Demystifying Grant Applications, Lunch & Learn
Disclaimer:
Everything below is a mix of what I observed and heard during the event. The goal isn’t to pinpoint "who exactly said what," but to share (usually) an outsider's view and overall perspective on these industries. I’m not here to act as a definitive firsthand source—readers should do their own research. I hope this inspires you to attend events, explore new industries, and hear what leaders are presenting. These notes combine my observations with thoughts on how things could run smoother and how ideas connect (IMO). I’m not an expert, you know? Just hanging out in the room with them. Enjoy!Topics Covered: Grant Writing, Attention to Details, Applications, Team Building, Business Planning, Getting Investors
Grants are one of the biggest headaches out there. Applying can take so much time, effort and attention to detail. Learn from a seasoned Grant Reader/Approver to learn excellent strategies to apply for a grant with success.
Initial Conference Thoughts - Why Attend? Too many times I’ve heard people say, “don’t even bother applying for grants!”. Less often I hear, “there is legit so much grant money out there, just apply.” And once I heard, “just have Ai write the grant for you, it will save you so much time, use it to help you.” I figured all of that advice combined with some more first-hand knowledge, maybe I CAN apply for a grant one day. For now, I just want to keep figuring out the basics.
Conference Overall Ratings: Venue (5/5) - Food (0/5) - Speaker Content (5/5) - Networking Opportunity (0/5) - Likeliness to Return (4/5) —- more details below
Photo Collage & Commentary
Notes from Conference—
"“Most of what we talk about has a short shelf life, whether it’s dollars available or such.”
And why I’m attending this is to learn general things about grant writing. I know almost nothing, but I’ve been told ‘these days, Ai can do it’. I’ve been told it’s exhausting and takes 100 years to do, but now Ai is making it possible. I’ve also heard to “make sure every question is answered”. This this event + what I know + Ai… maybe I will get closer to applying for a grant in the future if needed.
This workshop specifically focused on NIH Phase 1 Applications for SBIR and STTR Funds.whatever that means… let’s find out together! (and everyone can use a workshop about applying for grants, that’s useful info!)
Agenda:
- Purpose and goals of these funding mechanisms
It helps to know about what agnecies are thinking about when placing these awards.
They want to meet R&D needs and they will give extra credit if you meet certain things (if you’re employing underserved, women, etc)
they want to make sure big organizations aren’t continuously getting pots of money.
30% of awards have not received the money ever before. It’s a regular course of new companies getting awards.
70% repeats…
People who have submitted applications are sometimes getting the company started.
The first real dollars (other than $1000 from the founders) came in the form of their first SBIR award.
It is not uncommon for these to be the first dollars in.
The agencies fund these (11 agencies)
Department of Defense funds everything you could ever possibly imagine.
What do the grants overall fund? As broad as you could possibly imagine.
207,794 awards made since 1982.
The range of the topics funded is broad. Geophysical systems for fluid flow, iso geometric analysis, social platform…
PHASES
PHASE 1: around $314,000 in funding.
PHASE 2: 1-3 years and expands on the ‘Phase 1’ results. Prototype development, field testing, clinical work demonstrating safety/efficacy - generally only available to phase 1 awardee normally up to ~$2.09MM for up to 3 years.
PHASE 3: The innovation meets… (he moved on, I didn’t get it recorded - but he said he’ll email it all… okay, lemme rethink how i’m taking notes. more “listen/rewrite, less copy exactly”)
SBIR vs STTR:
STTR = technology transfer, transfer with technology —-
he said this is like when companies use new innovations found in universities.
i’m like “WOW/what!?” haha - you can discover stuff in university then companies use this to innovate. hahah - that’s why universities exist…. 🙄 to take the ideas of students?! haha. geeze.
at least 30% must be performed by a single research institution
at least 40% of R&D must be performed by the small business (30% is left over, it can go to a multitude of other partners or players). No more than 60% can be sub awarded.
SBIR: Intellectual property created is owned by the small business. PI must be primarily employed at the SB. You can be working at least 50% of your time on this, so you don’t need to quit your day job till you get the funding, you don’t need to be doing this full time.
Applicant Organizations:
Sole propriator, c-corp, s-corl, llc
Recommend people applying to form an entity (instead of a sole proprietorship) - for the reviewers and registration it feels more real
Having the corporate entity setup makes things much more simple as well
For a sub award, you can sub-out to independent contractors and consultants as well.
only for-profit small businesses can apply (an STTR) , you are the applicant (fewer than 500 people). Then you bring the university/help with you.
All work must be done in the USA.
Must be primarily US owned, greater than 50% by US Citizens or permanent resident aliens or owned by another small business that is greater than 50% US owned.
If the small business is venture backed, that can be problematic if it is more than 50% venture owned.
He confesses that there is some heartburn around investing in people who hire from mainland China and Russia.
Expenses
What’s allowed?? Expenses for indirect and indirect costs? there are rules.
but the profit you make doesn’t need any justification
Prepare the Proposal:
You’ll want to make a schedule
It takes more time than you anticipate.
Start at the end and work backwards.
If you haven’t completed company registrations, do that the moment we finish up this webinar. Soon.
if you run into hiccups along the way, It can be gutwrentching in the last minutes
You want a team no one can say “no to”
Evaluation Criteria
People get hung up on how to show their “innovative” work. The way I think about this typically, is, lay the ground work for how ‘state of the art’ the technology is that you’re developing. Show what’s going on already, and then show what your approach is.
compare and contrast yours to what is the state of the art and show what’s going on.
talk about how the world is going to be different when your technology hits the market
that gets them ready to see how your world will be transformative state-of-the work technology…
you can be specific saying, “this work is innovative because”. It’s good to do and call out, saying “this team is ideally suited, because”.
Anything you can do to check boxes on the evaluation criteria is going to help you out here.
“Is this an incremental improvement or a new approach?”
depending on the agencies, they have different reactions to that answer.
some love the crazy, over-the-horizons kind of sciece
Others don’t need that over-the-horizon kind of technology but it will be something that effects massive systems in problems that haven’t been able to be addressed yet.
YOUR TEAM AND RESOURCES
What do you need to do all the work you outlined in your technical proposal?
Think of this like a terrarium or sealed room… in your 6 page phase 1 proposal for technical application.
If they read that and your bio sketches of your key personal, they’re going to ask themselves": CAN THIS TEAM WITH THESE RESOURCES DO THE WORK THAT’S OUTLINED IN THIS SIX PAGE OUTLINE?
if the answer is yes: and everyone is well outlined you’re going to get a good score
if the answer is no: they’re not really sure these peopel live up to what needs
Your biosketches need to be written specifically tailored for this application. So it looks like this is what they’re doing and this is what they’re dedicated to do.
This is laying out exactly what’s available to us.
You’re painting a picture with these various grant components so everything pieces together in a complete story.
When building a team: you don’t need to know everything and you don’t need to build the PI
you can be backed with key personelle.
If you’ve never been the recipient of the grant, bringing someone onboard for not even a ton of time, maybe once a month for an hour… it isn’t a bad idea either.
Being a first time receiver is looked upon positively, but not if you don’t fill in all the gaps.
General guidance for grantsmanship (from a reviewer with experience helping national institutes of health and veteran affairs)
Make sure everything is tailored for the application you’re putting in
Obvious to reviewers when things are not SPECIIFC
Even from VERY prestigious institutions… the bio sketches of rate team are generic. It comes off as a little bit lazy and not that focused on the details.
Once you’ve looked at 8-10 applications as a part of a study section, the ones that have paid attention to those bits of detail become really obvious.
PANEL
usually business experience, not always experts in the industry
semi-patient advocacy kind of things sometimes
experts in the industry
EVALUATION CRITERIA COMMERCIALIZATION AND SIGNIFICANCE
Is the problem important and critical to progress in the filed?
Are patient’s lives or systemic inequities, these things that are problematic now, will they be resolved by this?
Quantification is going to be helpful. The more you can quantify that, the better off you’re going to be.
Also, letters from customers - maybe a well established company, donation, knowable person… saying things like, “if this thing is developed as described, I would be interested in distributing/purchasing/prescribing/promoting this”
It has to be from a well respected source of what you’re doing.
BUDGETING BASICS FOR CONSULTANT RATES
You need to describe how it is and why it is you came up with the number you came up with.
If they are a famous consulting company and they have a large list of clients they’ve worked with, list this. Justify how/why their expense is high.
This sounds like…. monopoly.
A highy regarded PI is given a token role and token percentage effort. Multiple variables are in-play but the overarching guidance is the effort shoudl not like “window dressing” and you’re not overreaching.
The profit (this might be one of the most important things I say): you’re allowed to ask for up to 7% of profit.
that 7% is infinantely flexible. You can use that to pay for your IP, to hire a grant writer to help you write a grant, bonus your employees, spend it on direct and indirect costs you didn’t account for.
Your direct costs can never be reallocated to profits. Your indirect costs can never be reallocated to profits - but you’re allowed to move some money from one line to another without permission… but as a general rule, if it’s in indirect it’s not going to go profit…. the profit can flow any direction you want it to flow. It’s absolutely worth doing.
Budget Justification: a section you’re allowed to use as much space as you’d like. Don’t worry about being economical with words. If it’s not well justified…. I like to have a robust description of what it is I’m asking for, why I’m asking for it, and how I came up with these numbers.
If the reviewer or program person at the NIH or agency doesn’t really understand how they came up with it, if there’s any confusion, they will cut the award amount.
I’ve seen more than I’d like to think about where the award amount came back for less than was asked for because it wasn’t described well, it was confusing in the budget justification. You almost never can get that money back unless you can show it was an agency error
Having a clear robust explanation is worth it here.
There are many resources available in many formats about how to apply to these applications. Just go searching! :)
‘Human Subject Research’ - if your research involves humans in any way, that involves another conversation we’re not going to have here
if you have tests on animals and humans, often grants want to help with this if it falls in line with their interests
what is he talking about?? I guess that’s the ‘specialty’ of this grant application omg hahah ahh.
remember to check “we are giving proprioritory information in the application” so that you can redact anything you feel you want to redact
after years of doing this, only one ever fell under a freedom of information request
If there’s a section where you’re disclosing prioporitory information you want to put it in the areas where you’re truly digging into things that you dont want to have published or released . Check the box and note it in the application.
Okay, I have another thing I need to get to… this next part they’re going line-by-line through the different boxes and talking about niche things (like guidelines for working and researching on humans and animals!!!)
hahaha. That’s what happens when you join a niche event. But, doesn’t mean you gotta stay the whole time. Life is happening!!! (and now i’m on my way to the doctor :D - health is wealth, baby!!)
Conference “Overall Rating” Further Elaboration:
VENUE - 2.5/5
Allow Me to Elaborate: The only reason I mark this down is cause it wasn’t like “stand out” haha - like a stand out zoom room. What does that mean? I guess you know it when you see it. But this was a great event and interesting to see. and then my house, where I attended, is good too! I approve haha.
FOOD - 0/5
Allow me to Elaborate: Uh oh. I didn’t even make myself a tea for this!
SPEAKER CONTENT - 5/5
Allow me to Elaborate: He was super interesting and full of information. If it had been on a topic I work more in the field in, I probably would have found it EVEN MORE useful and interesting, but my basic understanding was enough to get plenty of value out of his words.
NETWORKING OPPORTUNITIES - 2/5
Room for Improvement: Actually, I bet a few people met from this event. The chatbot was so active. But networking wasn’t the goal. Cool for me!
LIKELINESS TO RETURN - 4/5
Room for Improvement: Was great! But idk if this is my sector -hahaha. But i’ll keep an eye out.
Kelly’s Remaining Questions:
Uhhh, so, what kind of “grants for research on humans/animals” are trending now? What is the most money going towards?
70% of grants are to repeat customers, I’d like to know even more details on that.
What is the average amount of a grant?
What are alternatives to grants?
Do we have any data that grants work? Could there be a “better” way for this that people are well aware of, or does this system work?
What are some of the strongest unbiased praises and attacks at grants, if you were to be honest about it all?
Until next time, I wish you the motivation and success to search for opportunities around your area. Search and explore: Who is out there giving talks? There are new things happening all of the time.
Find relatable or interesting topics you like and check them out! Maybe even something hosted at a cool venue, if there’s no other reason to go. Let’s see what you can learn and discover not too far from home. 😊
