Developing, refining and submitting a grant proposal 5th June 2013

University of Glamorgan

Developing, refining and submitting a grant proposal

• Session 1 - Refining your proposal

• Session 2 - Finance and resources

• Session 3 - Submitting the document

• Session 4 - Glamorgan’s approval process

• Session 5 - What happens next?

• Session 6 - Further support and information

SESSION 1 : REFINING YOUR PROPOSAL

Impact

• More easy to define for some projects; but research councils know this

• Can be up to 20 years• RCUK impact:

- Fostering global economic performance, and specifically the economic competitiveness of the United Kingdom;

- Increasing the effectiveness of public services and policy, and

- Enhancing quality of life, health and creative output.

Potential beneficiaries

• Are there potential beneficiaries within the private sector?

• Is there anyone, including policy-makers, within international, national, local or devolved government and government agencies who would benefit from the research?

• Are there potential beneficiaries within the public sector, third sector or any others (e.g. museums, galleries, charities)?

• Would the research be of interest to professional or practitioner groups (such as the legal profession, architects, planners, archivists, designers, creative and performing artists)?

• Are there any beneficiaries within the wider public?

Writing about impact

• Impact Summary (Who, in what way)• Pathways to impact (How- ‘dissemination plan’)

• Example of how to deal with impact: http://www.ahrc.ac.uk/Funding-Opportunities/Documents/ImpactFAQ.pdf

Peer review

• Who can help to improve the application?

• What disciplines does it cover? Are there other perspectives on how it will be reviewed?

• How can you defuse any potential opposition? What are the elements that reviewers may question?

Improving your proposal

• Clarity - of expression and ideas

Things to Avoid Use

might, should, could is, will be

passive voice active voice

hype passion

past tense present and future

undefined jargon technical language

long sentences short ones, especially in key areas

• Key words : ‘persuasive structures’ for impact • Rule of three- e.g. “the project will deliver a

solution that is affordable, efficient and effective” • Use key phrases- innovative, cutting edge,

novel, transferable, high impact, achievable.......• Snappy titles and acronyms- e.g WISERD,

REACT

Workshop:

What are some good/bad phrases to use?

Yes Minister- The Right to Know

Sir Humphrey: There are four words you have to work into a proposal if you want a Minister to accept it.Sir Frank: Quick, simple, popular, cheap. And equally there are four words to be included in a proposal if you want it thrown out.Sir Humphrey: Complicated, lengthy, expensive, controversial. And if you want to be really sure that the Minister doesn't accept it you must say the decision is courageous.Bernard: And that's worse than controversial?Sir Humphrey: (laughs) Controversial only means this will lose you votes, courageous means this will lose you the election.

The fine detail

• Word counts

• Spelling and grammar

• Borders and font sizes

• Multiple fields- extra pieces of information you may not realise at the start.

• Showing that you care about the proposal is important.

SESSION 2 - FINANCE AND RESOURCES

Finances and resources

• Full Economic Costing

• Achieving the best level of funding- RCUK 80% FEC

• Estates and indirect costs

• Justification for Resources- show value for money; impact costs; well thought out.

• Investigators- justify time and expertise, not money.

• Other elements- justify cost (e.g. camera- prices)

Costings: what to ask for• Start date and total duration of project

• Your time (in % or hours, i.e. 20%= 1 day per week)

• Time of any co-investigators to be employed on the project

• Any research fellows/assistants to be employed (often postdoctoral). Grade E (recent post-doc, probably first job) Grade F (e.g. 5 years postdoc experience) or Grade G (v. experienced- equivalent to senior lecturer level)

• Any costs for technical support in the faculty (as a % of time) or any admin costs (as full time or a % of time)

• Equipment cost estimates (IT should normally only be if it’s a specific bit of equipment that wouldn’t normally be provided at the University)

• Any travel or subsistence costs that are likely to be required (eg for research meetings, steering group meetings, participants)

• Impact costs- to include things like workshops, seminars, conferences etc

• Recruitment costs (eg £2000 cost for national advertising, if fundable)

• Any other costs you can think of!

SESSION 3: SUBMITTING THE DOCUMENT

Electronic forms

• Key forms- summary, impact summary, resources, appendices

• Je-S Joint Electronic Submission- used by RCUK (AHRC, EPSRC etc)

• https://je-s.rcuk.ac.uk• Register via website- validated by Research

Office• Register partners as early as possible!

SESSION 4 : GLAMORGAN’S APPROVAL PROCESS

Institutional approval

• EFAS-External Funding Application System https://efas.glam.ac.uk:8443/

• Part A and Part B

• Signatures and approvals

• Proposal submission through Je-S, e-Grants

• Approval from other partners

SESSION 5: WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

What next- review and panels

• Peer review and grading process (research councils)

• PI response- how it works and guidance• Panel- proposals are ranked• How many are funded? – success rates• http://www.rcuk.ac.uk/research/Efficiency/

Pages/Successrates.aspx

SESSION 6: FURTHER SUPPORT AND INFORMATION

Support

• Research office

• CSO

• European Office

What can RO support?

• Peer review

• Workshops/sandpits

• Help with writing aspects of proposals including impact, justification of resources

• Institutional approval – EFAS

• ‘Matching’ service

Other resources

• Write a winning funding bid- NCVO knowhow (focuses on charitable funding)

• http://knowhownonprofit.org/studyzone/write-a-winning-funding-bid