An important mission of higher education worldwide is pushing back the current limits of knowledge through scholarly activities and research. Research about higher education itself studies a wide range of political, economic, social, and technological issues employing a variety of methodologies, and includes topics such as teaching, learning, course design, student experience, education quality, system policy, institutional management, and academic work (Tight, 2012). Higher education research is generally conducted by specialists from various disciplines who have research as part of their academic or professional duties (Altbach, 2014; Teichler, 2000). However, there is a distinctive subgroup of researchers investigating higher education topics in the service of an institution’s management (Teichler, 2014). These specialists convert data into information and communicate their analyses throughout the institution. As such, institutional research sits at the junction of research and knowledge management. This chapter is about refining our understanding of the nature of institutional research (IR) as it relates to the institution it serves and to the national system in which it operates. It is also about assessing the quality of IR in a continuous development perspective. The focus is on the concepts and dimensions defining IR in a manner that can not only further our understanding but can also be used to measure and improve IR development. The conceptual framework elaborated here is strongly influenced by the authors’ direct experience in the Canadian context and by the vast literature available about IR in the United States. Nevertheless, a concerted effort has been devoted to create a modular system that can be adapted to varying regional and national contexts via the relative emphasis placed on some of the functions. The framework is resilient to jurisdictional differences in historical, social, and political factors modulating IR (Webber & Calderon, 2015) which is demonstrated by its reported validation and applicability in Chile.