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For many principal investigators, securing external funding is followed by a shift in daily work that is both predictable and difficult to avoid. Time once planned for experiments, analysis, or mentoring is increasingly spent on administrative tasks tied to the grant itself.
The Federal Demonstration Partnership (FDP) Faculty Burden Survey, which collected responses from 6,081 principal investigators, found that 42% of the time associated with federally funded research is spent on administrative work rather than research. This proportion remained largely unchanged for years, despite efforts by federal agencies to reduce the burden.
In this article, let’s understand the reason behind this and how to manage it effectively using integrated research administration platforms like Key Solutions.
How Administrative Work Accumulates Over a Grant’s Life
The FDP survey documented 25 specific tasks that consume the actual research time. Let's walk through what this actually looks like in practice.
Pre-Award Administrative Burdens
Proposal preparation alone consumes 15% of the research time associated with a federal award. This includes:
- Writing scientific narratives
- Developing detailed budget justifications
- Coordinating with sponsored research offices
- Routing proposals through compliance, departmental, and dean’s offices
Each office operates on its own timeline, often sending proposals back for clarification or revision.
System fragmentation adds another layer of friction. NIH proposals flow through eRA Commons, NSF uses Research.gov, and other sponsors maintain their own portals. Each system has different registration rules, interfaces, and submission logic. PIs are expected to learn and navigate all of them while coordinating institutional approvals in parallel.
The burden here isn’t just time spent writing, but it’s time spent orchestrating systems and stakeholders that were never designed to work together.
Post-Award Administrative Burden
Financial oversight: It is the single largest burden. Did you know that over 90% of PIs cite monitoring project finances as their most time-consuming administrative task? This includes:
- Reviewing monthly expenditure reports
- Verifying charges against the correct grant
- Reconciling planned budgets with actual spend
- Approving cost transfers and justifications
- Tracking balances and burn rates
Effort reporting: Under 2 CFR 200.430, PIs must certify that salaries charged to federal awards reflect actual work performed. This means reviewing and certifying effort reports (quarterly or semi-annually) for themselves and every team member is critical and consumes significant time.
Progress reports: This is another recurring obligation. The FDP survey found these reports carry a mean burden rating of 3.32 out of 5, consistent across agencies and disciplines. PIs must document outcomes, explain deviations from the proposal, justify timeline changes, and outline future plans.
For research involving human subjects or animals, compliance requirements multiply and include:
- IRB protocols, reviewer responses, amendments, annual renewals, training, and adverse event reporting
- IACUC protocols, institutional reviews, renewals, and usage documentation
The FASEB survey found investigators consistently identified these reviews as especially time-consuming, particularly when institutional requirements exceeded federal compliance needs.
Other tasks include Personnel management, no-cost extensions, budget modifications, and closeout documentation. From all these activities, it’s evident that nearly half of a PI’s time is spent managing the grant, not executing the research it funds.
The Cost of Lost Productivity
The National Science Board reported that administrative burden could cost billions in lost productivity over a decade. The 42% figure remained unchanged from 2005 to 2012 despite federal efforts to reduce it.
Universities implemented new systems, professional organizations developed best practices, and yet PIs are still spending the same proportion of their time on administrative work that they were spending nearly two decades ago. The problem isn't getting worse, but it's certainly not getting better.
What Faculty Want: The 95% Who Need Help
The FDP survey found that 95% of faculty said they could devote more time to research with better administrative support. Furthermore, 76% indicated willingness to reallocate direct costs to obtain that support.
This finding reveals that research teams want support systems that:
- Handle routine tasks efficiently.
- Reduce unnecessary burden while maintaining compliance.
What "Administrative Support" Means
Based on survey responses and recommendations, PIs want:
1. Dedicated Pre-Award Support
Research administrators who assist with proposal development by:
- Identifying appropriate funding opportunities
- Preparing budget templates and justifications
- Managing institutional approval routing through electronic workflows that reduce approval times from weeks to days
- Ensuring compliance with sponsor requirements
- Coordinating multi-institution proposals with centralized document storage for seamless collaboration
2. Post-Award Financial Management
Administrators are empowered with tools to handle budget monitoring:
- Reviewing expenditure reports through integrated financial dashboards that display real-time budget vs. actual spending
- Identifying discrepancies before they become problems using automated burn rate tracking
- Processing cost transfers promptly
- Preparing financial reports for sponsors
- Tracking spending against approved budgets with automated alerts for potential overruns
3. Automated Systems for Routine Tasks
Technology that eliminates busywork:
- Automated deadline tracking for submissions, reports, IRB/IACUC reviews, and certification periods
- Electronic routing for approvals
- Pre-populated forms using institutional data (investigator information, certifications, facilities descriptions)
- Centralized cloud document storage with version control and search functionality
- Real-time budget dashboards pulling data directly from institutional ledgers.
- Simplified effort reporting with visual displays and quarterly (not monthly) certification requirements
4. Clear Workflows
Processes designed to minimize PI interruptions:
- Standardized procedures for common tasks
- Designated staff authorized to handle routine matters
- Clear escalation paths for issues requiring PI decisions
- Consistent communication between offices
- Audit trails are maintained automatically by the system
The best part? You don't need to piece together these capabilities from multiple vendors or build workarounds. Our research administration platform delivers all four pillars of support in one integrated system, giving your faculty the time they need to focus on groundbreaking research.
Ready to give your faculty the support they're asking for? Schedule a personalized demo to see how our platform handles deadline tracking, financial dashboards, electronic routing, and automated workflows in action. We'll show you exactly how institutions like yours are reducing administrative burden while maintaining full compliance.
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