The Grant

I slowly build up information and content on different funding schemes. I started out with Horizon Europe Pillar II and have moved into European Defence Fund, ERC and Erasmus+. More is to come. The next two weeks I will be looking into proposal preparation within the Erasmus+ funding scheme.

As regular listeners will know I have developed The Timeline Series that goes through the proposal preparation process step-by-step. That is for Horizon Europe Pillar II proposals, but has a lot of generic elements that also apply to funding schemes in general. However, there are important specificities for each funding scheme and how to prepare the proposals.

To provide guidance on how to prepare a proposal for the Erasmus+ programme I have invited three strong capacities on Erasmus+ into the virtual podcast studio. Daiana Huber, Chief Operations Officer, CPIP, Christina Achilleos, Founder and EU Funding Expert, InnoEUspere and Ulla-Alexandra Mattl, Director & Consultant, Eurakom have all years of practical experience developing proposals for the Erasmus+ programme.

In the first half released last week we focused on the preparation process for the writing phase. In this second half the three panelists take the bull by its horns and share how they put their pen to paper. They give their recommendations on how to attack the different sections. And the budget, of course. In the end we shortly touch on the actual submission itself.

This is a must-listen for all Erasmus+ proposal developers – no matter the experience!

Time codes:

00:02:32 Pen to paper - overall fly in

00:18:16 Key sections

00:33:25 Impact and sustainability of results

00:40:16 Submission

00:54:04 The toughest challenge

I slowly build up information and content on different funding schemes. I started out with Horizon Europe Pillar II and have moved into European Defence Fund, ERC and Erasmus+. More is to come. The next two weeks I will be looking into proposal preparation within the Erasmus+ funding scheme.

As regular listeners will know I have developed The Timeline Series that goes through the proposal preparation process step-by-step. That is for Horizon Europe Pillar II proposals, but has a lot of generic elements that also apply to funding schemes in general. However, there are important specificities for each funding scheme and how to prepare the proposals.

To provide guidance on how to prepare a proposal for the Erasmus+ programme I have invited three strong capacities on Erasmus+ into the virtual podcast studio. Daiana Huber, Chief Operations Officer, CPIP, Christina Achilleos, Founder and EU Funding Expert, InnoEUspere and Ulla-Alexandra Mattl, Director & Consultant, Eurakom have all years of practical experience developing proposals for the Erasmus+ programme.

This first half of the double episode we dig into all the preparatory steps you need to do before the writing phase sets in, in order to have as smooth a proposal developing work as possible incl. idea development, developing the project concept, consortium building and how to best involve the partners in the developing phase.

This is a must-listen for all Erasmus+ proposal developers – no matter the experience!

Time codes:

00:02:31 Introduction

00:09:56 Fly in on Erasmus+

00:15:07 Preparation for writing phase

00:23:33 Working with the partners

00:37:15 Concept note

00:46:14 Internal tools

00:53:30 Flow of work in-between the partners

Being an innovative SME is a rough job. The founders are die-harders that have worked the lower part of their back off to build up their company. But they can’t sit still even when they have passed the first dangerous years – they have to keep moving on improving their technologies and solutions and fend off competitors and large industrial companies that might go into their market.

The EU Commission is doing a lot of efforts to support the SMEs of the continent. On the funding side the target is to take off the majority of the risk to develop new technologies and get the SMEs involved in quality international collaborations.

Esen Kunt is an old contact of mine and she is working as R&D Manager in the Turkish ICT SME Faradai. The company develops software for energy efficiency control in buildings and as such is operating at the very heart of one of technology areas that the EU Commission is focused strongly on. They are using EU R&D funding as a core part of their innovation strategy to develop as a company.

I invited her in for a talk about the company, the conditions of being a technology developing SME in a highly competitive market and how EU funding is pushing the company forward technically at the same time as it helps with the risk. Of course very interesting for any SME representative out there, but also valuable insights for SME support organisations facilitating EU R&D funding.

Time codes:

00:02:24 Introduction

00:06:49 Fly in on Faradai and the background for approaching EU funding

00:15:00 The world of the innovative SME

00:30:57 EU funding - door breaker or treacherous sea for SMEs

01:15:59 A piece of advice

01:23:11 The toughest challenge

Ocean energy is one the technologies that has been long under way. And is still under way. The has traditionally been quite research heavy, but over the last years a certain level of private industry involvement has occurred. The area is facing the big paradox that energy from the different ocean energy technologies could provide substantial and sustainable energy to the continent, but the research, development and innovation costs are very high to get there because of a harsh environment.

I have myself supported the Danish ocean energy sector over a period of 4 years back in the beginning of the 10’s. It was my job to facilitate EU funding for them and lobby towards the EU Commission on the work programmes. That work put me in close contact with Ocean Europe which is the European umbrella organisation for the whole sector both R&D and industry.

They have taken a big journey from 1½ person secretariat and very few perspectives for support from EU to an eight -person organisation with their own Strategic Research Agenda and strong ties and commitment from EU Commission.

I invited my good old contact CEO Rémi Gruet into the virtual podcast studio for a talk about the ocean energy sector, how the Ocean Europe has moved to a strong professional lobby and support organisation and how they work for their members.

This episode gives insights into how to work as a stakeholder organisation in Brussels, how to get most out of your influencing resources and slowly growing your organisation.

Please enjoy

Time codes:

00:02:30 Introduction

00:09:43 Fly in on the sector

00:20:39 Fly in to Ocean Energy Europe

00:33:03 Ocean Energy Europe and its role in funding landscape

01:00:11 Membership involvement

01:13:30 The toughest challenge

One of my goals with this podcast is to shed light on the Brussels eco-system and open it up, take out the mystery and share how the different organisations work and how you can get involved.

Some time ago I recorded a special on the Circular Bio-based Europe Infoday with Programme Officer & Call Coordinator Dieter Brigitta representating the Circular Bio-based Europe Joint Undertaking. Of course the natural follow-up to that episode was an episode zooming in on Circular Bio-based Europe itself.

Circular Bio-based Europe is part of the European Partnership framework. It is in the so-called Institutionalized Partnerships category which means they have their own corner of the Horizon Europe work programmes where they decide and govern their own calls.

I managed to get Head of Programme Virginia Puzzolo into the studio together with Programme Officer & Call Coordinator Dieter Brigitta to take a dive into the organisation and how they work.

It became a long talk so it is divided into two episodes. Last week we covered CBE’s place in the Horizon Europe framework and how they work strategically with the input for the work programme.

In this second half my guests share with us the different tools CBE has developed to support the community – especially the extraordinary networking platform!

Time codes:

00:02:10 The networking platform

00:18:43 Other support elements

00:31:26 The toughest challenge

One of my goals with this podcast is to shed light on the Brussels eco-system and open it up, take out the mystery and share how the different organisations work and how you can get involved.

Some time ago I recorded a special on the Circular Bio-based Europe Infoday with Programme Officer & Call Coordinator Dieter Brigitta representating the Circular Bio-based Europe Joint Undertaking. Of course the natural follow-up to that episode was an episode zooming in on Circular Bio-based Europe itself.

Circular Bio-based Europe is part of the European Partnership framework. It is in the so-called Institutionalized Partnerships category which means they have their own corner of the Horizon Europe work programmes where they decide and govern their own calls.

I managed to get Head of Programme Virginia Puzzolo into the studio together with Programme Officer & Call Coordinator Dieter Brigitta to take a dive into the organisation and how they work.

It became a long talk so it is divided into two episodes. This first half zooms in on Circular Bio-based Europe’s place in the Horizon Europe framework and how they work strategically with the input for the work programme they are responsible for. It also provides nice sum-ups of the Horizon Europe programme and the process of how Horizon Europe work programmes are developed

Time codes:

00:04:08 Introduction

00:09:49 Short about Circular Bio-based Europe

00:20:51 Circular Bio-based Europe and its role in Horizon Europe

00:30:08 Strategic elements

The impact problem is a constant. Making sure that the projects that are being funded moves on into self-sustainable initiatives post-project is not as easy as it seems. Or at least as simple as the EU Commission THOUGHT that it would be.

Back in episode #60 I had freelance science journalist Catherine Collins in the studio where we talked about the EU Commissions initiatives to get project results out and working in the free normal non-funding world. Here we touched upon the initiative Horizon Results Booster funded by the EU Commission itself.

The initiative is headed by META Group and I invited CEO and Senior Expert Alessia Melasecche Germini into the virtual podcast studio to have a talk about this impact support initiative. The core idea of the Horizon Results Booster is to give an extra push to former and running framework programme projects with spreading the results, exploring the results, developing business plans and go-to-market strategies. Only admission ticket you need to have is that you are or have been running a framework programme project. And it is free.

It became a long talk, so the episode is divided into two. In the first half we talked about the issue of getting project results into the real work, the background of the initiative, how you apply to get access. Further, Alessia shared how the support to projects are organized and we dug into the first chunk of the three different support mechanisms focusing on dissemination and exploitation strategy.

Here in this second half, we cover the rest of the support initiative namely: on exploitation, business plans and go-to-market strategies. Further, we have a talk about the status of the initiative and how they have reached their goals within the Horizon Results Booster initiative.

This is really great content and guidance for all project owners and partners that would like to get an extra hand to secure getting the most out of their EU funded project.

Time codes:

00:03:03 Portfolio Dissemination & Exploitation strategy (cont.)

00:15:29 Business plan development

00:28:13 Go-to-market

00:40:48 The impact results of the HRB

00:52:48 The toughest challenge

The impact problem is a constant. Making sure that the projects that are being funded moves on into self-sustainable initiatives post-project is not as easy as it seems. Or at least as simple as the EU Commission THOUGHT that it would be.

Back in episode #60 I had freelance science journalist Catherine Collins in the studio where we talked about the EU Commissions initiatives to get project results out and working in the free normal non-funding world. Here we touched upon the initiative Horizon Results Booster funded by the EU Commission itself.

The initiative is headed by META Group and I invited CEO and Senior Expert Alessia Melasecche Germini into the virtual podcast studio to have a talk about this impact support initiative. The core idea of the Horizon Results Booster is to give an extra push to former and running framework programme projects with spreading the results, exploring the results, developing business plans and go-to-market strategies. Only admission ticket you need to have is that you are or have been running a framework programme project. And it is free.

It became a long talk, so the episode is divided into two. In the first half we talk a little bit about the issue of getting project results into the real work and Alessia shares the background of the Horizon Results Booster and how you apply to get access. Further, she shares how the support to projects are organized and we dig into the first chunk of the three different support mechanisms focusing on dissemination and exploitation strategy.

This is really great content and guidance for all project owners and partners that would like to get an extra hand to secure getting the most out of their EU funded project.

Time codes:

00:04:19 Introduction

00:09:54 Fly in to the problem of impact

00:17:54 Horizon Results Booster introduction

00:35:36 The supportive tools: Portfolio Dissemination & Exploitation strategy

Some times when you record a podcast episode magic happens in the interaction in-between the guest and the host. You are about to listen to one of the most heart felt The Grant episodes I have recorded to date.

I was supposed to record an episode with two other podcasters on how we are working with our podcasts for you all. One of them got ill, but instead of cancelling independent consultant and podcaster Ilaria Rudisi and I carved out a topic on the spot where we would dig into the instances where everything goes wrong with a proposal process.

But we didn’t get to talk about that. Because in the entry of the episode we suddenly found ourselves talking about stress, anxiety, horrible managers, horrible business models, the immense pressure of KPIs, deadlines, being a young woman in the funding world in Italy, the damage that other free-working consultants they do and the lack of respect of the grants consultancy profession.

It is a talk that vibrates of anger, frustration, pain, but also hope and relief. And a profound understand and honesty between Ilaria and I. It is a conversation where I finally release to you all that I was laid off from PNO and didn’t leave myself.

Listening to this might offend some of you. Might make some of you sit uneasy on your chair. Might leave you sad. Or it might give you some peace in your stomach that your feelings of stress and anxiety are common and that others are angry about it too.

The Grant is not just about proposal preparation tips and insights to the Brussels eco-system. The podcast is indeed also a mission to shed light on all the difficult things, the darkness that is luring right under the surface and a deep determination from my side to open this up and talk about it.

I have been looking very much forward to release this weeks episode. Universities and their project support departments are heavy users of the EU R&D funding programmes. Therefore it has been an ambition since I started this podcast last summer to get representatives from a university project support office into the studio to share with you all how they work and support their research teams.

As regulars will know I already had Massimo Busuoli from the NTNU Brussels Office in the studio last year. That spinned off a contact to their project support unit back home in Norway and today’s release is a panel episode with three leading employees from that office – Hilde Røysland, Patrick Reunick and Håvard Wibe – all three with the title of Senior Advisor.

In this episode you will get an in-depth insight into how one of the strongest technical universities in collecting EU funding in Europe they organize themselves to support their researchers. First of all they give an overview of the funding strategy including policy and lobby elements. Second, we dig into how they have practically organized themselves and the practical approach to the funding support. Finally, they share their key research areas and give practical project examples as a result of their approach.

You can’t get this kind of information anywhere else than on The Grant. Pure gold for research managers across the continent.

Time codes:

00:06:53 Introduction to NTNU

00:09:22 Overall EU funding strategy

00:33:42 Organisation and practical approach

01:09:03 Key research tracks and concrete projects

01:17:41 The toughest challenge