A couple of my research projects are ending, and it’s time to write applications for funding again. This is not something I find especially easy or quickly done. On the contrary it takes me hours, hours and hours. It also takes lots of sighing and thinking “this is just too difficult”.
The main thing with my kind of applied research is to find a project that fits all of the following criteria:
- A project area that the organisations that I collaborate with are interested in working on. This means a lot of meeting to understand what things are on their agenda.
- Something that I want to do, and that the people I write the application together with want to work with. There are many crazy ideas out there related to digitalization 😮
- An research area where I have the competence to do the research in. For me that means for example digital work environments, computer science education or eHealth implementations.
- An area where there is research missing – and where we can fill that hole as in the picture for this blog post. This means quite an extensive literature review to be able to describe the current state of the art and how the research project fits. This also means that you need plenty of time.
- Something that is possible to do within the framing of the call that you send the proposal to. Often the project is three years, and not all things can be done within this time frame
- An idea that fits with the current calls for research projects available. And an understanding of what kind of research they are funding. This is knowledge that I have gained gradually, but I am far from knowledgeable yet.