Tag: biomedical research proposals

NIH Investigator-Based Support Begins!

Just a quick update of note today, which is also a call to action:

Immediately following the joint announcement by Drs. Collins and Rockey yesterday of the NIH’s new investigator-based funding, NIGMS issued an RFI for an investigator-based pilot funding program. (I discussed this new funding model in yesterday’s post.) Similar announcements from NIH centers and programs will follow, and I would encourage all researchers interested in seeing this funding model succeed to take the time to respond to these RFIs. As I explained in yesterday’s blog, the NIH clearly recognizes the challenges being faced by researchers–especially new investigators–in the current funding climate and is working to make changes to improve the environment. The strategic researcher will take the time to learn about–and shape through responding to RFIs–these new opportunities as quickly as possible.

I will re-tweet these opportunities as they become available. My Twitter handle is @JKNByram, and my Twitter feed is available on this blog page, kellybyram.wordpress.com.  You are invited to follow me for timely updates.

More Changes to Funding at NIH to Benefit Researchers

Shrinking pools of research funding, lower success rates, and increasing resource scarcity at research institutions strain most researchers, but new researchers have had a particularly difficult time securing funding of late and many have left the field as a result. The NIH has signaled awareness of these pressures, announcing in April changes to the biosketch form that benefit new researchers and the replacement of the onerous “one resubmission” rule with a more relaxed policy.

Today, Dr. Sally Rockey and Dr. Francis Collins announced that the NIH would allow its centers and programs to offer longer, sustained funding to researchers in the model of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s (HHMI) “people, not projects” funding model. Continue reading “More Changes to Funding at NIH to Benefit Researchers”

Grants Are Business


Those of you who follow my blog have probably noticed a lack of blogging of late–I am finishing my MBA, and there is quite a bit to do in these last weeks of the program. My first graduate degree was in biology, and the final weeks were actually much more relaxing than the months of research and writing that had preceded them. I am currently in a scramble to get things done, and to get done. So I will be brief.

In the MBA theme, I will share the key thesis of my grantsmanship strategy: A grant proposal is a business proposal. Boom. Pretty simple. But I am always amazed by how academicians want to resist the concept that they are, fundamentally, selling an idea and their team’s labor. There is some feeling among academics that the grant proposal is somehow more intellectual, more precious, than a business proposal. I’m here to tell you it is not. Rant, yell, cry, go through the five stages of grief, but at some point arrive to the realization that you are asking for money for your idea and a plan to create the end product . . . which is a business proposal.

Once you come to grips with the realization that a grant proposal is nothing more than a business proposal, you will be liberated and more efficient. At the highest level, if you are a strategic, efficient person, you will research the needs and perspective of the funder and have a much better understanding of the direction your proposal should take. That is, if you are strategic, you will do your research into what the funder is looking for and give it to them. This effect will ripple through all aspects of the development of your project and proposal, and you will produce a more competitive, fundable proposal. Boom.

A Great Resource for Biomedical Research Grant Proposal Writers

As a follow-up to yesterday’s post about the utility of using field-specific models of effective communication when expanding into a new area, I thought I would offer more examples. Yesterday’s example was specific to patient-centered engagement and research, but today I thought I would share the resource I suggest to the biomedical research proposal writers in my training sessions. For these writers, many of whom are research faculty and fellows, the sample applications offered by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) provide a wonderful resource. Continue reading “A Great Resource for Biomedical Research Grant Proposal Writers”