How did the BMS Grant Writing Club originate?
Knight: ‘It’s been a while since we started thinking about it. It started with an informal conversation I had with our dean Tanya Bondarouk. It’s based on a club-type idea; basically a group of people who support one another. I was familiar with a similar kind of initiative for writing research papers, with people coming together and giving each other feedback. You could do the same for writing grant proposals.’
Who is involved?
‘The coordinating team consists of Adam Henschke, Le Anh Long, Shenja van der Graaf, Sofia Mutlu, Shaunie Schutten and myself. Since we started, we have about 25 colleagues who are interested and attending the sessions we host. It’s not only colleagues from BMS, by the way. A few people from other faculties also decided to join.’
What does the Grant Writing Club offer?
‘There is a lot already going on at a university-wide level. The Strategic Business Development department has a grants office for a reason. We do not want to duplicate that. This is mainly a kind of sounding board that brings people together, to give and receive feedback. It’s a cohort of people who regularly come together, showing collegiality and mutual support in finding the right grants. You do have to consider that each person has their own trajectory. One could be applying for a bigger personal grant like a Vidi, another is an early-career academic trying to get a foot in the door, while another could be working on building a consortium.’
In practice, what does that look like?
‘We try to have a meeting every week, which includes a short presentation and discussion. That can be about a bunch of different topics. The last time, we had a Q&A session about project finance. For example, we discussed the challenge of negotiating a fair share of the budget in a European project when pay scales vary so much by country. If the budget is to be split ‘equally’ between partners, is that in terms of number of personnel or finance? Those are important details that can be overlooked, but you have to understand the implications.’
‘Besides the weekly meetings, we also host so-called ‘shut up and write’ days. That was something we borrowed from professor Maaike Endedijk’s team and it literally means what the name implies: you write your grant proposals with as less distraction as possible.’
How has this concept been received so far?
‘Positively, though it is a challenge to get enthusiasts in the same room at the same time. Everyone is overwhelmingly busy. Also from an ethical point of view, we don’t want to cram our sessions in the lunch breaks for instance. We typically have about six people coming to each session, so that’s a good number. We try to schedule the sessions as fluid and flexible as possible.’
Is there any golden rule to writing a successful grant proposal?
‘Don’t give up. I think that sums it up quite well. The success rate is usually terribly low and the competition is quite severe. Once a promising fund opens up, you see that everyone jumps on it. We hope our club can help in getting feedback, sharing ideas and experiences and help researchers determine their own strategy.’
Could a similar kind of club also be beneficial for other faculties? Considering the UT’s financial challenges, there is a need for more research funding…
‘If another faculty want to start a similar initiative, that would be good! If more people want to join our grant writing club, they are more than welcome. It could even be organised on a department level. I believe it is quite important to not have too big of a crowd during your gatherings. Sometimes, people tend to share some quite vulnerable experiences. It’s much easier to do that if you have about eight peers to talk to, not eighty. We’re also still trying to find a good formula as we’re moving forward.’
When would you consider this initiative to be a success?
‘That depends on the question how you would recognise a successful group. We decided to not quantify it too much. It would be hard to determine cause and effect anyway. If attendees are able to write more grant applications they are happy with and feel there is more practical support, that’s already a sign of success, I’d say.’
