IX. Strategic Area 6: Institutional Resources

Objective 1: Maintain Financial Stability

Initiative

Implement Financial plan

Actions by Initiatives

Enhance/Upgrade the Technological Solutions to Support Academic and Administrative Operations

• Develop and implement digital transformation to accelerate administrative operations performance.

• Maintain data and system security to ensure high performance.

• Improve the website presence by implementing search engine optimization best practices.

Diversify income streams

Actions by Initiatives

Implement ECoAD Financial Plan

2022-2027

KPIs Responsibility 2022 2023 2024 2025 2026

Deviation percentage (positive or negative) of expenditure and income from the budget (measured monthly, quarterly, per semester and annually).

Percentage of self- income of the institution to total income (KPI-I-14).

Percentage of achievement for each source of income to budget.

LEAD: DEAN

OTHERS: DEPT. CHAIRS

LEAD: VPPD

OTHERS: MF

• Improve the quality and equipment of the lecture rooms and computer labs to ensure high quality of teaching and facilitate the interaction with students.

Optimize the Use of Facilities and Equipment to Achieve Safe, Healthy, and Sustainable Campus

• Revise and update Master Campus Plan to ensure its alliance with ECoAD needs (including vacant land parcels) and to maintain compliance with Ministry of Education Bylaws.

• Annually review campus building and facilities to meet the emerging needs of academic and administrative units.

• Establish a smart campus deployment plan to maintain best practices in a sustainable and healthy campus infrastructure.

• Upgrade current campus facilities with the emerging needs of students.

Risk Management

The following table indicates the key risks associated with each strategic recommended area and a corresponding mitigation plan for every risk:

• Maintain the financial planning and management control system, with capabilities to perform budgetary and forecasting processes, financial delegations and risk management.

Diversify Income Stream

• Develop, implement, and evaluate Revenue diversification strategy.

Objective 2: Improve ECoAD Services (IT & Facilities and Equipment)

Initiative

Enhance/upgrade the technological solutions to support academic and administrative operations

2022-2027

2022 2023 2024 2025 2026

KPIs Responsibility

KPI-I-15 Average of beneficiaries’ satisfaction rate with technical services...) on a five-point scale in an annual survey in terms of: a. Suitability. b. Safety and confidentiality. c. Availability and ease of access. d. Maintenance and support services.

% Of fulfillment of facilities and equipment of the needs for the college

Average of beneficiaries’ satisfaction rate with facilities and equipment services on a five-point scale in an annual survey in terms of:

Optimize the use of facilities and equipment to achieve safe, healthy, and sustainable campus a. cleaning services b. Safety and healthy campus c. access for disabled d. Maintenance and support services e. security f. restaurant, CDC, residence g. transportation

LEAD: DEAN QA

OTHERS: DEAN/DEPT. CHAIRS /MIETS

Topic Risk

Improve ECoAD Infrastructure

Mitigation Plan

LEAD: DEAN QA – SES & PES

OTHERS: DEAN/DEPT. CHAIRS

Untenable financial demands for new technology commitments.

Prioritization and smart allocation of funds based on more lucrative opportunities. Strong faculty and staff resistance to new solutions related to buildings and grounds on philosophical or other grounds.

Long-term benefits to the ECoAD should be clearly communicated before taking capital decisions.

X. Strategic Area 7: Research & Innovation

Objective 1: Develop Diversified Research Impact in Areas of National and International Priority

Initiative

Identify and establish focused research relationships with national and international partners

2022-2027

KPIs Responsibility 2022 2023 2024 2025 2026

KPI-I-21 Proportion of external funding for research

The degree of international diversity in terms of partnered international research network is as: Formula = (Number of partners -1)/ln (number of collaborated research output)

Percentage of partnered research to the total research output (Including internal collaborations amongst ECoAD and its departments).

LEAD: DEAN

OTHERS: DEPT. CHAIRS.

Monitor and respond to national policy on international HE regarding research

Percentage of operational steps completed.

LEAD: DGSR OTHERS: DEPT. CHAIRS.

Actions by Initiatives

Identify and Establish Focused Research Relationships with National and International Partners

• Prioritize fund-raising efforts through collaborative research proposals targeting national and international funding organizations and businesses.

• Develop capabilities to raise funds (“5% from the total research budget of ECoAD (“not less than 125 K SAR”) through external sources by targeting national and international funding organizations.

• Support Faculty in identifying external sources of funding to supplement funding from the ECoAD, thus ensuring their financial autonomy.

• Assisting faculty with the process of writing proposals for funding by, among other things, organizing proposal writing workshops, marketing the capabilities of ECoAD Researchers among the funding agencies, and incentivize ECoAD Researchers for networking.

Delegate responsibilities to the most credible names within the research faculty to write proposals for funding. Monitor and Respond to National Policy on International HE Regarding Research

• Scan, on a yearly basis, the possible updates of research by checking the governmental research related institutions (i.e., KACST, RDO, SAIP).

• Design a timeline to review research related policies, and update if needed.

Objective 2: Consolidate Research Achievements

Increase proportion of active researchers

Extend integration of graduate students and programs in published research

Increase researcher productivity

Improve research impact

Actions by Initiatives

Increase Proportion of Active Researchers

Percentage of publications of faculty members (KPI-P-14 /KPI-PG-15).

Proportion of graduate students with a) at least one refereed publication during their study) presented paper in a conference to the total number of students in the PG program during the year. (KPI-PG-18).

Rate of published research per faculty member KPI-P-15 KPIPG-16.

• Citations rate in refereed journals per faculty member

• (KPI-P-16 KPI-PG-17).

Number of patents, innovations, and awards of excellence (KPI-PG-19).

• Number of Scopus publications per year.

LEAD: DGSR

OTHERS: DEAN/DEPT. CHAIRS

LEAD: DGSR

OTHERS: DEAN/DEPT. CHAIRS

LEAD: DGSR

OTHERS: DEAN/DEPT. CHAIRS

LEAD: DGSR

OTHERS: DEAN/DEPT. CHAIRS

Extend Integration of Graduate Students and Programs in Published Research

• Promote the process of involving PG students in research publication by co-authoring with their faculty.

Increase Researcher Productivity

• Focus further in the faculty recruitment on candidates with a proven track record in research.

• Aid new researchers and early careers in the process of publications and grant proposal writing.

• Provide adequate internal seed funding (Internal Financial Support) to increase the research productivity of active scholars.

• Allow teaching release time for very active researcher whenever possible to spend the needed time on research production.

Improve Research Impact

• Improve the quality of the research production published in national and international journals and books and impact through:

• Raise awareness for internal cross citations.

• Improve the quality of the research production published in national and international journals and books and impact through:

• Raise awareness for internal cross citations.

• Facilitate the ECoAD support for open access publications to increase the opportunity of citations.

• Indexing ECoAD journals to help in increasing the number of indexing citations.

• Empower faculty to publish with top 2% (highly cited) scholars.

• Spread the research advancements made by ECoAD researchers through effective PR communication, both internally and externally.

• Establish a regular newsletter to highlight and celebrate the achievements of ECoAD researchers.

• Create awareness about ECoAD research activities on EU website and blogs as a gesture of promoting research culture both within and outside the ECoAD.

Objective 3: Promote the Research Environment

Initiative 2022-2027

KPIs Responsibility 2022 2023 2024 2025 2026

LEAD: DGSR

Establish endowed/named research chairs

Utilize existing research labs/units / centers

Actions by Initiatives

Establish Endowed/Named Research Chairs

Number of chairs established

Degree of utilization of existing facilities & resources

Satisfaction of beneficiaries with research facilities, and equipment (KPI-PG-14).

OTHERS: DEANS/DEPT. CHAIR

LEAD: DGSR

OTHERS: DEANS/DEPT. CHAIR

• Foster the recruitment of leading national and international scholars, leading in their respective fields of research (postdoctorates, scholars on sabbatical, retired scholars as they can contribute through their experience).

• Offer adequate compensation or incentives for the active researcher, based on the research projection.

• Conduct regular workshops and meetings to promote collaborations between ECoAD faculty with active researchers..

• Identify research strengths and opportunities of ECoAD and develop plans for scientific chairs.

• Scan, identify and collaborate with governmental and/or ECoAD bodies for the selected research areas.

• Address potential donors/ sponsors for research chairs.

• Manage the chairs and evaluate their effectiveness..

Utilize Existing Research Labs /Units /Centers

• Enhance the research environment and infrastructure to increase the research productivity through effective use of state-ofthe-art research laboratories, research centers, online databases and resources such as Scopus, Thompson Reuters Web of Science, and software for both qualitative and quantitative research.

• Evaluate the satisfaction of the users of research facilities and equipment.

Risk Management

The following table indicates the key risks associated with each strategic recommended area and a corresponding mitigation plan for every risk:

Topic Risk Mitigation Plan

Research collaborations

Research Output & Alignment to National Objectives

Competitive space to get grants and funding from external sources.

Financial constraint, lack of resource and skill.

Increase credibility of ECoAD research Enhanced communication and marketing to get ECoAD out there in the public space thereby enhancing visibility.

Focus on high ROI through spends to hire more resource.

Conduct training workshops to develop skill. Focus on winning grants and getting funded.