August 25 Update | New Grant Proposal Intake Process
Dear Colleagues,
I am writing to share that the Office of Research has introduced a new research grant proposal intake process designed to provide a simpler, more consistent experience, with less back-and-forth and better visibility into proposal submissions. This new process is the result of close planning and partnership between our Proposals and Grants (OSR) staff, departmental administrators, and faculty researchers, and has proven simple and effective in pilot testing.
Starting this week, all federal or nonprofit research grant proposals, supplements, incoming subawards, and progress reports, including all proposed NIH submissions for the upcoming October deadlines, require the use of the new Smartsheet Proposal Notification Intake Form.
This 12-field form supports the new proposal intake process and provides OSR with the top-line data elements of your planned proposal (e.g., your name and department, funding opportunity and deadline, proposal title and elements) so they can triage your request to the proper team and analysts. The form also requests the attachment of a two-page Proposal Intake Form (PIF) with some additional checkbox questions to ensure OSR identifies and addresses all components of your proposal expeditiously.
Please note that this process preserves your working relationship with your pre-award staff. You can still reach out directly to get the help you need.
Over the next few months, we plan to further improve this process by combining the Smartsheet and PIF into a single electronic submission to reduce data entry redundancy and tailor the questions to the type of proposal being submitted. These changes are part of a broader institutional effort to improve our administrative processes and make it easier for researchers and their teams to advance their work. I will be communicating about these efforts more in the coming months.
I want to thank you in advance for working with my office to transition to this new grant submission process. We have prepared several resources on the OSR website to assist you and your departments if you encounter any issues. You can also contact OSR directly or attend their September 1 office hours to have your questions answered.
Yours,
Hal