The Difference Between Academic and Grant Writing

Research faculty have generally done plenty of academic writing in their training and careers, but oftentimes they have done less grant writing by the time they're ready to apply for grant proposals. This shift in writing genre can feel like a rude awakening, quite simply because the rules and acceptable styles are different in a grant proposal versus a scholarly publication. Below are some of the ways they are different.

Difference in Purpose
One of the biggest differences between a proposal and a publication is that a publication is usually sharing research that you've already completed. Proposals on the other hand are focused on making a case for the research you want to do. However, proposals do require a discussion of the cutting edge research and gaps in that research similar to what you see in a literature review in a publication. Also, many granting agencies expect PIs to have preliminary data to be competitive for a grant, so PIs must describe work they've already done in making a case for the work they want to do.

Audience
One of the similarities between publications and proposals is that they are generally peer-reviewed. That means, someone like you (a researcher in your field) is asked to weigh in on whether your work should be published or funded. The key difference is that usually your publication is sent to a few reviewers who individually review your publication and send feedback and a recommendation through the journal editor. For a proposal, usually a larger group of peers review your grant proposal and weigh in after discussing it as a group. These larger groups tend to include peers who are further away from your area of expertise. Some agencies even include non-experts on review panels in which case your proposal must be accessible to the layperson

Citations
In publications, oftentimes scholars use citations to justify their inclusion or use a particular theory or framework without a full explanation of that theory/framework, since they assume that the readers will know it or can go research it through the articles they've cited. In a proposal, you cannot rely on citations in the same way. You must instead clearly outline the theory, methods, or framework you are engaging in addition to citing it. Certainly, you cannot expect a grant reviewer to go and do additional research to understand your grant; they've usually been given a whole stack of proposals to review at a time. This is another difference between grant reviewers and journal reviewers. Anytime I've been asked to review a journal article, I am only asked to review one at a time.

Format
Certainly, publications expect you to follow some guidelines and style requirements for your submission for publication, but these guidelines and requirements are usually much larger and more stringent for a grant proposal. The majority of grant proposals submitted are not even reviewed because they did not follow the format rules or the project was not in line with the mission of the agency. So, it's best to read and re-read the grant proposal guidelines and to follow them closely.

In closing, it's true that good writing is good writing, but what makes writing good in most cases is that it is written with the audience in mind.

References:
Why academics have a hard time writing good grant proposals - Robert Porter
Academic vs. Grant Writing - ORDE