Managing Community: The Organization and Management of Federal Research Funding Agencies

该项目调查了三个支持科学研究的联邦机构的组织和管理，以确定机构之间的主要差异，以及它们如何影响所进行的研究类型，利益群体的发展和研究成果。初步研究表明，在管理资助过程的机构人员和接受资助的科学界研究人员之间，对定义每个机构和影响研究成果的关键因素的理解存在显着差异。该项目检查并比较了美国国家科学基金会（NSF）和国防高级研究计划局（DARPA）的资助活动。它还包括一个以美国国立卫生研究院（NIH）为重点的探索性部分，并收集了一些关于其他联邦资助机构的观察结果，这些资助机构支持了NSF、DARPA和NIH资助的研究人员。知识价值这项研究的一个主要贡献是促进了对项目经理角色对资助决策的影响的理解（或项目经理），在组织的这一级别的决策自主权的程度，以及管理和指导这种自主权的方式。该项目大量借鉴了关于公共部门“基层”官僚机构和私营部门大型公司组织权力下放的文献。在这一点上，它偏离了最近文献对公共部门管理的强调，承认不同社区规范的作用（例如，科学界;项目经理的专业团体、军事团体）以及这些规范的演变可以通过各种管理方法来指导和指导的方式。这项研究是基于对当前和最近的资助机构工作人员的采访，以及对已申请（成功或失败）资助机构的研究人员的采访。它还利用了马萨诸塞州理工学院在十五年内提交的所有资金申请的机密数据库，并与专利、许可证和与联邦资助研究项目有关的学术出版物的数据相联系。更广泛的影响该项目旨在帮助政策制定者和管理者评估联邦研究项目的设计，了解他们如何在他们资助的研究人员眼中相互联系，以及他们试图影响的行为，并更好地确定有效管理研究和开发的杠杆。它还将为试图评估科学投资的影响提供一个初步模式。最后，它提供了有关如何提高管理绩效的建议，一个分析模板的程序超出了那些是研究的直接重点，并有助于更广泛的公共部门管理的文献。

This project investigates the organization and management of three Federal agencies that support scientific research to identify the key differences among the agencies and how they impact the type of research that is conducted, the development of communities of interest, and research outcomes. Preliminary research suggests there is significant variation in understanding, within both the agency personnel managing the funding process and the scientific community of researchers that receive funding, of what critical factors define each agency and influence research outcomes. The project examines and compares funding activities at the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). It also includes an exploratory component focused on the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and gathers some observations about other Federal funding agencies that have supported NSF-, DARPA, and NIH-funded researchers.Intellectual Merit A major contribution of this research is to advance understanding of the impact on funding decisions of the role of the program manager (or project manager), the degree of decision-making autonomy at this level of the organization, and the way in which that autonomy is managed and directed. The project draws heavily on the literature on "street-level" bureaucracy in the public sector and on the decentralization of authority in large corporate organizations of the private sector. In this, it departs from the emphasis in the recent literature on the management of the public sector by recognizing the role of the norms of different communities (e.g., the scientific community; the professional community of program managers, the military community) and the way in which the evolution of these norms can be guided and directed by various management approaches. The research is based on interviews with current and recent funding agency staff, and with researchers who have applied (successfully or unsuccessfully) to the agencies for funding. It also draws on a confidential database from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on all applications for funding submitted within a fifteen year period, linked to data on patents, licensing and scholarly publications related to federal funded research projects.Broader ImpactsThe project is designed to help policy makers and administrators evaluate the design of federal research programs, understand how they relate to each other in the eyes of the researchers who they fund and whose behavior they seek to influence, and better identify the levers for effectively managing research and development. It will also provide a preliminary model for attempting to evaluate the impact of scientific investments. Finally, it provides recommendations regarding ways to improve managerial performance, an analytical template for programs beyond those that are the direct focus of the study, and contribute to the literature on public sector management more broadly.