Data Management Plans

Data Management Plans are compulsory for students commencing their research programme from the 2019/20 academic year onwards and will be checked at Confirmation Review.

All students must plan how they will manage the data they create and gather by writing a Data Management Plan.

• Data must be recorded accurately and systematically, and managed appropriately throughout the research project.

• This includes (but is not limited to) the creation, processing, analysis, preservation, access to and reuse of research data.

• Data should normally be shared with at least one other person (e.g. the supervisor) throughout the research process.

• A statement indicating where the underlying data can be found should be included in all publications. The University encourages all researchers to make their research data discoverable by recording details in its research data catalogue (ORDA) with a link to where it is stored.

Creating a Data Management Plan

Further information about creating a Data Management Plan is available here: https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/library/rdm/dmp which also includes downloads on using the DMPOnline tool recommended by the University.

Finding and reusing data: https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/library/rdm/finddata

Managing your data: https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/library/rdm/index

The library also offers a training session 'Looking after your Research Data / Making a DMP', which lasts about 90 minutes: http://ris.dept.shef.ac.uk/skills_seminars/listings/view/122

Sharing Research Data

The FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable) principles were created to more effectively share data with both people and computers. This checklist and FAQs are designed to help you ensure your data is FAIR. A more complete overview of FAIR found at www.go-fair.org. While this is mainly tailored towards digital datasets, the principles can also be applied to software and physical data.

Guidance for how to make your data Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reliable:

The checklist can be found here

The slides from the launch event, with guidance in the notes, can be found here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1amPSs8bTib7i01I_jC1RuYnF0Fd4WlUt/view?usp=sharing

Further information can be found here: https://www.go-fair.org/fair-principles/

For further information, please contact: rdm@sheffield.ac.uk