Cluster

Career management

Target group

Members of the Doctoral Schools and Ghent University postdoctoral researchers, who are applying for a FWO Postdoc Fellowship (junior or senior) in December 2022.

We strongly encourage that you only apply for this course if you intend to submit an FWO application. Given the limited number of spaces, we may need to reject enrolment applications from PhD candidates who are not preparing FWO applications should that be necessary to guarantee places for those who are.

Objective

To support FWO Postdoc applicants in writing their grant proposal.    

Content

Grant reviewers often say that many excellent projects do not get funded because the idea was not communicated clearly enough. Strong science is not enough for writing a successful proposal: to get funded, you also need excellent persuasion skills. So how do you make sure the advantages of your work are understood and appreciated?

In this workshop, you will learn how to:

1. Interpret correctly the FWO application form and scoring grid in order to respond accurately to the expectations for a competitive research grant.
2. Use strong structure in the key proposal sections: State of the Art, Objectives, and Methodology & Work Plan.
3. Provide clear, convincing answers to the key evaluation criteria of originality, high-risk, methodological ambition, and project impact.
4. Present persuasively your academic record, and convey a strong message about your growing maturity and research independence.

Programme

• Meeting 1: Opening lecture with analysis of the FWO application and evaluation format, and broader discussion of an appropriate writing style when using persuasion in funding applications.
• Meeting 2: Structuring the 10-page scientific proposal – Rationale, Objectives, Methodology sections.
• Meeting 3: The Work Plan component: planning the project and your career trajectory vision, with deliverables, milestones, timeline, mobility, collaborations. Here, we will discuss Horizon Europe’s ‘project implementation’ format and how it influences writing trends in national funding.
• Meeting 4: The candidate’s profile (CV elements) and personal statement.
• Meeting 5 (optional): Q&A and final questions (open to all)

Meetings 2-3-4 include lecture time, group discussion with Q&A, analysis of key statements from open-access funded grants and exercises including brainstorming, opinion polls, quizzes.

Time schedule per Doctoral School

Members of the Doctoral School Life Sciences and Medicine

+ the option to attend the open Q&A and final questions session on Monday 21 November 2022, 14:00-16:30.

Members of the Doctoral School (Bioscience) Engineering

+ the option to attend the open Q&A and final questions session on Monday 21 November 2022, 14:00-16:30.

Members of the Doctoral School Natural Sciences

+ the option to attend the open Q&A and final questions session on Monday 21 November 2022, 14:00-16:30.

Members of the Doctoral School Social and Behavioural Sciences

+ the option to attend the open Q&A and final questions session on Monday 21 November 2022, 14:00-16:30.

Members of the Doctoral School Arts, Humanities and Law

+ the option to attend the open Q&A and final questions session on Monday 21 November 2022, 14:00-16:30.

Venue

Online

Registration procedure per Doctoral Schools

Members of the Doctoral School of Life Sciences and Medicine (September 19-23, am): registration link

Members of the Doctoral School of Life Sciences and Medicine (September 19-23, session 1: am, session 2-5: pm): registration link

Members of the Doctoral School of (Bioscience) Engineering (September 26-30, am): registration link

Members of the Doctoral School of Natural Sciences (September 26-30, session 1: am, session 2-5: pm): registration link

Members of the Doctoral School of Social and Behavioural Sciences (October 3-7, am): registration link

Members of the Doctoral School of Arts, Humanities and Law (October 3-7, session 1: am, session 2-5: pm): registration link

Registration fee

Free of charge for the members of all Doctoral Schools and UGent postdoctoral researchers

The no-show policy applies.

Lecturer

Julia Staykova-McKinnon, PhD (Founder of Scriptorium). 

Format

Blended format and time commitment.

• Self-study: a lecture series available in podcast format; 190 mins listening time and 80 mins extras.
• Live meetings: 4 meetings of 2 hours each, held on Brussels time. Not recorded for future use.

Teaching method and materials

Materials: link to podcast series active for 1 month after the workshop ends; PowerPoint slides for live meetings and podcast lecture series.
Technology: Zoom for conference calls, Scriptorium website for self-study materials

Language

English

Number of participants

Maximum 25 participants per course

Evaluation criteria

Doctoral candidates can add this course to their curriculum after participation in all sessions (including self-study through podcasts).