Identifying and accessing external income sources, (for profit, not for profit and public entities) that can either provide funding for research or be leveraged for funding, has become an increasingly higher priority for all forms of research providers. In many cases, this is becoming a necessity to allow their organisation to grow/maintain their research profile.
Most research providers including universities, already have a documented goal to increase their research funding from external organisations (for profit and not for profit) as part of their strategic plans.
Unfortunately, the gap between having this as a planned goal and the reality of achieving the research income has been a challenge that many organisations have either not resolved or have at best, only a partial solution.
We have seen several internal strategies to achieve this objective, but many/most require researchers to be able to:
- Communicate their research in a way that an external organisation would find of benefit/interest,
- Identify organisations that would directly benefit from a positive result of the research being proposed/undertaken,
- Contact the external organisation and reach an agreement to provide funding that is seen to be in both party’s interest.
Historically, for many researchers, these are skills that they have not been trained in and without these skills, the attempted approaches have led to knockbacks which have proved discouraging for any future efforts.
After a full analysis of the market and current tools available, VIP-Research confirmed a need for a product that could assist with both the identification of organisations that could potentially fund research and the presentation of a the research (or proposed research) in such a way that an external organisation could recognise and understand the benefits to them, and therefore increase the success rates in obtaining industry funding.
FITT has been developed using feedback from individuals that have sponsored research, that have worked with researchers on techniques and strategies and in some cases acted on behalf of researchers, when approaching external organisations for research funding and with trainers who have worked with researchers to help them develop skills to handle the process of approaching external entities for funding and creating business proposals for research funding. FITT is best described as a guidance system that walks researchers through a series of stages in the funding approach, providing suggestions and recommendations as to how best to progress an approach to an organisation. The guidance system has a fully integrated specialist database of external entities that have the need, the financial capacity and in many cases, the past track record of funding research in various disciplines. Using the process and built in recommendations, the researcher is guided through each step of approaching organisations for funding whilst training them on best practice towards achieving a successful outcome.
To find out more about FITT and how the tool can be used to assist researchers to increase their research funding from external sources, please contact us at info@vip-research.com.au
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