang in there, and build up those relationships each opportunity that you get!