The Research Outcomes System (ROS) is a web-based system which allows users to provide research outcomes to four of the Research Councils – AHRC, BBSRC, ESRC and EPSRC. The ROS can be used by these Research Council grant holders to input outcomes information about their research. It can also be used by Higher Education Institution (HEI) research offices to input research outcomes information on behalf of grant holders and/or access the outcomes information of grant holders in their institution.
Grant holders, research office managers and associated staff will log into the system and input outcomes information, comprising both narrative and data, under nine different categories, as follows:
- Publications
- Other Research Outputs
- Collaboration
- Communication
- Exploitation
- Recognition
- Staff Development
- Further Funding
- Impact
Each of these categories has various sub-sections to help users be as specific as possible when inputting information. In addition, grant holders will be asked to provide a brief summary of the Key Findings arising from their research. This information can be made available to research users to stimulate engagement and collaboration.
The ROS will help make the process of recording research outcomes more straightforward for researchers because they can do so at any point in time and not have to recall information only at the end of a grant. Researchers can also continue to input outcomes into ROS after a grant has ended reflecting the fact that the impact of research is often felt some time after a grant has ended. A key feature of the ROS is the option to bulk upload outputs information for multiple grants which will save time and effort.
The ROS was developed in liaison with the research community and underwent extensive user testing. It is also aligned as closely as possible with requirements for the REF, so researchers can use the information in the ROS when they come to prepare their submissions for the REF.
The information gathered by the ROS is key to the Research Councils strengthening their evidence base for strategy development, and crucial in demonstrating the benefits of Research Council funded research to society and the economy.
The remaining three Research Councils will continue to use alternative existing systems. The MRC and STFC are using the e-Val system and at present NERC is currently continuing to use its Research Outputs Database (ROD) until a decision has been reached regarding which collection system to replace it with. STFC has already informed its communities that it intends to use e-Val for the foreseeable future, and is currently seeking community input on ways to streamline the system to make it easier for users whilst fulfilling STFC’s data collection requirements.
A set of frequently asked questions about the Research Outcomes System is available here 
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You can access the Research Outcomes System here.
A series of short video tutorials for using the system is available here.