Researcher FAQs

Through HHRI’s Education and Quality Clinical in Research Office (EQ Office), an online CITI webinar is available for HHRI personnel: “Getting Started in Grant Writing: An Introduction for Graduate Students, Postdocs, and New Faculty”.  For help on setting up a CITI account or adding the webinar to your courses contact the EQ office, EQ@hhrinstitute.org.

The ClinicalTrials.gov resources can be found here .

Information on HCMC resources and how to access them can be found on the Clinical Research Resources page .

HHRI's federal overhead rate agreement can found on the Sponsored Research Administration's page under the Institutional Information and Guidance section.

The IRB's meeting schedule can be accessed at the bottom of the Human Research Protection Office's page .

HHRI's IRB is the Human Research Protection Office.  Their information and resources are on their page which can be accessed here .

Not sure who to contact or need help getting started?  They can be emailed at HRPO@hhrinstitute.org.

Required trainings are facilitated by the Office for Education & Quality in Clinical Research.  Their policies and a list of trainings they provide can be accessed on their page .

The Sponsored Research Administration's Grant Administrator distribution by department can be found at the bottom of their page here .

The Sponsored Research Administration's Guidance and Procedures document can found on the Sponsored Research Administration's page under the Institutional Information and Guidance section.

The question of giving programs access to a corporate credit card has been considered and declined a number of times in the past because it creates additional risk and an additional compliance burden.   This is because it allows expenses to be incurred outside of our existing internal control procedures, and the additional management review that is necessary to ensure expenses are allowable and allocated correctly is not insignificant.  In short, it increases risk and creates a need for additional central staffing that in the end has not been deemed a reasonable cost/benefit. 

If/when a purchase comes up that requires a credit card, you can submit a purchase order to Sally Gill and ask her to make the purchase on an institutional card on your behalf.

HHRI's Conflict of Interest policy can be accessed under the Policies section on the Forms & Policies page .

All costs must be reasonable, necessary and allocable.

• Reasonable: The price paid is what a prudent person would pay.
• Necessary: The project could not be completed without it.
• Allocable: The project was only charged its share.
  • Example: if you purchase software that will benefit multiple projects, each project must be charged its estimated share, such as 25% of the total software cost.

All costs must be directly charged to the correct project at the time of order. Coordinate correction of errors with your GA and HHRI Accounting. 

All goods and services must be received prior to the budget’s end date AND needed to complete the scope of work. Last minute spending, or shifting prior costs from other accounts in an attempt to “spend down” is not allowed.

If a good, submit a check request to accounting.

If a service, submit a PO to purchasing.

HHRI Competitive Pricing Checklist--Required for purchases and check requests for $10,000 or more

HHRI Sole Source Justification Checklist--Required for Sole Source purchases and check requests for $10,000 or more

Remember to follow the HHRI Business Expense Guidelines!  

Please attach a completed and authorized Travel Authorization form (previously the green form) to an email and submit it to TravelAuth@hhrinstitute.org.  You will get a response which will assign your submission a ticket number, which will also serve as your TA number. Save this email. When you are ready to submit Travel Expense Forms and receipts, reply to the corresponding ticket / TA confirmation email. Attach the necessary forms and receipts. Sending this email will attach those forms and receipts to the original authorization request and submit them for payment.

The process to hire a new employee should begin by contacting Danielle Hennen, Director of Human Resources.  Her contact information can be found here .

Start a conversation with your GA.  If the consultant is an independent contractor, complete the Independent contractor checklist.  Regardless of type of entity, we will need a W9 (for either independent contractor or business.

Get in touch with your Grant Administrator. They can get started on putting together the required documents, which most likely will only be updated other support and any required approvals for the project (i.e.: IACUC or IRB).  They can also get in touch with any subawardee key personnel for their updated other support.  Occasionally NIH will request an updated budget, or if there’s a change to the workscope or personnel they may ask for more info, but typically it’s solely a request for updated other support and confirmation of relevant approvals.

1. Title of the Project
2. Name of HHRI PI
3. Name of the PI at the Prime Institution
4. A budget for the project
5. A work-scope or short description of the work to be performed
6. Name/address of individual to whom the letter should be addressed
7. Name/address of sponsoring agency
8. Sponsor Guidelines, such as a link to the NIH Funding Opportunity Announcement
9. Name/contact info for the grant administrator at the prime institution. 

It is always wise to obtain subcontract guidelines from the Prime Contractor well before a proposal deadline in case HHRI is required to provide additional documentation (copies of bylaws, verification of tax-exempt status, etc.). While most standard information is on file at HHRI, some documentation (such as certificates of insurance) requires significant lead-time to obtain.

The Application for External Support serves multiple purposes.  It alerts the institution and your grant administrator that you will be applying for funding, it discloses any conflicts of interest so those can be mitigated by the conflict of interest committee, it ensures the PI has support from their department and division with necessary resources to accomplish their science, and, if federal, it provides the federally-required certification and assurance that HHRI must retain on file for federal proposals.

The form and an associated training video can be accessed under the Forms section of the Forms & Policies page .

You can find your grant's account number in your HHRI Notice of Award which your GA will send you once an award is made.  You will also find your account numbers on your monthly financial reports which will be sent via HHRI Accounting.

HHRI posts positions on the HHRI career site , MN State Workforce Center, Simply Hired, Indeed, Glassdoor, and at the UMN in addition to contracting with a third party administrator – Jobs in Minneapolis and MN Diversity who is connected to 15,000 community based organizations who provide employment and training services to target populations including: veterans, people w/ disabilities, minorities, women, diversity organizations, LGBTQ , HBCUs, other universities and colleges, and professional/technical/general business trade schools. We attend a few veteran and minority-centered career fairs each year.

HHRI is a felon friendly employer in that we don’t bar felons from employment unless their criminal background is directly related to their line of work (i.e. embezzlement history and applies for a finance position, identify theft and applies for a case mgmt. position working with vulnerable adults, etc). Further, if the role is patient facing, the candidate would need to undergo a DHS background study which has their own exclusions – some being permanent.

If you have received federal funds to support your research, and you end up publishing an article as a result of that research and federal funding, it is a requirement of your federal award to make sure that article is compliant and publicly available .  HHRI grants staff checks institutional compliance weekly; it is the responsibility of every PI to be sure their federally funded publications are compliant.  Even if first author, last author, only your data referenced in the publication—every PI has a responsibility to maintain this compliance.