Effort Administrator Software - Automate the Reporting and Certification Process

Automate the Reporting and Certification Process

Effort Certification and Reporting Solution

Effort Certification Tools

Grant Management Tools

Additional Information

Effort Certification and Reporting Solutions from IT Works

Effort Administrator is IT Works’ web-based Time and Effort Certification and Reporting Solution that enables institutions to meet federal effort reporting mandates and facilitates staff and faculty participation in the effort certification process. It is easy to use and can be quickly configured to automate your certification policy without excessive consulting costs.

100% Web Enabled and Easy to Use

Effort Administrator is an internet-based solution that operates like an on-line banking system. Its intuitive user interface is designed for both administrators and researchers (i.e. principal investigators, faculty, and research staff). Researchers can review and certify their own time or the time of their research team. Administrators can easily monitor the certification process of their entire team using:

  • Data expanders for organizing uncertified effort data, previously certified effort data, as well as cost sharing and committed time
  • An alert dashboard that identifies potential rule violations and employees whose effort has not been certified
  • A Microsoft OutlookTM style folder system for organizing employee and project information by school, department, division, research team, or other organizational unit.
  • User controlled search and filter systems to identify information for individual or groups of employees and projects
  • An internal security system that limits and displays information appropriate for the user

Configurable to Match Your Institution’s Certification Policy

IT Works recognizes that effort certification policies vary by institution, so, Effort Administrator is designed to be easily configured and adapted to match your institution’s certification policy. During the initial implementation process, IT Works technical staff and project managers configure Effort Administrator to match your institution’s:

  • Certification calendar (monthly, quarterly, semester, annually, etc.)
  • Attestation statement
  • Terminology and naming conventions
  • Account structure
  • Sign-off and approval requirements
  • Certified effort statement report format
  • Logo and color scheme

Supports Multiple Implementation Methods

Depending on an organization’s needs and policy, Effort Administrator can be configured to accept data by either one or a combination of methods:

Review and Certify Effort by Employee or Project

IT Works recognizes that time and effort management is reviewed in terms of both employees and projects. Effort Administrator provides both. The employee review provides verification and/or review of:

  • Total effort equaling 100% for each employee
  • Sponsored research and institutional funds
  • Compliance with agency salary cap regulations (including NIH) are maintained
  • Compliance with institutional thresholds
  • Cost sharing data
  • Comparisons between actual time and committed effort
  • Effort information by certification period, month, and pay period

Effort certification is one of many parts of post-award grant and research management. A modification to effort on one project affects another. In addition, issues such as grant budget periods not aligning with institutional fiscal periods, such as fiscal year or effort certification period, complicate effort certification just as they do grant management as a whole. For these reasons, Effort Administrator is designed to support not only effort compliance management but post-award administration as well by displaying of effort by project. Effort Administrator verifies:

  • Effort for the entire project team
  • Compliance with agency salary cap regulations (including NIH) are maintained
  • Compliance with institutional thresholds
  • Cost sharing
  • Comparisons between actual time and committed effort
  • Effort by budget period, project period, and month

Supports Workflow and Multi-level Approval and Certification Hierarchies

Effort Administrator includes a flexible workflow system with multiple reviewer routing options which allow PI review and/or certification of their research team. Implementation options include:

Administrator to end user

Routing from administrator to end user typically involves three steps. First, salary or payroll information is imported or entered into Effort Administrator. Second, a departmental or local research administrator reviews and approves this information for the employees within their department. After administrator review, the end user is notified by dashboard alerts and e-mail that their records are ready for review and certification. Finally, research faculty and staff (or their principal investigator) review and certify their time. Administrators may monitor this entire process via a dashboard and send e-mail notifications to prompt users to complete their certification statements if necessary.

End user to administrator or supervisor

Routing approvals from end user to administrator or supervisor is most often used when certification requires supervisor verification of an end users effort (for a second or third signature). This workflow process allows supervisors to review an end user’s effort record modifications, assuming users have the access rights to modify records. It supports multiple signature levels that may be created dynamically or according to your institution’s organizational hierarchy.

Tracks Cost Sharing, Committed Effort, and more

Effort Administrator manages effort data in percentages or hour increments and can track amounts paid for salaries and fringe benefits. Types of effort managed include:

  • Percentage or hours worked
  • Percent, hours or amount paid
  • Percent, hours or amount cost shared
  • Committed effort

E-mail Alerts Prompt Administrator and Faculty Participation

Effort Administrator includes an e-mail alert system that can be triggered upon completion of a workflow stage or prompt faculty and staff participation. Alerts may be used to notify individual and groups of users when:

  • Records are available for certification
  • Certification statements are outstanding and need to be completed promptly
  • Staff certifications have been completed and are ready for supervisor approval
  • Rule violations occur

Powerful Reporting System

Effort Administrator provides administrators with a reporting system that features powerful selection criteria and numerous canned reports formats. Criteria selection allows users to determine which data is to be selected from effort administrator for display in one of the formats.

Criteria Selection Options

Criteria selection allows users to select different variations of data (basically setting filters or parameters for a report) by:

  • Certified and/or uncertified effort
  • Individual employee
  • Groups of employees where the groups are defined by PI, or organizational unit
  • Individual funding source
  • Groups of funding sources where the groups are defined by PI, organization unit, type (research vs. hard money), funding agency, and agency type (federal, state, etc)
  • Date ranges including certification period, pay period, fiscal year, and budget or project period
  • Transaction type (payroll, adjustment, etc.)

Report Formats

Report formats are designed for managing employees or projects and provide the capability to:

  • Compare actual effort to committed effort or percentage paid
  • Analyze cost sharing data
  • Monitor adjustments by employees
  • Review effort by funding agency, agency type, or organizational unit

Information may be grouped and sorted in numerous report formats for:

  • Reporting by Employee(s)
    • Summary
    • Detailed
  • Reporting by Project(s) / Funding Source(s)
    • Summary
    • Detailed
  • Validating and/or Updating Internal Systems (such as GL)
  • The notification administrators or senior staff of potential rule violations (such as effort not equaling 100%, actual effort not equaling committed effort, etc.)

Streamlined Implementation without Heavy Consulting Costs

IT Works’ solution for effort certification and reporting includes both our software product and our professional services. Our professional services are designed to expediently customize and implement Effort Administrator™ in accordance with your organizational environment. Our Professional Services include:

  • Project Management
  • Implementation
    • Software configuration, integration, and customization
    • Testing
    • Training
  • Long Term Technical Support

IT Works is primarily a software company with over 25 years of expertise in business processes related to grant research management, effort reporting, and accounting; we are not a consulting company that primarily derives its livelihood via billable hours. We do however excel in the area of Project Management (PM) and have experience in implementing our solutions in large complex environments.

We offer direct access to senior software architects and developers allowing customization of our product as if it were designed and developed by your own staff. And, we provide senior project management personnel averaging over 20 years experience in the implementation of multiple large, complex, enterprise-wide business applications. Our key strengths include agile responsiveness to customer requests, the ability to navigate through roadblocks impeding project progress, and a proactive project management philosophy that continually evaluates key performance factors in order to minimize risk.