Natalia 00:09 Hello, everyone, this is yet another episode of Career Talks by Welcome Solutions. And in these meetings, we talk with professionals with interesting career paths, who can teach us a little bit about how to find yourself a cool job on the basis of their own story. Grant Advisory, how cool can that be? We all have something to do with grant writing as academics we had the chance to, at least once during our careers, write a personal grant proposal. Most of us don’t really enjoy the process. 

Natalia 00:45 However, as it turns out, Grant Advisory can be a career path. But is it hot or not? Can it be an interesting job that gives a lot of career opportunities? Well, let’s find out.

Natalia 01:22 [00:57 – audio is missing]

Natalia 01:46 Thank you so much, Irina, for joining us today. Thank you for accepting our invitation. We will be most happy to hear your story from your own perspective.

Irina 01:54 Thank you for inviting me here, Natalia. And I hope that my story can be interesting for some of you, who’s now currently looking where to go; how to proceed after their PhDs. I did my PhD in Nijmegen in the Netherlands. And I came there from Moscow where I grew up and studied biology. Shortly after my master’s, I moved.

Irina 02:21 And my first position was as a research assistant at the Max Planck Institute for psycholinguistics within the neurobiology language group, and year later, I started PhD. We looked at the semantic memory; and how do we recognize objects, and how do we integrate different multi-sensory signals in order to create a coherent representation of an object in the brain.

Irina 02:52 And the practical side of that project was to see if we can decode representations from brain signals from EEG and fMRI. And this project was really interesting, I spent 4 years with it. And it was back 10 years ago, when the study of decoding the brain just started, so that was really exciting. And we got some nice papers published.

Irina 03:17 And after that, I stayed for 5 more years at the Donders Institute. I did a postdoc there; it was a long postdoc contract; also, with some administrative parole. I coordinated a work package of a big funded project. After those 5 years of postdoc, I physically moved out from Nijmegen. And I also was not sure anymore of what I wanted to do. And I guess that’s why I’m here.

Irina 03:54 Because I think when you look at the career path of other people, especially on platforms like LinkedIn, or you know, when you just look into someone’s CV. It often looks very smooth, and impressive. But I think in fact, all of us go through these moments of some of uncertainty in that and where we have to make choices; especially if you are not from Europe.

Irina 04:27 If your work choice is also linked to your choice where to live, and whether you will have residence permit, and all those very practical considerations, especially if you also have family to look after. Yeah, that can be very tough. And I think that was my first message that this is okay, that I think everyone has those moments and it’s just fine.

Irina 04:54 It’s very good if you have a possibility to take some time and really think very well what you want to do next. For me, that also coincided with the fact that I started to teach yoga. I did yoga teacher training, and I first did it as a hobby, I started to teach for a small group of students at the Donders Institute. For a while, I gave classes at the Radboud student’s church, for it was just a donation-based classes and all the revenue went to a charity.

Irina 05:34 I really enjoyed that time of life; then I also gave classes in a studio. Slowly it started to grow. And I realized that I want to keep that, so I really want that to become part of my life. I also enjoy the people, friendships, you know. This completely different world of yoga students, yoga teachers, it’s very different from the research world. And I liked it.

Irina 06:04 My intention was to keep that as part of my professional life as well. And I also started to explore how to link this with research. I talked to people who did research on mindfulness meditation. I attended several conferences, did some courses on the neurobiology of meditation and contemplative science. And I discovered also that it is a very interesting research field. But I also realized that it’s not, … I don’t want to do research in this field, it’s just I really don’t want to do research anymore myself.

Irina 06:44 It was not easy to accept that I just don’t want to be a researcher anymore. And I don’t want to follow this standard academic path, you know, to fight for a senior position and do all these things that we have to do if we want to stay in research. And it took me some time to accept it, and to come to terms with this realization. However, I also realized that I do want to stay in the research world, in academic world, after several months of doing of, you know, being a yoga teacher. I realized that I do want to have that connection.

Irina 07:25 And then, it came down to sitting down and writing up what I want to do; what I actually like, what I don’t like to do, what I can do what I can do well. And with this, having the structure really helped me to make a step forward. And that step was looking for a position in the grant advisory world; in the research support world. And soon after I got the job, the Vrije University in Amsterdam, which was really nice.

Irina 08:06 I was a part of the grant office there with a few more people. We were responsible for helping researchers within the university to obtain funding. And that means informing researchers about funding possibilities, helping them to navigate this world, reviewing grant proposals, organizing workshops, and informational events for researchers. That kind of work.

Irina 08:36 And I think today, I want to talk a little bit more about the world of research support and grant advice. Because I think for many people, many people don’t know about it that it exists. And this world is very big, and it can be very interesting. And just a few weeks ago, I started a new job at the One Planet Research Center. I am working there now as a grant officer. So, my work is to attract public funding for projects within One Planet. But I literally started just a couple of weeks ago, so I don’t think I should talk a lot about it because I am still learning and seeing what I’m doing in this position.

Natalia 09:19 Okay, fantastic. Thank you so much, Irina, for your great story. And my first question for you would be, when you were thinking about your first job outside academia, except for your yoga activities. Was grant writing your first line of choice? Did you consider also other options or you decided early on this is going to be my next career?

Irina 09:43 No, I didn’t know that it exists, first. I looked at the medical writing, scientific writing, because I do like writing part. I applied for several jobs in that world. I did some teaching jobs, but that was sort of partly within academia. Of course, with those skills that I already had.

Natalia 10:15 Okay, I understand. Could you tell us a little bit more about how this job looks like in practice? How does your working week look like? And also, we have a question from the audience from Julian. The question is, do you work in teams in this job? Is it an individual grant writing? Or is it teamwork?

Irina 10:41 Okay, thanks. Again, I will be talking about working as a grant advisor at the university. And usually, you work in a team. For a big university, there would be a team of 3-5-10 people it depends, who together have to support researchers and the roles could be divided by discipline. You might be helping researchers within your own discipline. And of course, it is, in certain sense easier when you can understand the content of this proposal.

Irina 11:24 You might also focus more on personal grants versus consortium grants. And the world of grant advising, it is much bigger also than I had thought in the beginning. The type of work that you can do may range from, you know, just informing researchers about what opportunities are there. And for that, of course, you have to know yourself.

Irina 11:52 It takes time to learn, you need to know what opportunities are there at the regional level for your particular province. Even maybe for your city, you may know what opportunities are there at the national level. For the Netherlands, of course, there are several big funding agencies that play a major role there. And then, what opportunities are there at the European or even international level.

Irina 12:18 And for each of these funding opportunities, you need to know how it works and what is the procedure, what are the requirements, who can apply, who cannot apply and all these little details. First of all, you accumulate all this information and this is something that researchers often don’t know; they come to you with questions.

Irina 12:37 The second thing you can do is review the proposals. Just help researchers to structure and help to, well, to sell their ideas to write it in the most effective way, to make sure that what they write is in line with the requirements of the funding agency. And we’ll do that you also need to know these requirements very well.

Natalia 13:03 Right. I have a question about that part. I can imagine that being a grant advisor is a bit like being an advocate, you want the best for the person you collaborate with. But what happens if you don’t like the proposal? Did you also have that situation when someone was coming to you with a really crappy idea for a grant? And do you then discuss and really tell them what you think about their idea, or that never happened to you?

Irina 13:38 Of course. Again, it depends. What I already said, … I will come back to your question a minute. What I already said, at the university, you are mostly doing, like informing people and reviewing. It also can be a little bit more advice on the strategy. For instance, if I see that this particular proposal, … You don’t have bad proposals in a sense that mostly you work with people who are already experienced researchers, you know; they know what they’re doing.

Irina 14:05 But it can happen that people come with some ideas that does not fit this particular call. And then you may suggest a better fit. Or you may suggest, you know, given the requirements of this particular call, you need to have more publications in order to have a chance there. Maybe you need to wait for one more year and try then, and then you’ll have better chances.

Irina 14:30 This, more strategic, talk is also part of grant advice job. And in this sense, you don’t usually tell people that the idea is bad. Especially because most of these people, it’s not your discipline and you don’t know exactly. But you can give some strategic advice on how to make it better.

Irina 14:38 And so, how does your week look like? Is it that you have some office hours when researchers schedule appointments with you and meet you at your office? Or how does this look like?

Irina 15:04 For a university grant advice job, you have office hours. There are always some requests from researchers; this is nonstop. It’s a service job, you know. You have a service line, and people ask questions, and you need to come back with answers in time. But then there are events that are organized. There are proposals with which you’re working from day-to-day. And of course, some more work accumulates towards deadline, you know. And then there are more quiet times, more busy times.

Natalia 15:51 I have a little bit different question now. There’s a lot of PhDs who doubt whether this might be a right career path for them. Mostly because, they have this strong association with their job and they really like this ownership of projects. They fear that once they go, like outside academic career track and towards a grant advisory, for instance, then they will lose the sense of ownership.

Natalia 16:20 My question is for you. Was it easy for you to give up on this, of the ownership part? How do you feel about the fact that now you are in this advisory role, and you’re helping other people with developing projects, rather than developing your own projects?

Irina 16:39 Yeah, that’s a good question. I guess, I feel fine with it. I can also imagine that; it might not fit everyone. Once again, what I already said. The world of grant advice and funding support is very diverse. If we talk about the university job, grant advice position, this will be mostly about informing researchers and doing reviews and giving strategic advice.

Irina 17:09 You may also work as a grant advisor in a consultancy agency, you know. And then it becomes … Then I guess, you have a little bit more ownership because you help people to develop an idea; from idea to proposal. You might help them to find collaborators; this can go all the way to business advice. You may help them to write; and physically write the proposal.

Irina 17:37 You may also help people in that, another type of grant advice, to make strategic decisions on their career. For instance, if you advise people on personal grants, it often comes with advice on where to go next with their research in general, and with their, you know, choice of positions, which becomes more like coaching. And that also can be part of grant advice job. I think, indeed, you lose ownership of research project, but it’s still … you own your own work. That is still there.

Natalia 18:13 Okay. I mean, like, I always wonder about this, because I myself feel like I have very strong ownership of the projects. That’s also why I started writing books, because then you know, authorship is always there. I know many people who have the same dilemma. This is their fear that once they lose the sense of ownership, then they will also lose satisfaction from the job.

Natalia 18:40 I guess it’s also something that you have to try sometimes and see if you enjoy it or not. Because in those types of jobs, it might be that your name is not known, like beyond the project, but you get a lot of satisfaction from people who work with you. You get this validation from them that you’re doing a good job. Maybe you don’t need this external validation then from –

Irina 19:06 I guess you still get external validation because, for big research projects. For instance, if it’s a consultancy agency, very often it’s kind of known what agency what consultant was helping. And if you’re good and you’re successful in what you do, then your name is still known. It might not be on paper, but it is there. And you get feedback from researchers even if it’s not the consultancy agency. If you’re working in the grant desk or for university, you get feedback from researchers. And if you’re good at what you do, they know it.

Natalia 19:57 And we have a question from Nevash, which is, how do you get this type of job? What are the minimum requirements to start working as a grant advisor?

Irina 20:09 Again, as I just said, like the world of grant advice and funding advice is really diverse and very broad. And there are positions at the universities and I think for most universities, at least in the Netherlands, these positions are now growing. Because we realize that researchers need a lot of support and funding advice is just one type of research supports that everyone needs.

Irina 20:38 Then there are positions in consultancy agencies; there, you might become a freelance advisor. And then there are all kinds of positions between industry and scientific world that are also possible. First you just need to see which of these “flavors” you want to go for. But PhD is often a requirement, not always though. There are no education program advisors currently, I guess there will be at some point.

Irina 21:16 Now there isn’t any course that prepares you to do this, so you need to like writing or reviewing or editing others’ writing. It’s a lot of work with text. You need to notice little details, you know, like look into details and small requirements of course, and see how that relates to a piece of writing that is in front of you. That is important. And further, I think the requirements would be different depending on for which particular job you go into.

Natalia 22:08 And in your own recruitment process, did it matter? For instance, what types of grants you got before as a researcher? Did you use your former grants, successful grant proposals, as a form of application or that was not the subject to assessment?

Irina 22:27 Of course, it matters that you have experienced with the grant system; you have to know how it works. Also, if you know it well from the researcher’s perspective, that’s good. I think it helps if you have experiences of different types of grants. Not only, for instance, one particular national fund, but also European grants. And know how these regulations work, you know how coordination works.

Irina 22:58 If you know that part a little bit from the inside, that helps, of course. What I was told once during one of my interviews is that, it doesn’t really matter if your applications are successful or not. Of course, it’s good too. If you are able to show that you are successful in writing, that’s of course really good and it helps. But having an experience with writing a proposal or setting up a big consulting proposal, even if it’s not accessible at the end, that helps also for a position of applying for such a job.

Natalia 23:31 And do you think it might also help to have some science communications experience? Like, write some scientific blog or other forms of like-

Irina 23:41 Yeah, I think that helps. For me, that helped. I have been writing a blog for over a year on a regular basis. And that helps. Because if you’re doing this, you show that you like writing and you can put together a coherent piece of text. That is important.

Natalia 24:02 That’s great to know, because I have a blog myself. And I’m like, ‘Okay, one reason to do this.’ Great. Okay, so my question for you would be, –

Irina 24:15 Can I add on this? It is also a communication job. And I think that the most important part of this job is communication. Even if you work in a grant office of a university, you do have to communicate to different researchers, starting at different levels from business students to professors. And as you mentioned in the beginning, sometimes this communication it’s not very easy because you do have to give feedback.

Irina 24:46 And it is possible that you are talking to a professor and you need to tell him that he needs to work more or she needs to work more on his or her proposal. You need to be able to do this in a nice respectful way and effective way. But of course, if you go for a consultant agency, then it’s even more so about communication. Because then you have to bring together different parties, and be able to talk with different people in their language; their level. I think the most important part of this job is to be an effective communicator.

Natalia 25:25 Okay, great. And so, my next question would be, what is your most and least favorite part of this job?

Irina 25:35 Again, I will be talking about the university grant advice. What I really enjoyed is working with researchers and reviewing proposals. Most of the time, you feel that you can improve something; you can help. And it is just interesting, because you read really bright ideas, and you just learn all the time. That is very interesting. Well, the least! I really like this job, it’s not that I had something that I really did not like. Of course, you get to answer the same questions over and over. Again, I think had I worked there a little bit longer, it would become sometimes tiring. But that’s very normal, I think, for any kind of service job.

Natalia 26:50 Definitely. I would like to know a little bit more about, how do these career paths look like? For you, if you would like to get promoted or like, you know, get farther in your grant advisory career, then what do you do? Like, what are your options?

Irina 27:17 Once again, you can do it within a university, or you can go in a consultancy or freelance. And there will be, I guess they’ll have different pros and cons. And you can consider that as a promotion, or at least that shift or a change in the direction that you may like more. Within the university, you may shift towards a particular type of grant advice. For instance, being closer to a particular funding agency, you know.

Irina 28:01 And once you are a little bit more integrated with a particular funding agency, you also grow. Because your expertise of this particular, of these funding tools is growing. This is one way to grow. And there are people who work for instance, in collaboration with Brussels and the European Commission, and who are situated part-time in Brussels, part-time in the Netherlands who work to bring this experience from European Commission to the universities here. I guess, it also can be considered as a crisscross.

Natalia 28:45 My next question would be a little bit different. I’m very curious about what do you think about this growing grant writing, grant advisory industry? Because, at least here in Europe, we have more and more bodies, such as grant advisory centers at universities, but also these external, independent consultancy companies. And this on one hand, that gives opportunity for those who are not professional grant writers to still get help and draft successful proposals.

Natalia 29:26 But at the same time, it’s like a threshold. Because you have to invest first or have good connections to be able to draft these proposals. And I have a feeling you know, there’s a lot of European money in these, like Horizon 2020 projects, and all of these are big. When you look at the numbers, it’s like billions of euros and with really big plans.

Natalia 29:48 But I have a feeling that if you are a small company or a small lab without many resources then, the fact that there are professionals like you that advise those who have funds or are in that right position, and that makes it really hard for everyone who doesn’t have those opportunities.

Irina 30:11 I guess, that’s why universities are also trying to create this department that will be helping within the university. And that’s paid by the university, you know. The grant advice within the university is free for researchers. In this sense, I guess it’s really good indeed, that these opportunities are created now. And in general, the fact that there are more and more people who are professional writers, I think it’s good.

Irina 30:48 It’s kind of like, the research work is becoming more and more diversified. Instead of doing everything on your own and being good in everything, you can delegate part of your work to someone who is doing this professionally. And I think it will be the way; I hope that this will be the way that research world is developing.

Natalia 31:19 What advice would you have to those who are considering grant advisory? You know, how to possibly find options for themselves? And maybe, since you were mentioning a few times already that there are different types of grant writing. Maybe it would be good to also revise what options and what are these different schemes in which you can do grant advisory? Since you were mentioning that, but maybe for people who first heard about grant advisory today. Maybe it would be good to review, what are these different forms of grant advisory?

Irina 31:57 Yes, sure. You may work at the university and the same in the Netherlands at least, big universities now, all of them have grant support offices or grant offices. That’s one option. The other option is a consultancy agency. And there are several big agencies also in the Netherlands that usually hire people after a PhD. It’s possible.

Irina 32:28 There are options for freelance work. There are options for work within more in the collaboration with industry. There are all these … I think, yeah. I think I listed (most of them); maybe I forgot something. But these would be the main options of where to find for such a job. But it’s also as I said, it’s good to realize … Also, just like big research structures, like for instance, KNFA or AVRO in the Netherlands. They also have their own grant advice desks.

Irina 33:16 That’s also a place to look at. It’s also important that you may do different work in all those different places. And the work may range from writing grants, you know, to advising on strategies and collaborations, and with all possibilities in between. It’s good to see what you want to do.

Natalia 33:43 And do you sometimes miss those times when you were sitting behind your computer and programming? Because I normally don’t like programming. During my PhD, it was always driving me nuts. I liked everything else except for programming. But now, once I have to do a lot for the company, like I have to, you know, I have to take care of the website, of the clients, of the communications, of the social media, of creating new products; and I have to do all that.

Natalia 34:15 And sometimes once in a while, I just have to program something. For instance, a piece of backend for the website of the company. And then, I started liking it because there’s two hours during the day when no one bothers me and I can focus on one thing. You don’t have those days when you miss your PhD at times?

Irina 34:42 I don’t miss programming particularly. And or like I still do have at least one research project that I’m finalizing with my collaborators at Donders which I do enjoy doing that. Reading and you know, Bringing your writing articles and I still … I can say that I miss it, but I am still doing it for this other job. No, I don’t miss the research job.

Natalia 35:19 Good to hear. I mean, I think for those who think about switching to industry and they have not decided yet, I think it’s good news to know that you don’t have any regrets and any after thoughts about your transition. That’s great. All right, let me ask you this cheesy question that often comes in job interviews, which is, how do you see yourself in the future? Do you have some picture of yourself in 5 years from now? And do you see yourself still as grant advisor, or is it an open question?

Irina 35:50 Thanks for this question. I just started a new job that is also grant advice, but then in a more public-private collaboration. And also, in this topic of “Health, Nutrition in Behaviors” that I really like, that is close to my interests. I see myself developing in that job, that is pretty easy. And I haven’t thought further yet.

Natalia 36:21 I was just curious. But I guess it probably is a good mindset. Just do what you enjoy and don’t think too much about the future. Just to create a network, make sure that you meet new people along the way. And if it feels good, then what’s the problem? This is a problem that we often have in academia that we kind of, we are pushed to plan ahead.

Natalia 36:47 Because we know that there will be the end of the road at some point. And at one point in time, our contract will be expired. We kind of, are forced to always think about, ‘Okay, what is my next step? What is my next step?’ And then, I can also see that it’s hard to sometimes get rid of this feeling and just accept that things are good. And that I just enjoy my job, and I don’t have to be worried anymore.

Irina 37:15 My current contract is also not permanent, so I do have an end date. On the other hand, I learned that, you know, I have to work and don’t want to set goals for myself. And maybe it’s like a yoga approach, you know. You work on what you have now in front of you without thinking about the end result. Even though you may have this end result in mind as a dream or, you know, sort of an ideal situation.

Irina 37:49 But if you’re focusing too much on that, then it drives your attention away from the present moment. And in the present moment, I have an intention, like what I want to do now, what I can learn, what I can do better. And I know where I am heading, so I’m kind of focusing on the present moment. And that I think, that helps, you know, to make decisions. It’s just what helps me to make decisions.

Natalia 38:16 It might have a lot to do with yoga; that’s very yoga style. I tried to do yoga when I was in high school, but I was never patient enough I have to say. I’m very bad at meditating and yoga and everything that requires sitting still. Good for you, it’s probably better for your mental health that you can do it.

Irina 38:46 I teach just one class a week right now, but I also teach … I have several nice and interesting projects with yoga. For example, I am contributing in a teacher training for healthcare professionals in Amsterdam, but it’s around the entire country. We have different … We have doctors, physiotherapists, psychologists; so healthcare professionals who want to learn more about yoga and integrate yogic tools in their practice.

Irina 39:20 We are doing yoga teacher training for this group of people and I offer scientific course within this yoga teacher training. And this is really interesting, I enjoy this a lot.

Natalia 39:35 That’s amazing. Scientific training. I always admire people who can just put together two, apparently, disconnected pieces and just make it work. Last week, I was talking here on this channel with Matthias Hombauer, who put together music and photography and became a concert photographer. That was two of his passions, and he just decided to put them together.

Natalia 40:03 And now during the crisis, he couldn’t do the concert photography anymore. He decided that since his biggest passion is his kids and building businesses, then he became a ‘dadpreneur’. He created a mastermind group for dads who have businesses. And he has a very good way of putting together some pieces and creating a niche for himself. If you can do that, like do science and do yoga at the same time, then great. That must be hard, but sounds ambitious.

Irina 40:41 Yeah, that’s what I’m doing. And as I said, you know, I’m focusing on what they have now. And these projects are intertwined in many ways. Although these are still two separate jobs and maybe one day, I can blend them together into one job. I don’t know yet. But I’m very content with how these things are going now. And thanks for offering, I will watch this other episode. Sounds interesting.

Natalia 41:09 And who knows, maybe there will be some grant calls for projects about meditation and yoga.

Irina 41:17 Of course, that exists. And as I said, I looked into these possibilities. I even had an idea in mind, like what could be an interesting research. But then I realized that I feel very excited about writing it up, you know, and making this proposal and talking about it. But when I think about getting these funds, you know, and start doing the research work, I don’t feel this excitement anymore.

Irina 41:47 And at that point, I thought that maybe I’ll just be done with this and it’s just not my path. Maybe I’ll just stay here with, you know, working with ideas and helping people to get their ideas running. And then we’ll see how yoga incorporates in that.

Natalia 42:09 As a last question, could I ask you for some general advice you might have for PhDs who are wondering about their options outside academia?

Irina 42:21 I think my first advice is that it’s okay to wonder, you know. It’s okay to take your time, if you have such a possibility to take your time to think what you want to do. It’s okay to say no to things, if you feel like you it’s something that you don’t want to do. Even if it’s feels scary to say no, because you don’t know if there are other options.

Irina 42:53 And it is good to think about what you want to do, in terms of, what are your values? What do you want to bring? It might sound very big, but it’s about what you want to bring to the world, and how do you want to feel? And then, you start from there looking for something that fits you. And talking to a career advisor, it’s good. It never hurts.

Natalia 43:22 Indeed, I can confirm. That’s great. Okay, fantastic. Thank you so much, Irina, for sharing your story and for telling us all the secrets about working as a grant advisor at the university. I thank you so much for joining us and also for everyone who is watching us right now. If you guys would like to get more of this type of content, then please subscribe to this channel.

Natalia 43:55 And also, we are welcoming all your questions. I will attempt to answer all of them. If you have any questions for Irina, you can ask here or you can also contact her on LinkedIn. Let’s do that and have a nice day. Thank you so much for your attention.

Irina 44:15 Thanks Natalia.