Understanding Private Funders: A Look at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

As stated on their website, "The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is the nation's largest philanthropy dedicated solely to health" (RWJF). Because of this, the RWJF is certainly worth knowing if you are a health researcher, but even if you are not, it's useful to understand the RWJF to get a sense of how private funding agencies can work similarly and differently than the federal agencies with which we tend to be more familiar.

Understanding the big picture vision of a private agency is vital. Although, it is important to understand the big picture for any agency, private agencies tend to set a a more narrow focus for their funding. For instance, the vision set by RWJF is "Building a Culture of Health," which although they define this culture of health very broadly, they have nailed down four interconnected and measurable action areas:

• Making Health a Shared Value
• Fostering Cross-Sector Collaboration to Improve Well-Being
• Creating Healthier, More Equitable Communities
• Strengthening Integration of Health Services and Systems

Find more details on these action areas in the President's 2015 Message.

Another way that private funders like RWJF can be unique is in the role of their Program Officers (POs). Some smaller foundations do not have POs, and for those that do, the responsibilities and processes of those POs can differ from what we expect from POs at the NIH or the NSF. For instance, the RWJF assigns a PO to each call for proposal and supplies an email address for that PO in the call. PI's are encouraged to email questions to the PO and the PO will offer live webinars at times to allow him/her to answer questions for everyone at once. However, the RWJF does not supply comments or feedback on proposals and the PO does not discuss declined proposals.

The RWJF also tends to be a proactive agency in terms of the connections it makes with researchers in the field. Last week Benjamin Miller, Assistant Professor in Family Medicine and RWJF-funded researcher spoke at ORDE's Know Your Agency Lunch on the RWJF to share his experience.  He talked about how the RWJF reached out to Dr. Miller's colleagues to find out what he was like to work with before contacting him directly and asking him to submit a proposal. Since being funded, the RWJF has served as a partner and a resource for Dr. Miller. This gives us a glimpse into the RWJF's approach and also the vast network they have and use to move their mission and vision forward.

As with any agency, it's important to understand the mission/vision of the agency, their history, and what sorts of projects they've been funding as you work to understand if your research would fit. Use the links below to begin to understand if the RWJF might be a good fit for your research.

Resources:
RWJF Site
ORDE Know Your Agency Brief: RWJF