ProS Region Newsletter February 2019

Welcome to the ProS Region Inaugural Newsletter!

It is our goal to provide continuously updated information to our region via the ProS website. Our website is currently under development. Over the next several months we will be working with all of our regional contacts to help craft a website that is both easy-to-use and a one-stop resource for service links and information.

February updates:

• ProS Welcome Party: ProS held a welcome party to kick-off the official “stand up” of the region on January 16. Special thanks to the Goldman School of Public Policy for hosting this event. Even though the weather was bad on the event day, the Goldman library was filled with ProS staff, faculty and departmental staff. Our hope is that we will be able to hold quarterly events over this formative period to foster relationship building and communication within our region. The next quarterly event will be announced within the next two months.
• ProS is hiring research administration staff: Recruitment of RA staff is currently underway. If you have friends and/or colleagues interested in a new or advanced position in research administration please contact ProS RA Manager Katie Larkin Hudson for more information on these openings. ProS will also have a post-award RA Supervisor position open by 2/15. Please watch for the posting and alert all who might be interested!
• ProS is hiring HR team members: Your HR team is currently recruiting an HR Supervisor 2, who will help our region create an HR Operations and Analysis group. This team will be very important as we move to UCPath.  We are also looking for an experienced payroll specialist, who will be a critical member of the Ops/Analysis team. Please let Valerie Ventre-Hutton know if you have any recommendations.
• ProS staff move to campus: ProS will have two main campus locations for RA staff. The first location is now up and running at 140 UHall. The second location at 112 Hearst is currently under development.Regional Director Arno and Sr. Project Manager Ballati have been working with an architect and other campus support services to finalize the space configuration and costing plan. The current plan will include a kitchen area and conferencing space, open plan offices for RA 3 and 4 level staff, as well as hoteling office space for HR and other staff from the 4th street location to ensure that all can provide service closer to regional faculty and staff when necessary. All ProS RA staff currently at the Banway building will be relocated to the Hearst site within the next 3-5 months. The ProS staff for human resources and academic personnel, as well as purchasing and reimbursement staff will remain at the 4th street location. Within the next several weeks RD Arno will stage a review of the plan and tour of the Hearst location for the ProS RA staff currently located at the Banway building.
• ProS staff retirements: Please join us in acknowledging and congratulating Katherine Wang (32 years) and Claudia Martinez-Schwarz (10+ years) in their retirement from UCB. Both will be greatly missed by their colleagues in shared services!
• New hires: Please join us in welcoming Susan Gardner to our Research Administration team.  Susan is moving to us from another region on campus. She will be providing pre-award assistance. We also welcome David Beausoleil to HR. David has a background in payroll and administration and will take on an HR Generalist 2 role starting this month.
• ProS is preparing for UCPath implementation: We are finalizing the initial access and roles for region staff and are having conversations with your teams about roles, handoffs and expectations.  We are also working with clients to identify the UCPath ‘initiators and approvers’ on their staff and how the work will flow between clients and the ProS teams. For those of you who may not be aware, we are working with our amazing process improvement team (Nick Endlsey and Chris DeMarco) to develop preliminary process maps. We expect to have plenty of room for process improvement after the system launch in March and look forward to working with you to get the most out of this new system.