Short Answer
A DMP provides information about technical, organisational and content aspects of data usually derived from a set of structured questions.
Detailed Answer
Data management plans (DMPs) are ideally compiled as part of proposal preparation. Your proposal includes the most of the information you need to write your DMP. With the DMP, all questions about data management and its documentation are planned before the project starts. In this way, many problems can be avoided during the project period and more efficient work is possible. Precise documentation and the establishment of rules make the results reliable and reusable for others. But a DMP is not only created at the beginning of a project, it is a living document, and you should return to it at every phase of your project to ensure proper data documentation and management.
Instructions for writing a DMP can be found here.
You find further information about the data life cycle in our fact sheets.
If you need help to write your dmp, please fill in the GFBio Data Management Plan Tool (DMPT).