Details of Data Management Plans

Content of a DMP

Whilst each funder specifies particular requirements for the content of a plan, common areas are:

which data will be generated during research
metadata, standards and quality assurance measures
plans for sharing data • ethical and legal issues or restrictions on data sharing
copyright and intellectual property rights of data
data storage and back-up measures
data management roles and responsibilities
costing or resources needed.

You should critically assess how you can share your research data, what might limit or prohibit data sharing and whether any steps can be taken to remove such limitations, when developing a data management plan.

Roles and responsibilities

People with responsibilities for data management and sharing may include:

project director designing research
research staff collecting, processing and analysing data
external contractors involved in data collection, data entry, processing or analysis
support staff managing and administering research and research funding
institutional IT services staff providing data storage and back-up services
external data centres or web services archives who facilitate data sharing

Costing and resources

To cost research data management and sharing at the time of preparing an application, we recommend that you identify the resources that would be needed to make research data shareable beyond the primary research team, above the planned standard research procedures and practices. Resources needed may include people, equipment, infrastructure and tools to manage, document, organize, store and provide access to data.