Do you lead a team of RCD professionals? Are you involved with the strategic planning for such a group? Are you interested in growing your leadership skills and/or your management and mentoring skills? Are you looking for good practices on budgets, finances, and how to communicate your group’s needs to senior leadership? Join your peers to discuss these topics and more on the Strategy and Policy-Facing Track of the People Network!
Some of the ideas we’d like to explore include the following (but we want to hear your ideas as well!)
- Updates from events and meetings of peer organizations for RCD leadership (e.g., CASC meetings, the EDUCAUSE conference, etc.)
- How do build a strong impact report for your program
- Mapping influence networks on your campus
- How to create compelling value propositions for your key stakeholders
- Where to go for management and leadership training
- How to share resources across centers? Issues finance, legal, and practical.
- Recharge models, pros and cons
- Models for IDF/Overhead distribution and implications for program funding
- Organizational models (where your team sits and who you report up to) and the implications for strategic planning
- How to speak to finance teams
- How to support regulated research and sensitive computing/data
- Your suggestions here!
Some of these topics overlap between this track and others, especially the Emerging Centers Track. We’re working with our peer track coordinators to explore how we can collaborate on these, possibly exploring the topics from different perspectives in our respective track meetings.
We connect via monthly calls (details below) and an email list: strategy-and-policy-facing-track@carcc.org.
Join Us!
Join Us! Create a membership profile to let us know who you are and what you’re interested in. You can add other People Network Tracks at the same time.
Monthly Calls
Monthly calls are on the first Wednesday of the month, 12PM ET/ 11AM CT/ 10AM MT/ 9AM PT. Connection information and links to any materials are distributed via the Strategy and Policy-Facing email list.
Upcoming Call(s)
May 7, 2025 – Planning for resilience (This call will not be recorded)
Abstract:
How can RCD organizations best prepare themselves for new leadership, changes in organizational structures, periods of financial uncertainty, and evolving technology, or shifts in institutional priorities? Please join us on May 7 at 2PM ET/ 11AM CT to hear a panel of RCD leaders discuss their practices and strategies for preparing times of uncertainty and change. We hope to have a lively question and answer session, so please come prepared to share your own thoughts and questions.
Please note that this call will not be recorded.
Panelists:
Raminder Singh, Senior Director, FAS Research Computing, Harvard University
Kristin Lepping, Director, Business Operations and Research Partnerships, Rutgers University
Ruth Marinshaw, Executive Director, Research Computing Technologies, Yale
June 4, 2025 – Infrastructure Planning
(details coming soon)
Track Coordination
Track Coordinators (spf-coordinators@carcc.org):
- Amit Amritkar (Penn State University)
- Chuck Pavloski (University of Illinois)
Steering Committee Members:
- Patrick Schmitz (Semper Cogito)
- Jackie Milhans (Northwestern)
- Jason Simms (Swarthmore)
- Jim Wilgenbusch (Minnesota)
- Melissa Cragin (Rice University)
- Preston Smith (Purdue)
- Rich Knepper (Cornell)
- Susan Ivey (North Carolina State University)
- Thomas Cheatham (Utah)
- Pamela Reynolds (UC Davis)
- Michael Navicky (Mississippi State University)
Previous Calls
| 04/02/2025 | CASC, RDAP, ABRF, and NAIRR Pilot recap We heard from folks who have gone to important spring meetings and conferences: CASC (The Coalition for Academic Scientific Computation), RDAP (Research Data Access & Preservation), ABRF (Association of Biomolecular Resource Facilities), and the NAIRR Pilot annual meeting. We invited a few speakers to do brief talks to make folks aware of the content and interesting discussions that happened at the event. All of these meetings cover important topics for the community, and since attendance at each is somewhat limited we wanted to share out and discuss what folks heard. |
video doc |
| 03/05/2025 | The data problem In this discussion, Curt Hillegas from Princeton University, and Scott Yockel from Harvard University and NESE shared insights on the data related challenges they’re tackling, the lessons they’ve uncovered, and their visions for the future—both where they’re headed and where they aspire to go. |
video doc |
| 02/05/2025 | Round robin discussion and 2025 preview We heard from everyone about what they are up to and their plans for the upcoming year. The free-form conversation generated several ideas for future calls. |
video doc |
| 01/01/2025 | No call (just after the holidays). | |
| 12/03/2024 |
RCD Workforce Interest Group Call We heard from members of the CaRCC Staff and Student Workforce Development Interest Groups about the groups’ work, including recent explorations of Mentoring for RCD Professionals. |
video doc |
| 11/06/2024 |
Meetings recap: CaRCC Retreat, Fall CASC Meeting, EDUCAUSE We heard from folks who attended several fall meetings and conferences, including the Annual CaRCC Retreat, CASC, and the annual EDUCAUSE conference. A few speakers did lightning talks to make folks aware of the content and value of the event, with a focus on why folks attend (or send team members), and what they think the best thing is about each meeting/conference. We then had a discussion of the general themes and the value of these meetings. |
video doc |
| 10/02/2024 |
RCD Cybersecurity Requirements, Trends, and Use-Cases Across Different Institution Types In this discussion we had introductory remarks from Erik Deumens and Carolyn Ellis on trends and requirements in RCD cybersecurity followed by cybersecurity use cases from a couple of R1 universities. |
video doc |
| 08/07/2024 |
Reflections and discussion of PEARC24 This was a community discussion of what those who were able to attend PEARC saw and heard, to explore our impressions and to more broadly share the ideas with those who are not able to attend PEARC. |
video doc |
| 07/03/2024 |
No Call (Holiday Break). |
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| 06/05/2024 |
Leadership Training Programs We held a community discussion of people’s experiences with various leadership training programs and what value they provided for leaders and prospective leaders. We hope to gather this into a document that can be shared more broadly. |
video doc |
| 05/01/2024 |
Panel: Institutional Metadata Speakers from the EDUCAUSE Core Data Service, the CaRCC Capabilities Model, and others (TBA) discussed pending changes to several institutional metadata models including the new Carnegie Classification system, and how we use institutional metadata in various contexts. |
video doc |
| 04/03/2024 |
CASC and CNI recap This session provided a community update on these meetings of interest (both of which happened in March this year). |
video doc |
| 03/06/2024 |
Strategy and Policy challenges in supporting LLMs for research (open discussion) LLMs are a hot topic in research these days, and RCD program leaders are facing many challenges as they explore what is needed to support various applications of these tools, from data center infrastructure to access policies to when cloud makes sense. This session was an open discussion on the big challenges in supporting LLMs for research, on the ROI metrics on this, and how to make strategic, financial, and policy decisions around this. |
video doc |
| 02/07/2024 |
Finance, Funding Partnerships Funding comes from different streams, depending on where you sit in your institution, expectations for recharge, partners, and champions. In this call, we discussed various funding streams for institutional computing and storage facilities, staff, software, etc., as well as how to demonstrate need for additional investment. |
video doc |
| 01/03/2024 | No call (just after the holidays). | |
| 12/06/2023 |
Major RCD expansion (Joint with EDUCAUSE RCD CG) In this call, we heard from two research computing and data organizations, New York University and Northwestern University, who have undergone or are undergoing rapid growth. We will heard why they are growing, the types or services affected, and the positions added. Speakers discussed strategies in hiring, building services, and meeting goals, as well as challenges along the way. Please note that this session was not recorded. |
doc |
| 11/01/2023 |
Meetings recap: Fall CASC Meeting,EDUCAUSE, + We heard from folks who have gone to several fall meetings and conferences, including CASC, EDUCAUSE, Internet2 TechEx, and others. We invited a few speakers to do lightning talks to make folks aware of the content and value of the event (but not a summary of presentations or agendas), with a focus on why folks attend (or send team members), and what they think the best thing is about each meeting/conference. |
video doc |
| 10/04/2023 |
Satisfaction Surveys We discussed practices around conducting Satisfaction Surveys for RCD programs. Some of the issues we explored include: How to get a good response (and what is a good response rate)?; How to “sell” participation in surveys to the user community?; Why should users contribute?; How often to conduct surveys?; and What to do with the data (how to analyze and report). |
video doc slides |
| 09/06/2023 | RRIDs: Persistent Unique identifiers mark the things that are used in studies, key biological resources, and other important tools such as software tools, databases, core facilities, and now also instruments. These are used by various journals (primarily in biomedicine) to make searching for these things easier. The listing and use of the RRIDs has also allowed us to create AI tools that find papers where authors do not necessarily refer to the tool using the RRID, making it easier overall to find key resources. |
video doc |
| 08/02/2023 |
Reflections and discussion of PEARC23. We had a community discussion of what those who were able to attend PEARC saw and heard, to more broadly share the ideas with those who are not able to attend PEARC. |
video doc |
| 07/05/2023 |
Documenting metrics for RCD programs (part 2). (See June session for a full topic description) This second session focused on how the collected data is used as input to strategic planning, documenting impact, etc. |
video doc slides |
| 06/07/2023 |
Documenting metrics for RCD programs (part 1). From reporting operational performance metrics in terms of system up-time to research impact metrics of grant dollars generated, every RCD program uses some sort of performance metrics to showcase its impact to various audiences. In this two part discussion series, we explore different types of metrics in use at various RCD programs which are diverse in maturity and size. This first session focused on the data collection done in compiling metrics. |
video doc slides |
| 05/03/2023 |
No call in May. Check out the recordings for Accessibility Month on the CaRCC Youtube channel. |
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| 04/05/2023 |
Origin stories of RCD programs. Following up on the series about factors that define/characterize a given RCD program/service provider, our April call will consider “origin stories” as a key context frame or driver in the development of planning and decision-making. |
video doc |
| 04/05/2023 | No call in May. Referred folks to the May accessibility talks on other tracks (see the youtube channel for recordings!) | |
| 03/01/2023 |
Exploring factors that impact RCD strategy (part 2). Second in a series of meetings where we discuss factors important for growth and development of your program at your institution. |
video doc slides |
| 02/01/2023 |
Exploring factors that impact RCD strategy. What programmatic and institutional characteristics affect how you make strategic decisions for your RCD program? We’ll hear from four RCD programs and then open a discussion on what’s similar and what’s not, and what the key factors seem to be. First in a series of meetings where we can look at factors important for growth and development of your program at your institution. |
video doc slides |
| 12/02/2022 |
Updates from
CASC,
EDUCAUSE,
NSF Cybersecurity Summit. This session provided a community update on recent (external) meetings of interest. |
video doc slides |
| 10/05/2022 | Kickoff and brainstorming topics for the new track |
video doc slides |