The University of Oregon encourages faculty and staff to perform outside consulting and provides support to help faculty and staff manage potential conflicts of commitment and interest that may be associated with consulting. 

UO’s outside work policies apply to all individuals employed by UO. Two UO policies cover outside consulting:

• UO Policy I.02.02 covers the process for managing potential conflicts of commitment and interest and obtaining approval from UO if necessary UO
• UO Policy II.06.01 covers the process for managing financial conflict of interest in research and is managed by our Research Compliance Services unit.

Some consulting activities must be approved in advance. Read the UO policies to see whether your consulting needs pre-approval.

Tips on Outside Consulting

• UO personnel may not bring information from personal consulting/outside activity back into UO without a written agreement.
• Only certain UO officials are authorized to sign non-disclosure agreements (confidentiality agreements) on behalf of UO.
• If you are performing outside consulting, you negotiate and sign non-disclosure agreements solely for you as an individual or on behalf of your company.
• If you would like to use intellectual property developed at UO in your consulting work, you should obtain a license from IIT.

Academic personnel can also provide standard-practice or project-based consulting activities through the University of Oregon. These are handled by Sponsored Project Services and Industry, Innovation, and Translation (IIT), with the details depending on whether the party seeking consulting services is a for profit or non-profit entity. Income for the consulting activity would contribute to the academic personnel’s standard salary. To learn more, please see the Faculty & Staff Consulting Overview.