Holiday Storytelling Lessons for Your Grant Writing

Around the holidays, I often find myself recounting family stories for various people at different occasions.  Having a toddler and a new baby, people ask what's new with the kids at holiday office parties, dinners with close friends and family, and old acquaintances you run into at the grocery store.

Especially around this time of year, I try to keep a couple of hilarious toddler stories in my back pocket, but as I regale folks with my story, I notice how the story changes depending on whom I'm telling and when, and have noticed how this also applies to grant writing and marketing one's research in general.

My story:
A few weeks ago, my three-year old, Linus, and I went for a walk around my block.  When we go for a walk, he likes to tell me what he wants to see - these holiday decorations, or the blow up Peyton Manning that our neighbor puts out on Broncos game days. On this particular occasion, Linus told me he wanted to see the "mantis." "The mantis?" I asked, having no clue what he was referring to. He and I went back and forth on it, he, more and more adamantly saying he wanted to see the mantis. Exasperated, I said, "I'm sorry, I don't know what you're saying!" And, Linus very clearly said, "I want to see the praying mantis!"

I could somewhat recall seeing a praying mantis during the summer and pointing it out to Linus and figured that's what he was talking about.  I explained that we probably wouldn't see one during the winter, but that we could keep our eyes open looking for it. Linus seemed somewhat happy with this explanation.

The next week while at the store, I saw a t-shirt with a picture of Peyton Manning on it. "Look Linus," I said, "it's Peyton Manning!" "Yeah," he replied, "It's Praying Mantis!"

What strikes me about this story is how I vary it as I tell it.  When I run into that acquaintance at the grocery store and they ask about the kids, I might say, "They're great! Linus is into the Broncos and calls Peyton Manning "Praying Mantis!" (chuckle) "Take care! Say hi to so and so!"

At extended family dinners, depending on how many glasses of spilled milk there are or how many people are trying to tell their own story, I may or may not tell the whole story. In all likelihood, I'll say something along the lines of - the other day Linus was saying he wanted to see the Praying Mantis and I had no idea what he was talking about until we saw a picture of Peyton Manning at the store and he said, "Look Mom, it's Praying Mantis!" Now, you'll notice that I've changed some details of the story in this iteration to get the idea across more quickly, but still put in a few of the details of the story that I thought were charming. If I'm sitting down for coffee with a good friend, I might decide to tell the whole story, or at least start the story, gauge their interest, and abbreviate the end if I see their eyes start to wander.

This is the balancing act we must manage whether we're telling cute stories around the holidays or we're trying to "sell" our research to potential collaborators or program officers - deciding when and how much to tell. As we initiate telling these research stories, be they written or verbal, we want to be clear and concise, yet we do not want to abbreviate "the story" to the point where it is not engaging. To do this, it's important to identify the clincher - what's the most interesting/exciting part of your research story and how do you hone your story down to include the clincher and give enough context for folks to get the gist?

A helpful exercise is to try narrowing your research story - or your current research project - down to one or two sentences that give enough context and interesting points. Perhaps you can state what you're doing briefly and then make a pun about it or a quick metaphor for your work. This helps you to be memorable. If your listener seems engaged, try giving a bit more detail or give the PO or collaborator a little room to ask a question. If you have different lengths of your story to tell and you pay close attention to how engaged your listener is, you can maneuver initial conversations to your benefit or at least not waste your time and your listener's if they're really not interested.

Hopefully this parallel allows you to better engage stakeholders in your research, but if nothing else, perhaps it will allow you to be the life of the party over the holidays! :)

Aligning Research to a Sponsor

Many faculty researchers, especially those in under-funded disciplines feel that aligning their research and work to funders' expectations is selling out. And, in all fairness, faculty that see external funding in that light won't apply and probably shouldn't. It really takes a perspective that includes funding agencies and potential sponsors in achieving some larger research goals to find grant success. So, in that respect, the PI needs to understand the goals of the sponsor to which they are applying and tailor their research project to allow the sponsor to invest in something that aligns with their priorities, preferred approach, ideology, etc.

This is not to suggest that researchers should throw their own background and agenda out the window to chase the big dollars. This will not work even if they do it, because they will be competing against researchers who do have the background and an agenda that lines up with the granting agency. Reviewers will see through an overly opportunistic PI and always go with the PI whose project and background are a match made in heaven. So, what to do? Developing a fundable project for an agency calls for a balancing act that I try to illuminate in this blog.

Find agencies that fit
As you develop a project idea, start searching for what agencies fund the sort of work you want to do. There are many resources available to you for this.  Faculty at CU Denver and Anschutz Medical Campuses are encouraged to reach out to ORDE to have a personalized fund search conducted for them/their project. Please visit our website to get more information on this service. Other ways to discover potential sponsors are to look at where your colleagues are being funded and which sponsors are funding projects similar to yours.

Also, try to think outside the box.  How can your research become a fit for an agency.  We've seen PIs able to form and re-form their research to appeal to diverse sponsors - NSF, NIH, and private sponsors while still staying on their research career path.

Understand the agency
To be successfully funded by diverse sponsors takes some skill at being able to reframe your work in different ways. However, that's only half of the work. You must also really understand an agency to be able to customize your work for them. Understanding an agency should happen on different levels. Of course, you want to understand the subject matter that a sponsor funds, but beyond that, you want to understand the approach the sponsor prefers (e.g., exploratory or applied), the level of risk and/or innovation the sponsor desires, and any ideologies or political motivations that might drive the sponsor. Does your agency report to congress? Or, what is the back story on how your foundation began?

Develop your project
Once you understand your agency, it's important to meaningfully integrate their needs and priorities into your project.  Agencies and grant reviewers will see through superficial project changes that are tacked on to your project to respond to their interests. So, although you certainly have goals and a path for your research, this stage of aligning calls for you to step back to see how you can integrate sponsor priorities into your work. This may come in the form of new partnerships with colleagues in other disciplines that better connect your research to the sponsor. Or, it might come in the form of re-creating the story of your work to relate it to the agency - again, meaningfully.

Work with your PO
Another important way to gain insight into a funding agency as well as to receive feedback and a partner to help you customize your grant is to work with the agency's program officer (PO). POs generally have great insight into the agency and the grant review process and are interested in having the very best grants submission from you. Generally, you want to have a sense of the project you want to propose before you reach out to a PO. Once you do, send a short email to the PO (make sure the whole message fits in the view window), briefly describe your project (3-5 sentences), and ask to schedule a short phone call with them to discuss. If they don't respond to you within a week, follow-up with a call. Refer to your email and ask to schedule a call (they may not be ready to talk right then and there). When you talk to the PO, have specific questions ready that demonstrate that you are well-versed on the agency (don't let them catch you not having read the program announcement or information readily available on the website). Take careful note of any advice and feedback from the PO and integrate it into your project and ultimately your grant proposal.

Resources
Fund Search and Resources Page - ORDE
What do grant reviewers really want anyway? - Robert Porter, Ph.D.
Can we talk? Contacting Grant Program Officers - Robert Porter, Ph,D.