Ideas, money, and time: what do they have in common?

By Ksenia Bagrintseva, senior grant writer & ERC expert - GO

Image source: Nichole - stock.adobe.com

What do you think you may need to prepare a grant application?

• Great scientific ideas? Yes.

• Preliminary data? Yes, sure.

• But is there something else quite crucial you need to consider while thinking to apply? Yes! You need time!

If you want to convince evaluators that you must get the grant, you should write it in a way that is clear (i.e. for experts and non-experts) and convincing (i.e. why your project should be funded and not others). And it takes time, sometimes quite a lot of time (various sources report an average of 60-120 hours for 1 application!).

We understand that you might need to apply to multiple grants every year and you do not have up to 3 weeks of full-time writing for each of these applications.

The Grants Office will support you in the application preparation, especially through the grant writing support service. Our Grant Writing team can explain to you the general call requirements but also what evaluators will look for in this specific grant. The team will also provide you with annotated templates and give other useful tips and comments to help you prepare more rapidly a high-quality compelling application. 

Contact us at go-grantwriting@pasteur.fr.