How Late Is FedEx Open: T houghts About The Grant Writing Process

How Late Is FedEx Open:
Thoughts About The Grant Writing Process
O. Dale Williams, PhD
Professor and Associate Director
Division of Preventive Medicine
UAB
Research Funding and Publications
• Research funding, or “Grants” and
Publications are the currency of the realm
• Small improvements in the process of
generating proposals for grants and
manuscripts can have important consequences
The Creative Writing Process
Writing Grant Applications vs Writing Papers
Common Elements
•Both are peer reviewed
•Abstract most read component
Major Differences
•Papers don’t have a budget
•Papers don’t have a hard deadline
•Audience for papers larger
Briefly on the Review Process
• Two reviewers read everything, including
some of the appendices
• All reviewers will read abstract
• Some reviewers will read more
• An annoyed reviewer is not a good thing
What Annoys Reviewers
• Having to search for key information
• Incomplete and/or unclear text
• Having to go to an appendix for information
that should be up front
• Having to read the text several times to
understand what the grant is about
• A budget that doesn’t make sense or with
components that are clearly wrong
The NIH Laundry Carts
How do you separate your application from
others in the pile?
Key Components
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Brilliant Idea
Outstanding Methods
The Promise of Important Results
Appealing, Easy to Read and Understand
Package
Grants and Politics
The grant equivalent of the political statement:
“It’s the economy, stupid”
is:
“It’s the package, stupid”
The Challenge
• Life begins with 25 pages of real estate
• That is 2,337.5 square inches to fill with 11
point text
• Early fear is blank pages
• Fear near end is cramming into 25 pages
A Most Critical Issue
• The process used to fill the 25 pages on time is
a management process
• Who is in charge
• How will decisions be made
• How will deadlines be set and what will be
done when they are not met
Levels of Organizational Complexity
and Management Burden
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•
•
•
•
You by yourself is easy
You with colleagues is harder
Your team with other local teams is harder still
Your team with other institutions is harder still
Large scale, long term, multi-center
collaborations are the hardest
• Lead-time requirements increase exponentially
as complexity increases
Management Challenge
• Managing the grant writing process may not be
easy
• Good organizational skills can be most helpful
• Small issues, such as keeping track of the
different drafts, can be very time consuming
Time Bulldozer: Time 0
Capacity for Excellent Proposal
Work Required for Excellent Proposal
Time 0
Drop Dead Date
The Time Bulldozer
• It just keeps moving toward the drop dead date
• No rewind
• No clicking on the “Back” icon
Time Bulldozer: Mid-Phase
Capacity for Excellent Proposal
Work Required
Time 0
Drop Dead Date
Time Bulldozer: Terminal Phase
Work
Capacity for Excellent Proposal
Time 0
Drop Dead Date
Implication of Time Bulldozer
Focus on Excellence
Focus on Door
Time 0
Drop Dead Date
Yogi Berra
The great philosopher Yogi Berra said
“It ain’t over til it’s over
The moral:
Cultivate the ability to do great work at
the last minute
Writing Goal
• Write the proposal in such a manner that the
primary and secondary reviewers become your
advocates during the review
• Write the abstract in such a manner that it
entices others on the review panel to read the
full proposal and become advocates
Battleships and Outhouses
• Harry Truman described congresses approach
to military appropriations as “Everyone knows
how to build an outhouse so they get extensive
discussion. No one knows how to build a
battleship so they get no discussion”
• The message—Be clear and concise about
those topics on which all reviewers are likely
to have an opinion
Poetry versus Prose
Grant writing is a little more like writing
poetry than writing prose in that the page limit
makes it more important to make sure each
word “counts.”
Disease of Familiarity
Seeing what you meant to say when
looking at text you wrote rather than
seeing what the words actually say
Working from Back to Front
• The 1st 15 pages vs the final 10
• The abstract vs the proposal
A Grant may not be a Grant
• A grant is your idea, a contract is not--so pay
close attention to what you are contracting to
do
• Different funding agencies have different
requirements
• Foundations often require a very short
proposal
The Biostatistics Dilemma
• A competent statistics methods section can be
essential
• Get input as early as feasible
• Make sure it is easy for you to understand—if
it is not clear to you it is not likely to be clear
to the reviewers
• No review by a statistician is possible
Who Owns the Hurdles
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•
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Various certifications
Division/Department/School reviews
Contract and Grant reviews
Discovering a “new” hurdle at 4:30 pm on the
drop dead date is not good
An old and tired, but useful expression
There are two problems with “grants.” One is
writing and submitting them, the other is
winning the award and then having to do what
you proposed to do.
The Grant Tourist
• After the review and you have been awarded
the funds to do your proposed project, then
you must do the project.