Grants & funding
Research funding grants provide opportunities for researchers to access additional resources to enable research activity to happen.
Applying for a research grant for the first (or second, third, fourth or even fifth) time can be a daunting experience.
This resource provides some guidance for new and emerging researchers applying for a research grant.
Research grants: the basics
There are different types of research grants available, including internal organisational funding opportunities (for travel, project work, conferences, etc.), research scholarships and fellowships (e.g., for PhDs, and other university-based research), external research funding (e.g., major grants like the NHMRC or MRFF; Western Alliance grants; health insurers, professional associations, peak bodies, philanthropic organisations, charities, foundations, etc.), and others.
Research grants are almost always awarded to researchers through competitive processes, meaning that submissions are judged based on the grant criteria and against other submissions. This is why almost all researchers will experience a grant rejection and also why it is important to be prepared for this.
Grants are awarded to institutions, universities, and organisations to fund projects, and are generally not awarded to specific individuals outside of their organisation.
Grants are key enablers of research and can be used to fund things like:
- research team members’ time to engage in the research activities
- specialist research input (e.g., biostatistics expertise, health economics, etc.)
- reimbursements for participants and consumers research partners
- research resources (e.g., licenses to use validated survey tools)
You can read more about allocating research funds in the budget section
Grant applications are often reviewed by researchers and other people who do not have specific content expertise including lived experience consumers, so it is important to write grants using accessible language that can be understood by people outside of the clinical/content area.
The key objectives of a research grant application are to convince the funders that you have:
- a clearly defined research idea that is important to address, and will have clear and observable outcomes and impacts;
- a solid plan to address your research idea using a rigorous methodology that will enable you to achieve your proposed outcomes and impacts, and
- a feasible, realistic project timeline, detailed budget, and strong research team
Components of a grant application
Typically, funders will specify the template to be used for applications and will be quite prescriptive about the details they require in the application. Funders will generally impose a tight word count, length or number of pages for all applications. It is very important to adhere to these guidelines and limits, as funders may disregard submission that do not adhere.
Different funders will ask for different types of information and levels of details to be included in grant submissions. Generally speaking, researchers will be asked to describe the:
- Research idea and why it is important
- Expected impacts
- Proposed methodology
- Budget
- Timeline for the research activities
- Members of the research team
- Plans to involve consumers in the research and how
When writing a research grant, it is crucial to convince the funder that the research idea addresses an important problem or situation in your local setting and in society more generally. To do this, researchers must describe the research idea and/or aims, with great clarity using plain language.
Researchers must present compelling evidence of the nature and scale of the problem/situation from multiple sources. These sources of evidence may include, but are not limited to:
- Your local setting (e.g., waiting list or service use data, prevalence data, frequency of adverse events, etc.)
- State or national datasets (e.g., Australian Institute for Health and Welfare, National Diabetes Service Scheme, National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System, etc.)
- State or national health reports (e.g., Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety Final Report, National Mental Health Commission, etc.)
- Peer-reviewed literature
- Local government, state or national policy documents
- Data attained through benchmarking with other organisations, or state or national data sets
- Other grey literature (e.g., local government reports, professional association reports, health service reports or audits, etc.)
With respect to the peer-reviewed literature, funders generally do not expect a full and systematic review of the literature, but rather a succinct summary of the recent and/or key literature related to the research topic. Don’t discount international literature. Hint – check out STaRR Literature review and searching for more details related to summarising useful and relevant papers.
Funders may stipulate the referencing convention or may allow researchers to choose their own. In either case, researchers must be sure to use one referencing convention consistently throughout and ensure the reference list is complete and accurate.
Funders want to support research that will have real-world impact. The size of the grant will typically give an indication of the scale of the impact expected. For example, it is generally not expected that a small seed grant (approx. $5,000) will have wide reaching or large-scale impacts. Regardless of the size of the grant, researchers must clearly identify and articulate the anticipated short-term outcomes and how these will influence longer-term impacts.
For example, the short-term outcomes of a research project co-designing a falls prevention program might include increased consumer acceptance and engagement with the falls prevention program. The longer-term impacts might include decreased incidence of falls in the relevant setting, and better quality of life for those who have participated in the program.
Researchers must also convince the funder that they have a solid plan for addressing the research idea using an established, reputable, and referenced methodology. It is important that the proposed methodology is appropriately matched to the research aims and research question, so that these can be addressed through the research.
Researchers may only have a few hundred words or a limited number of pages to describe the proposed methodology, so they must include key details such as the overarching approach (e.g., co-design, quantitative, qualitative, mixed-methods, etc.), any theories or frameworks they will use (e.g., implementation science, sociological theory, evaluation frameworks, co-design methods, etc.), and the data collection and analysis techniques to be used. Using reputable references to support the proposed methodology and methods is important.
Funders may stipulate the referencing convention or may allow researchers to choose their own. In either case, researchers must be sure use one referencing convention consistently throughout and ensure the reference list is complete and accurate.
Developing a budget for a grant can be tricky, especially for less experienced researchers. It is important to include items in the budget that align with the aims of the research and stipulations of the grant funding body.
Generally speaking, research grants cannot be used for health service delivery and general/healthcare equipment and resources. There certainly are exceptions to this, so it is very important to read the guidelines carefully or contact the funders to clarify what the grant funding can be used for.
Typically, research grants are used primarily to fund the research personnel, so that they can undertake the activities of research. For STaRR and the general Western Alliance grants, this is where we see most of the budget allocated to (i.e., backfill for staff/researchers to do the research or to pay a research fellow or assistant).
In the budget, it is important to be specific about the personnel costs and consider the base/hourly rate of the researcher plus any salary increases, on-costs (superannuation, sick leave, payroll costs) and casual loadings. It is advised that emerging researchers get some advice on budgeting for personnel and on-costs from an experienced researcher or their payroll office. Researchers must also reference the relevant staff award on which the salaries are based.
Other direct research costs may include research equipment, participant reimbursements, and travel (including a justification and travel costings).
In-kind costs also need to be included in a research budget. In-kind costs include any non-cash contributions made to the research. These include mentor support, the time dedicated by other research team members, librarian support, biostatistics support (although where extensive biostatistics input it required, this might be included in the cash budget), printing costs, etc. In-kind costs can be difficult to estimate, however capturing these as comprehensively as possible with indicative costs, will make for a stronger and more complete application.
There are may also indirect costs and contributions to consider. These include insurances, administration costs associated with the grant, IT costs and support, research governance (etc.). Indirect costs can be difficult to estimate and if you work for a research institution (e.g., a university), they will often have a pre-defined percentage for indirect costs.
The more detail researchers can provide in the budget, the better the grant reviewer can evaluate the feasibility of the project.
Funders are interested to know the key milestones researchers plan to achieve during the course of the research, and within what sort of timeframe. Some funders will outline or suggest key milestones; however, many will leave this to the discretion of the researchers.
Researchers should consider milestones such as:
- Any co-design or consumer involvement activities
- Ethics and governance approvals (which typically take longer than researchers anticipate, particularly for multisite research projects)
- Data collection commencement and completion
- Data analysis commencement and completion
- Dissemination of research findings (researchers should consider different methods of dissemination throughout the duration of their projects)
- Completion of the research
There may be other milestones relevant to different projects.
Researchers must identify the members of the research team, and their relevant experience and expertise. This speaks to the feasibility aspect of the project, and the key here is to consider the range of skills, experience, and expertise needed to do the research well. Research teams ideally comprise a mix of researchers from different background and perspectives, including, but not limited to:
- different disciplinary (health or research) backgrounds
- consumers/community representatives (for more information on consumer and community engagement in research, check out Monash Partners’ Consumer and Community Involvement resource and Deakin University’s Health Consumers Centre)
- someone in a decision-making position (e.g., a manager or leader who can authorise and/or champion research activity and practice change)
- a member with experience and expertise in the relevant research methodology/methods (e.g., qualitative researchers, mixed methods researcher, survey development, etc.)
- access to a biostatistician (as appropriate)
Depending on the nature of the project, there may be other types of team members, skill sets, and connections required in the team.
Top tips from a grant funder
Grant funders will generally state their criteria and what they are looking for in a strong submission, so read the grant guidelines and eligibility criteria carefully.
Drew Aras, Chief Operating Officer, Western Alliance and experienced grant reviewer/ funder shares his perspectives and top tips for emerging researchers applying for grants.
In summary, Drew’s top research grant writing tips are:
- Get the lay summary of the research idea, or the “elevator pitch” very clear and concise
- Justify the need for the research using local data (e.g., health service or population data) as well as research evidence and benchmarking data (if accessible). This gives the grant reviewer a sense of the scale of the problem
- Ensure the proposed methodology matches with or can address the research aim or research question
- Describe how consumers have and will be involved in the research
- Present a detailed budget so that it is clear what the requested funding will be used for
- Describe the intended impact of the research project accurately, and ensure that the claims of potential impact are feasible and measurable
- Bigger and more complex is not always better; sometimes it is better to propose a neat and achievable research project
- Be realistic about the timeframes. Research in health organisations often takes a lot longer than anticipated
Top tips from a researcher
The best way to build your skills in writing grants is to get writing, however we can also learn a lot from researchers who have written lots of grants and have had some success. Reach out to people in your networks and ask for some advice and even if they can read your draft.
Here, Professor Anna Peeters, Director of the Institute for Health Transformation, Deakin University, shares her top tips for approaching research grant writing.
In summary, Anna’s top research grant writing tips are:
- Make sure you have a clear and compelling research question
- Start writing using dot points outlining the key rationale, gaps, research question, your approach and outcomes, and make sure they all align
- Reach out to a trusted group of colleagues to test the research idea with- either on paper on in a workshop
- At the same time, check that the idea, format, setting and outcomes meet the requirements of the grant opportunity
- Think about the timeframes – is it realistic to get a great grant together or if it would be better off aiming for a future grant round?
- Seek feedback, feedback, feedback at all stages of the grant writing process and from a wide variety of people to make sure non experts can read and understand the application
- Use the assessment criteria and the words that the grant body uses; signpost the reviewers to show clearly how you have addressed each specific criterion
- Make sure your rationale is clear and compelling: why this, why now and why you
- Think about what you will do following the outcome of the grant, even if you are unsuccessful
