Career Paths

What Is Research Administration?

Research Administration is a profession that is often difficult to explain – we support the research at MIT, and are often involved in:

• Proposal Development (finding & interpreting opportunities and submission guidelines)
• Budgeting and Planning (direct & indirect costs, forecasting, cost sharing, under-recovery, salary limits)
• Communication (proactive and effective, coordinating efforts, networking with colleagues, explaining)
• Project Management (set and manage priorities, manage tasks and timelines, coordinate dependencies)
• Financial Management (payroll distributions, monitor and reconcile charges, budget management, subaward management, closeouts)
• Award Administration (policy Interpretation
• Compliance (Managing Conflicts of Interest, Animal Care, Human Subjects, EHS)
• Student Development
• Systems Development

Why be a Research Administrator at MIT?

• “Big diversity in the type of work done, opportunities to learn new things”
• “Helping people, faculty and researchers, who dream up these great ideas”
• “Seeing inventions from MIT used all over the world and connecting to that personally (how we helped)”
• “Great to work with students”
• “Access to a vast pool of talented individuals; an army of people that will help answer questions”

Some Of The Research Administration Positions At MIT: