The Researcher Development Concordat is a UK-wide agreement, first adopted in 1996 and substantially revised in 2019, that commits universities, research institutes, funders, and researchers to improving research culture, employment conditions, and career development for researchers. It is a distinct instrument from the Concordat to Support Research Integrity: the Researcher Development Concordat governs how researchers are supported and developed, not how research itself is conducted or investigated for misconduct. Signatory institutions report against it through a defined gap-analysis, action-plan, and annual-reporting cycle described below.
The Researcher Development Concordat (formally “the Concordat to Support the Career Development of Researchers”) is administered by the Researcher Development Concordat Strategy Group (RDCSG), a UK-wide governing body drawing representatives from funders, higher education institutions, and sector bodies including UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), Research England, and the Scottish Funding Council.
- What is the Researcher Development Concordat?
- Researcher Development Concordat vs the Concordat to Support Research Integrity
- The three principles and who is responsible for what
- What institutions must report under the action plan
- Answer-first Q&A
- Implications for research administrators
What is the Researcher Development Concordat?
The Researcher Development Concordat traces back to a 1996 agreement, A Concordat to Provide a Framework for the Career Management of Contract Research Staff in Universities and Colleges, negotiated between UK funding bodies and universities. It was substantially rewritten and relaunched in September 2019 under its current name and structure, and remains a living, voluntary agreement rather than statutory regulation.
Signatory institutions — the large majority of UK universities, plus a number of independent research institutes, funders, and regulators — commit to embedding the concordat’s principles in policy and practice. The concordat sits within the UK government’s wider R&D People and Culture Strategy (2021), which set an ambition of attracting and retaining an additional 150,000 researchers across the UK R&D system by 2030.
Researcher Development Concordat vs the Concordat to Support Research Integrity
These two UK concordats are frequently confused because both use the word “concordat” and both apply to universities and research institutes. They govern different things entirely, and institutions typically report against them through separate processes and to separate bodies.
| Aspect | Researcher Development Concordat | Concordat to Support Research Integrity |
|---|---|---|
| Subject | Researcher careers, employment, environment and culture | Rigour, transparency and misconduct-handling in research conduct |
| Origin | 1996 (as the contract research staff concordat); revised 2019 | First published 2012 by Universities UK; most recently revised 2025 |
| Governing/host body | Researcher Development Concordat Strategy Group (RDCSG); secretariat: Universities UK | UK Committee on Research Integrity (UKCORI), with the UK Research Integrity Office (UKRIO) providing advisory support |
| Reporting mechanism | Gap analysis, action plan, then annual progress reports published on institutional websites | Annual statement of compliance published on institutional websites, plus a self-assessment tool |
| Typical institutional owner | HR, researcher development, or research culture teams | Research integrity officers / research governance teams |
An institution can be a signatory to one concordat without automatically being a signatory to the other, and the two reporting cycles run on independent timetables. Research administrators should not assume compliance with one satisfies obligations under the other.
The three principles and who is responsible for what
The Researcher Development Concordat is structured around three defining principles, each carrying distinct obligations for four stakeholder groups: researchers, managers of researchers, institutions, and funders.
- Environment and culture — a positive, inclusive research environment that recognises the contribution of all researchers to the wider research endeavour.
- Employment — fair, transparent recruitment, reward, and recognition, and appropriate employment conditions for researchers regardless of contract type.
- Professional and career development — access to continuing professional development and support for career planning, within and beyond academia.
The RDCSG has also committed to reporting annually to the relevant government minister and devolved administrations on national progress, publishing a UK implementation plan, and commissioning a major review of the concordat’s implementation approximately every three years.
What institutions must report under the action plan
Concordat reporting is deliberately “light-touch and flexible,” in the words of the Researcher Development Concordat’s own reporting guidance, but it is not optional for signatories. The cycle runs in three stages.
- Gap analysis. A new signatory compares existing policy and practice against the three concordat principles. Institutions that have already completed a gap analysis for the HR Excellence in Research Award (HREiR) can reuse that work.
- Action plan. Within one year of signing, the institution must draw up and publish an action plan setting out how it will close the gaps identified.
- Annual report. From the following year onward, the institution submits an annual report to its governing body (or equivalent authority) and publishes it on its own website. The due date is fixed to the month the action plan was originally published.
Each annual report must, for each of the three principles, cover: organisational context and approach; strategic objectives and implementation plans; measures of success; actions taken and evaluation of progress; lessons learned and any resulting modifications; a forward look to the next reporting period; and a brief statement of the report’s internal approval process. The RDCSG collects and evaluates these reports centrally to track national progress.
Institutions holding the HREiR Award and the Concordat signatory status simultaneously benefit from an alignment arrangement: in the year they renew their triennial HREiR Award, they may submit that same documentation to meet their Concordat reporting requirement instead of preparing a separate report — reducing duplicated administrative effort, an arrangement the RDCSG and Vitae have formalised specifically to lower institutional reporting burden.
Answer-first Q&A
What are the three principles of the Researcher Development Concordat?
The three principles are environment and culture, employment, and professional and career development. Each principle carries specific responsibilities for researchers, managers of researchers, institutions, and funders, and each must be addressed separately in a signatory’s action plan and annual report.
Who is the secretariat of the Researcher Development Concordat?
Universities UK acts as secretariat to the Researcher Development Concordat Strategy Group, while Nottingham Trent University chairs the group. The RDCSG itself draws representatives from funders including UKRI, Wellcome, and the British Academy, plus sector and staff-association bodies.
What is the concordat for research development?
It is a UK-wide, voluntary agreement — formally the Concordat to Support the Career Development of Researchers — under which signatory institutions commit to improving the working environment, employment conditions, and career support available to researchers at every career stage.
When is a signatory’s first action plan due?
A new signatory must publish its action plan within one year of signing the concordat. The first annual report is then due roughly twelve months later, in the same calendar month the action plan was published, and every year thereafter.
Implications for research administrators
Because reporting due dates are anchored to each institution’s own action-plan publication date rather than a single national deadline, research administrators need to track their institution’s specific cycle rather than assume a fixed annual date shared across the sector. Institutions that also hold the HREiR Award should actively align the two reporting schedules where possible, as the RDCSG and Vitae explicitly encourage.
Given the frequent conflation with the Concordat to Support Research Integrity, institutions should ensure governance documentation clearly names which concordat a given policy, committee, or report addresses — misattribution creates real risk of a compliance gap being missed in an external review or funder audit. As the UK’s R&D People and Culture Strategy continues to shape funder expectations toward 2030, expect closer scrutiny of published action plans as evidence of institutional commitment, not just of formal signatory status.
