- What is Effort?
Effort is the proportion of time spent on professional activities such
as research, teaching, administration, service for which an individual is
employed by Case or for which one is appointed as a Case faculty member.
For clinical faculty at the Case School of Medicine, effort also includes
clinical activity for which they receive compensation from Case or a clinical
practice plan or other source of compensation for clinical activity.
Effort does not include activities such as consulting that are conducted
outside the terms of employment at Case or outside a Case faculty appointment.
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- What is Effort Reporting?
Effort reporting is a method of documenting the proportion of work time
devoted to these professional activities as a percentage of total professional
activity. It is important to note that effort is not calculated on a 40-hour
workweek. If an individual works 80 hours in a week, 40 hours represents
50% effort.
Payroll and effort distributions are not the same thing. Payroll distributions
describe the allocation of an individual salary, while effort distributions
describe the allocation of an individual’s activity to individual
projects “independent of salary”.
Case’s effort reporting process relies on payroll distributions to
provide a general reminder of the projects on which an individual’s
salary was charged during the certification period. Individual’s completing
effort reports are required to identify other areas where they provided
effort with no salary support and to ultimately report the appropriate distribution
of effort over all activities. Return to top
- Why is Effort Reporting Important?
As a recipient of significant sponsored funds, Case must assure federal
and other sponsors that the assignment of effort and associated salary and
fringe benefit costs to projects they sponsor is fair, consistent, and timely.
The Effort Certification Form is the document that Case utilizes to confirm
effort on externally sponsored projects.
Signed Effort Certification Forms are considered legal documents in which
an individual attests to the accuracy of the effort spent on sponsored projects.
Material inaccuracies in Effort Certification Forms can result in the misallocation
of costs to sponsored projects. An improper allocation of costs reported
by internal, external or federal auditors may result in substantial restrictions
in ongoing research activities and can affect Case and the individual researcher
both financially and publicly. Return to top
- Who is subject to Effort Reporting?
Every individual who devotes effort to sponsored activities, whether paid
or unpaid, is subject to effort reporting. Return to
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- What is 100% effort?
The total amount of effort expended to accomplish the professional activities
of Case faculty, staff, and students regardless of the actual number of
hours expended on those activities. This normally includes all effort expended
on Case-compensated sponsored research, administration, teaching, unsponsored
scholarly activity, and other activity and, in the case of clinical faculty,
clinical activity compensated by clinical practice plans. 100 per cent effort
is not defined as a single, standard number of hours or days per week, since
it will likely be different for each person and may vary during the year.
The number of hours implicit in an individual’s 100% effort must be
reasonable and supportable to department, school, university and external
reviewers, if requested. In most circumstances, a minimum of 40 hours (assuming
a full-time schedule) and a maximum of 80 hours would be considered a reasonable
average work week. Return to top
- Can the total effort listed on the Effort Certification
Form be less than or greater than 100%?
No. The effort percentages on the Effort Certification Form must total
100% - neither more or less. All Case compensated effort (and for clinical
faculty, Case compensated effort and practice plan compensated effort) must
be accounted for; and obviously the sum of the individual effort categories
cannot be greater than 100%. Again, just because an individual may work
more than a normal 35- or 40-hour week does not alter this rule. For example,
an individual who spends 40 hours a week on sponsored research and 40 hours
a week on clinical activity would report an effort percentage of 50 percent
for each category, totaling 100 percent for the report period. Return
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- Are there some sponsored projects where I can report
0% effort?
Individuals are expected to commit some level of effort (>0%) on sponsored
projects on which they are listed as a principal investigator or key personnel
with the exception of equipment and instrumentation grants, doctoral dissertation
grants, student supplement grants, and institutional/individual training
grants (for faculty mentors). Return to top
- Who should sign the Effort Certification Form?
To ensure that the effort reporting system reasonably reflects actual effort
expended in the various categories during the report period, the person
completing the Effort Certification Form must be a person with first-hand
knowledge of the effort expended. In general, this is the individual whose
effort is being reported. Therefore, at Case the individual named on the
Effort Certification Form should sign/certify his or her effort except for
non-faculty key personnel and other staff (e.g., graduate students, post-doctoral
fellow, research assistants) whose effort is certified by the principal
investigator of the sponsored project for which they are contributing effort.
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- How often are Effort Certification Forms completed?
Semi-annually, based on the fiscal year. The Form for the period from July
1 to December31 is completed in January of every year. The Form for the
period of January 1 through June 30 is completed in July of every year.
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- What if my effort on an externally sponsored project
changes?
Faculty are required to review, modify as necessary, and certify that the
effort percentages for themselves and their key personnel are reasonable
estimates of the actual work performed. Federal guidelines and Case policy
recognize that the activities that constitute effort are often difficult
to separate. Effort certification must often rely on a reasonable estimate
of effort, and when estimating, a degree of tolerance is appropriate. However,
a change in effort noted on the effort certification form (regardless of
how small the change is) must always be accompanied by a change in the payroll
or cost sharing.
Certified effort forms assert that the information represented is to the
best of the certifier’s knowledge, accurate and complete. Changes
to previously certified effort erode the credibility of the certifier as
well as the entire effort certification process. For these reasons, changes
to a certified effort form are not allowed except in limited circumstances,
which require extensive documentation as to why the effort was originally
certified incorrectly. Likewise, it is important for administrators to complete
known salary distribution corrections and salary transfers before the effort
form is certified, since changes to payroll distribution that contradict
certified effort are not allowed after certification. Return
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- How do I report cost-sharing of effort?
The Effort Certification Form requires that effort expended on an activity
be reported, whether or not that activity is funded by an outside source.
For example, if a faculty member expends effort on a sponsored research
project but does not charge the project for all (or any) of his or her salary
for that effort, the entire effort must still be allocated to that project.
The unfunded effort is generally considered cost sharing and must be recorded
in the cost-sharing column next to the listing of the specific sponsored
research project on the Effort Certification Form. As an example, if a faculty
member expends 75% of his or her total effort on a sponsored project, but
the sponsor is charged for only 50% of his or her salary, the 50% is entered
on the Effort Certification Form in the column marked “Payroll”
and the 25% is entered in the column marked “Cost-sharing”.
It is important to understand that this rule applies only to effort specifically
expended on a sponsored project. Return to top
- How long should departmental copies of Effort Certification
Forms be kept?
Grants Accounting is responsible for retaining the signed/certified Effort
Certification Forms (either hardcopy or electronically signed versions),
based on federal record retention guidelines. Grants Accounting strongly
recommends that departments retain signed/certified Effort Certification
Forms for a period of three years from the close-out of the project. Return
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- What kind of documentation or supporting evidence is
needed as back-up to the Effort Certification Form?
This can vary as a function of the individual and department and whether
they are engaged in activities other than externally sponsored research
conducted through Case. Examples of the types of documentation that could
support the Effort Certification Form include the annual faculty activity
summary, clinic schedule, personal schedule, consult schedule, class schedule.
These supporting documents should be kept for a period of three years from
the close-out of the project (i.e., for as long as the Effort Certification
Form is kept). Return to top
- Is training available for effort reporting?
Yes, formal workshops and seminars about Case’s effort reporting system
are provided throughout the academic year. In addition, individuals knowledgeable
about Case’s effort reporting policies and procedures are available
to assist on an as needed basis. These individuals are in the Grants Accounting
office, the Office of Sponsored Projects Administration, and in specific
research offices at the school/college level.
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Last modified: April 28, 2006
