Best Practices

➢ Departmental policies and procedures for the activity should be formally documented. This should include authorized activity, workflow, responsibilities, documentation requirements and step-by-step instructions for processing activity.

➢ Documented policies and procedures helps ensure departmental personnel understand expectations and requirements, and promote accountability and consistency in activities.

➢ Personnel should be familiar with Kentucky State University’s Grants policies and procedures. This includes provisions for coordination with the Office of Research, Grants and Sponsored Programs and Finance and Business Affair’s Grants Management Division.

➢ Grants should be properly accepted before activities are initiated. If there is any doubt if formal action is required, personnel should consult with the Office of Research, Grants and Sponsored Programs.

➢ All personnel should be properly trained in the performance of their duties. Performance assessments help identify areas where additional training would be beneficial.

➢ Staff should understand that compliance with grant requirements is mandatory. This includes any matching (in-kind or monetary) requirements.

➢ Personnel should be assigned the responsibility of reconciling grant activity recorded on the Banner financial system. These reconciliations should be documented and performed on a routine basis. This helps ensure accurate information is reported.

➢ Staff should maintain files for each grant. The files should contain the award so that requirements can be located easily.

➢ Financial reimbursements from the Grantor should be requested timely. This helps avoid the extended use of Kentucky State University resources for activities already incurred.

➢ Monitoring and oversight of activities is a critical duty of senior level management. This provides assurance that activity is performed as intended, and helps identify opportunities to enhance efficiency and effectiveness.

➢ The Office of Research, Grants and Sponsored Programs and the Office of Internal Audit should be contacted whenever a Grantor provides notification that an audit has been scheduled. This allows both entities to be involved from the beginning, which is beneficial to Kentucky State University and the department.

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