Strategic Research Planning in 2021 and Beyond

Unless you were living on another planet, 2020 probably threw you for a loop in terms of everything including your research. And, of course, we're not out of the proverbial woods yet, but it is important to reflect on your work from 2020, conduct a bit of a SWOT analysis, and begin planning for 2021. So, below I offer a map for research planning for 2021 and beyond!

SWOT your research

A SWOT analysis refers to an assessment of your Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. It is frequently used in organizations as they work to develop or revise their strategic plan, but there is no reason that we shouldn't also use it as researchers. So on a whiteboard or on your computer, create a list for each SWOT category. Consider your body of work now. What are the strengths of your research? What niche are you filling? What's unique about your research that contributes to its strength? Next, consider weaknesses. Are there holes in your research? Are there concerns about your approach or methods? After you've assessed your research, it's time to assess the landscape. Begin with opportunities. Although the pandemic is likely going to fall into your threats category, perhaps it has offered some opportunities. Is there a way that you can pivot some of your research goals to respond to the questions and calls for research we've seen during the pandemic? Lastly, consider threats to your research agenda. Certainly 2020 manifested many threats to most folks' research, but certainly moving forward, what are other threats to your research, including and beyond the pandemic.

Revisit your long-term goal

After assessing your research and the landscape, it's time to re-focus on your long-term research goal. If you haven't already, identify your ultimate research goal. What do you want to have accomplished in 5-10 years? What do you, as a researcher, want to be known for? This long-term goal setting or refocusing will help you to keep your planning and work in line and keep you from spinning your wheels or moving into unproductive tangents.

Create an annual plan

Once you've set your sights further into the future, it's time to focus on the now and the near future. Take your long-term goal and benchmark what needs to happen yearly to get you there. This will bring you down to what you need to accomplish in 2021 to stay on track. Once you have your annual goal, you can repeat the process to identify things like what projects do you need to complete? Which do you need to start? Which publications need to be submitted or revised? And, what grants do you need to apply for to keep the wheels turning on your research? As you answer these questions, you'll be able to map out a timeline that will serve as the skeleton for your annual plan. 

Consider your day-to-day

You've re-affirmed your goals and you know where you're going! As we are in the season of new year's resolutions and re-committing to good habits, consider your work habits. Identify when you are going to write. You might need to block time on your calendar, make a commitment to "touch" your work daily, or leave yourself bread crumbs in your writing so that it's easier to pick up where you left off. These daily practices and micro-goals can allow you to maintain your research productivity.

Take a break and give yourself grace

Lastly, 2020 has been difficult, and although we're optimistic about 2021, there are still more hard times ahead. Burnout is a real threat to researchers, especially right now, so as you are planning for the year ahead, be sure to include selfcare in that plan. And, when things don't go as you hoped, take a break and give yourself the grace and space you need before coming back around and forging ahead.

Resources:

The Nine Best Articles on Productivity in Research

30 Tips for Successful Academic Research and Writing

The Gift of Active Voice

As we enter the holiday break, I am feebly searching to make connections between the season and grant development. This week, I wanted to return to a grant writing pitfall that is one of the most common - using the passive voice. And, offer you the gift of an active voice. :)

Many PIs have been trained to do their writing in the passive, third-person voice rather than the active, first-person voice. As a quick reminder, here's the difference:

Passive, third-person: The research will be conducted by the research team.

Active, first-person: We will conduct the research.

Researchers are often taught to use the passive, third-person in both their manuscripts and grant proposals because it sounds more objective. It's not that you think something is happening, it's that a thought has been considered, like the thought is derived from the ether.

Writing in the active, first-person in your grant proposals is a better choice for a couple of reasons: it is easier to read and it cuts out extra words.

Now, I don't mean to pick on anybody. I recently got a review on a manuscript that critiqued my abrupt switch to the third person in discussing my methods. I reported my interview protocol in first-person, active voice and then stated, "the interviews were transcribed." Because I didn't transcribe the interviews myself, I just removed the subject from the sentence.

It is true that most proposals I review are not completely in passive voice. They often start off in active, first-person voice and then slip into passive a couple paragraphs in and proceed to move back and forth between the two. So, when I am giving feedback, I'm often on a hunt to find those little slips into the passive. Below, are some of the clues that usually make those passive slips stand out.

• will be collected
• can be assessed
• was determined
• It is plausible that
• It has previously been shown
• less is known

These phrases tend to be in passive and third-person sentences. To correct them, you'll generally switch the order of the object and subject of the sentence from their inverted position and identify the subject if it's been removed. Here's an example.

Passive, third-person: The samples will be collected by the team. Or The samples will be collected.

In this first sentence, "samples" are the object and "team" is the subject. In the second, the subject is missing altogether. To correct this, revise to the following.

Active, first-person: We will collect the samples.

Again, we identify the subject, "we" and we flip the subject and object so that we begin with the subject.

By looking out and correcting these slips in your grant writing, you'll find yourself writing a proposal that is much easier to read and your reviewers will thank you for it - it's a gift after all!

Resources:

Use the Active Voice - the University of Wisconsin Writing Center

How to Effectively Use Active and Passive Voice in Research Writing - editage insights

Diversifying Your Funding Portfolio

Yesterday, our Vice Chancellor for Research, Dr. Tom Flaig, gave our "state of the research" talk and in it showed how researchers at our Anschutz Medical Campus were largely funded by federal sources. It's great to see how successful our researcher are at agencies like the NIH, but it's still a good idea to diversify your funding sources. This can allow you new opportunities to find funding for projects you have brewing that aren't a good fit for the usual suspects.

Private foundations can be a good funding source to consider. However, the first challenge researchers face in considering private foundations, especially if you're used to going after R01s at NIH, is setting your sights quite a bit lower in terms of dollar amount.

Besides smaller funds, private foundation generally have the following attributes:

• They are unique and differentiated from one another in terms of mission, approach, cause, etc.
• They do not want to fund projects that are fund-able by federal or other public sources
• They want to fund projects that are innovative or even risky
• They want to fund projects that will further their specific cause
• They are sometimes a good place to find seed funding (when they see themselves as partners with government or institutional funders)

Susan M. Fitzpatrick and M. Bren Dolezalick expand on these attributes in their book chapter: Diversifying Your Portfolio: The Role of Private Funders in Writing Successful Grant Proposals: From the Top Down and Bottom Up.

In his book, The "How To" Grant Manual, David G. Bauer differentiates private foundations into four basic types:

National General Purpose: These organizations fund projects across the nation and are looking for research that will have an impact on a broad scale.  An example would be the Rockefeller Foundation.

Special Purpose: These define the scope of research they will fund much more narrowly and generally focus on one target area. An example would be the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (focused on American Health Care).

Community: These foundations focus on issues or areas of focus that are important to a particular region or community.  An example would be The Denver Foundation.

Family: These foundations are often created as memorials by a family and the projects they fund must be in line with the family's goals and ideologies.

Clearly, you want to understand the type of foundation that will be a good fit for your research based on the foundation's goals and your own.  But, private funding can serve as a good source for supplementary funding or initial funding as a seed grant.

For CU faculty, oftentimes you need to work with the Office of Advancement or through the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research when pursuing private foundation grants so that the university communications are coordinated and consistent, so be sure to check on the appropriate processes when pursuing a private foundation grant.

Resources:
Diversifying Your Portfolio: The Role of Private Funders
What is a private foundation?

Notes from "Writing a Successful Science Proposal"

 As some of you may know, this semester ORDE hosted its first virtual book club. We read the book "Writing Successful Science Proposals" by Andrew Friedland, Carol Folt, and Jennifer Mercer. Yesterday, we held our book club meeting and highlighted strategies from the book and from our own experiences, which I outline below.

What to include in the Specific Aims/Project Overview

The Specific Aims/Project Overview is the most important component of your proposal. Given this, you should focus on offering an overview of your project, as well as making a case for why this project is so important. One PI recommended including the "who, what, when, where, why, and how" in your Specific Aims. It's important to give your reviewers a clear understanding of your project as well as why it's needed right at the get-go. Another tip is to make sure you end your Specific Aims/Project Overview with the vision of your research. Where are you going from here? What's the ultimate goal of your research trajectory? This helps your reviewer get excited about the possibilities of your research.

Taking a Reviewer Perspective

When writing your grant proposal, it is crucial to consider your reviewer. Remembering that reviewers look at many proposals at once, anything you do that might frustrate them can really sink your chances for funding. Our group agreed that, because of this, it's important to make your proposal easy to read - leave space between paragraphs and include a conceptual diagram and other visuals that can quickly communicate what you're doing. Also, as we discussed, some reviewers still print out proposals before reviewing them, while others review them completely online. Make sure that your final proposal is proofed and is easy to read in different forms. Also, consider ability when putting your proposal together, remembering that some people can't see color. Some people who are sighted still have difficulty seeing really small text that might be in your figures.

Discussing authorship early for research teams

As more and more researchers are participating in team research, strategies for collaboration and considering team dynamics are significant. Our group talked extensively about the importance of discussing and agreeing to authorship and order of authors at the start of a team's work together. Even as you begin working together to develop a project and grant proposal, discuss how many publications you anticipate and who will do what work on those, and who will be first, last, or in other author positions. This can help prevent confusion, frustration, and conflict down the line.

Overall, our group found the book to be a valuable resource for grant development, particularly for early career investigators. Stay tuned for ORDE's Spring 2021 Book Club!

Resources:

ORDE Book Club Meeting Video

"Writing Successful Science Proposals"

Demonstrating Grant Stewardship

 As we get close to Thanksgiving, I think about stewardship, particularly as it relates to both gratitude and giving. Stewardship plays a significant role in grant development in a couple of ways. It is important to be a good steward of any grants you receive, but it's also important to demonstrate to your reviewers that you will be a good steward, as I discuss below.

Stewarding Your Grant

When you receive a grant, you receive with it a load of responsibility. I've heard some PIs joke that when they receive a grant, they're temporarily elated, but then filled with dread when they realize they now need to do the project. But, it's true, once you get the grant, it's time to do what you said you would do. One of your commitments is to share project reports with your Program Officer (PO), and to stay in communication with them. POs express frustration over needing to track down reports from PIs, and that's understandable. Timely communications and reports for POs are a key responsibility and how PIs show they are good stewards of their grants. But, additionally, POs remember how good of a steward you were with your grant. If you've been lackluster, this may affect your success in attaining future grants from that same agency. 

Demonstrating Stewardship in Your Proposal

Certainly, there's no way of proving that you'll get reports to your PO in on time before you receive your grant, but it is important to show that you will be a good steward of a grant, should you be awarded. There are a couple of ways to do this. One is to include a lean and judicious budget in your proposal. Make sure that the funds you're asking for are truly necessary to execute your project. Also, make sure that you know what things will cost and that you're not padding your budget. Reviewers are researchers themselves, and they know how much things cost. So, if they catch you inflating your budget, it will likely call into question how good a steward you will be. Another place to demonstrate stewardship in your proposal is in your timeline. Show your reviewers when you will do things and how you will benchmark success as you move through the project. Layout your plan clearly so that your reviewers can have confidence that your project will get done well.

In closing, I adapt the old adage to remind you that with grant funding comes great responsibility. Be a good steward with your grants and prove to reviewers that you will continue to be. Have a restful fall break.

Resources:

Stewardship - An Important Grantsmanship Component - Lynn DeLearie
8 Great Ways to Thank a Funder - grants edge

The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH)

The NEH is a unique grant-making agency that is often overlooked by researchers. In efforts to build awareness and understanding around the NEH, ORDE has created a website dedicated to just this.

Below, we offer some background on the NEH, but we encourage you to check out our site and of course the NEH's site to learn more!

NEH Overview

In 1963, three organizations - the American Council of Learned Societies, the Council of Graduate Schools in America, and the United Chapters of Phi Beta Kappa - established the National Commission on the Humanities. This Commission was charged with conducting "a study of the state of the humanities in America", and it released its final report in 1964 outlining the imbalance of science versus the humanities throughout all levels of the American educational system. Its recommendation was creation of a federal National Humanities Foundation to act as a cultural mediator to the nation's growing dependence on, and investment in, science and technology. The federal government adopted the Commission’s recommendation, creating the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) as an independent federal agency in 1965. (NEH History website). 

Specific Interests 

Promoting excellence in the humanities and making lessons offered through humanities disciplines accessible to the American people are major goals of NEH. To reach these goals, NEH supports research, public programming, access, and educational outreach projects designed to ensure the humanities are relevant to Americans and our dialogue on democracy. 

Agency Organization

NEH is headed by a Chairman who is advised by the 26- member National Council on the Humanities. The Chairman and Council members are appointed by the President of the United States and confirmed by the US Senate. All Council members are humanities experts and most are drawn from academia. NEH has seven program divisions and offices that provide competitive funding through 39 funding programs. Divisions and programs supporting University researchers are the: 

• Division of Research Programs 
• Division of Preservation and Access Programs 
• Division of Education Programs 
• Division of Public Programs Office of Digital Humanities

Each Division sponsors a variety of funding programs to meet their mission.

Resources: 

ORDE NEH Site

NEH Know Your Agency Brief - ORDE

NEH Site

PCORI

This week, we offered a Know Your Agency e-Seminar on the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) and released a brief on PCORI. Below is more info on PCORI, but if your research is a fit, it's a great time to consider applying to PCORI given that they were recently reauthorized by Congress and will be going strong for the near future!

OVERVIEW

PCORI was created as part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and signed into law by President Obama in 2010. The agency was recently reauthorized by Congress for an additional 10 years. PCORI is charged with providing a better understanding of prevention, diagnosis, and treatment options for patients, their caregivers, health care providers, and other stakeholders. This charge is met through 1) research, 2) an emphasis on research methodology and 3) efforts to encourage other funding agencies to incorporate patient-centered research methods. PCORI is supported through the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Trust Fund, combining federal and fee-based revenue for agency operation.

Specific Interests

Patient-centered is not just in this agency’s name, it drives their every action. Patients and caregivers are involved in every step of the research process and PCORI has become an expert on proper engagement tactics, all with the goal of influencing healthcare for the betterment of patients. PCORI’s National Research Priorities are:

1.       Assessment of Prevention, Diagnosis, and Treatment Options

2.       Improving Healthcare Systems

3.       Communication/Dissemination Research

4.       Addressing Disparities

5.       Accelerating Patient-Centered Outcomes Research and Methodological Research

6.       Strategies for Improving Maternal Mortality*

7.       Improving Health for Individuals with Intellectual and/or Developmental Disabilities*

*Note the last two priorities were added in the 2019 Reauthorization legislation (Executive Director’s Blog, 9/8/20).

AGENCY ORGANIZATION

PCORI is a 501(c)(1) corporation, not a federal agency. It is governed by a 21-member Board of Governors, drawn from academia, the health care industry, corporations outside of health care and non-profits, as well as the Directors of the National Institutes of Health and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. PCORI’s Methodology  Committee’s role is to identify best practice patient-centered research methods and to ensure these methods are employed in all research supported by PCORI. Committee members are experts in science, medicine, epidemiology, health care technology and the health care industry. Both the Board and the Committee are appointed by the US Comptroller General. 

PCORI is unique, particularly in the way that they truly focus on and indeed center patients in the healthcare research they fund. We encourage you to check out the resources below to see if PCORI might be a good funding opportunity for you!

Resources:

PCORI Brief - ORDE

PCORI e-Seminar - ORDE

PCORI Site