It’s always too soon to quit: Reapplying for an ERC grant

We interviewed political scientist Adina Akbik, who was awarded an ERC Starting Grant on her second application attempt. She explained her personal winning methodology, the importance of perseverance and the value of feedback from the ERC evaluators. 

You're working in the Netherlands? 

 

Yes, at Leiden University. I'm originally from Romania. I did my bachelor's studies in Romania, but since then I've been abroad. I did my master's in the UK, then my PhD at the Central European University while it was still in Budapest, then I was a postdoc at the Hertie School of Governance in Berlin. I moved around quite a bit.

 

For your first ERC application, did you not make the cutoff or were you placed on a reserve list?

 

I didn't make the cutoff. I did make it to the interview stage but subsequently I was awarded a “B” grade. So I wasn't on the reserve list for the first call. 

After you had a successful second application, why did you write a thread on X (formerly Twitter) about your (re)application experience? 

 

I wanted other people to know that if you fail the first time, it's not the end of the story. Continuing or persevering is a positive thing to do. So my aim was to be encouraging, something that I appreciated in senior scholars earlier in my career. Those that were honest about their achievements, but also about their failures. When people announce ‘Oh, I got a grant!’, well, that's probably because they also failed five times before.

I wanted other people to know that if you fail the first time, it's not the end of the story.

I think I am not exceptional in the sense that everyone who applies for an ERC grant puts a lot of work into it. When getting rejected, the immediate feeling for me was that “It means that I wasn't good enough”. Also, “I've done my best”, because I had prepared so much, and it wasn't enough. This feeling is very common across disciplines, and with all academics.  When we put a lot of work into it and it doesn't work out, we feel like we're worthless.  

What I wanted to share is that we're not alone in thinking this way. This one experience does not define you. The more you think about it, the more you realize this is work that you can use for publications, for other things, or for other project applications even if this particular project doesn't materialise. In hindsight, we're all smarter. 

 

On my second attempt, after getting to the interview stage in the last round, I was awarded an @ERC_Research #StartingGrant for a project studying the role of cultural stereotypes in #EU governance. Being rejected stung, but I learned a lot in the process. A thread. (1/18) https://t.co/Z6Zi20rGt0

— Adina Akbik (@MaricutAkbik) September 5, 2023

 

Sometimes applicants have only a short period of time which they could use to incorporate the feedback that they get into a second application. For example, when the EU moved from one research funding program to the next one (H2020 to Horizon Europe) there was a significant delay which had a knock-on effect on the subsequent ERC calls for proposals. 

Yes, I applied under the 2022 and 2023 ERC work programmes. I was in a very unusual cohort where one round of applications was in January and then the other one in October of the same year, whereas now the deadline is once per year in October. So it normally gives you about three months to incorporate feedback from your [first] application. Some could say it's too little, but it depends. If you have a full teaching schedule, it's very hard to do much in three months.  

I got the rejection and then I had to reapply in one week. But I had the interview at the end of September and the new deadline was end of October. After I had the interview, I already started with my revisions based on colleagues’ feedback and the questions I got during the interview, because this was my last year of eligibility for the ERC Starting Grant. I thought, what do I have to lose? So even if I didn’t get the grant, I would rather have invested these three, four weeks that I had in doing the revisions, rather than not doing them, and then submitting the same application.

because this was my last year of eligibility for the ERC Starting Grant. I thought, what do I have to lose?

You mentioned that you didn't have time to integrate the feedback before you made a reapplication. So what did you base your changes on?

 

During the first ERC interview, they asked me 10 questions. I wrote them down and in my revisions I addressed those questions. 

I'm also lucky that I'm in a department where we have a full system for all colleagues who apply for grants. The research director creates groups of five to seven people that give you feedback on applications, and we do mock interviews as well. Before each of my ERC interviews, I had two mock interviews with colleagues. They asked me very different questions because our department is very diverse. We have people who do quantitative research, qualitative research, coming from very different theoretical backgrounds. Not all of the questions they asked me were asked during the interview.  

So I revised my application based mostly on colleagues’ feedback. I would say about 80% of the revisions to my written application were based on that. Overall, I changed my application about 15 or 20%. I changed one work package almost completely. Luckily, this was the one work package where the written comments I received later from the ERC panel also indicated that it was not convincing.

 

You didn't have the feedback when you were writing your reapplication, but you had it by the time you were preparing for your second ERC interview?

 

It was only after I had submitted my second application that I got the ERC comments on my initial application, so at that point I couldn't change anything (in the written part). However, I was able to use the ERC feedback in preparing for the second interview. I was at least able to realise that there were some issues that the reviewers considered fundamental. Then I could deal with them better in the second interview.  

There was one thing that was really stressed in the comments from the first panel I interviewed with. The reviews were not harsh, but there was one point that indicated “this is not as it should be”. During the first interview, I thought I had addressed this question, but clearly, I wasn't convincing. I did not cover that same issue in the revisions to the second written application because I didn't yet have the information indicating that it was such an important thing for the reviewers.

During the first interview, I thought I had addressed this question, but clearly, I wasn't convincing.

When preparing for the second interview, I thought, okay, how should I deal with this question that I could not revise in the written proposal? It was likely that it would come up again. My attitude in the second interview was to say, “I understand this is a concern” and “Mitigation strategies to deal with this problem do exist”. In the first interview I might have come across as brushing off this problem. Whereas in the second interview, I could say, “I recognize this is a problem, but I think I can deal with it”.  

To further prepare for the second interview, I created a document with 86 possible questions. Some of them were basic, e.g., can you manage a team? These are on every list of what questions the ERC panel could ask you. But maybe 70 of these questions were about the substance of my project. From the 10 questions that I got during the second interview, only one was not in the list that I had. So you could say I was very well prepared. The one extra question that I was asked wasn't about my proposal, it was about another grant I got and how this relates to the ERC proposal.  

In the end, most of the ERC panel and reviewers’ comments were the same as those of my colleagues. To me, this shows that I am in a department so diverse that it covers all the concerns that ERC reviewers might have. What I would suggest to anyone who is reapplying is if your department doesn't already offer this sort of infrastructure for preparation, you should try to mobilize your friends and colleagues to help you. It's so important to have people who hit you with questions from different directions and different theoretical or methodological perspectives. Then whatever comes, you can expect it. 

you should try to mobilize your friends and colleagues to help you.

When you get the notice that you're going to be funded, you still get application feedback – it is useful at that point?

 

Definitely. In the second round, I also got very good feedback, especially for the future. One reviewer gave me a list of references that I did not know, they will be useful as I start to run the project. 

There's variation between reviewers. Some of them write five lines, others write two pages. This also happens when you submit papers to journals, so it’s not necessarily different when it comes to the ERC. Of course, you can do much more with extensive reviews, rather than the five-lines reviews that some give. I always appreciate the reviewers who take more time to explain why they disagree with you.  

I always appreciate the reviewers who take more time to explain why they disagree with you.

In terms of the reviews, I noticed something interesting when it comes to the additional field “Comments (Optional for reviewers)” in the Evaluation Report. In the first round, only two reviewers out of seven submitted additional comments. In my second application round, maybe five reviewers out of nine decided to use this extra space in the form. They wrote that they thought that my track record is very good, things about my career trajectory, my previous work, what I'd done before, the institutions I worked with, my theoretical contributions. Mostly about what I'd written so far. I do wonder if it makes a difference (to the evaluation result) if the reviewers take the time to write something extra.

 

If you had already acted as a reviewer for national funding bodies, do you think that might give you an advantage if you apply to the ERC (or not)?

 

I've been a reviewer for journal articles, books, but not for funding bodies. 

I guess it depends on the stage applicants are in their career. If they're applying for an ERC Advanced Grant, they're much more likely to have done reviewing at some stage than if they're more early in their career. I have seen a few successful applications from my department, but also from my academic circle, people I know. 

That's also the reason why I now made my application public on my website. I think it is in the interest of other scholars in the field to see what a successful application looks like. Because I, of course, looked at others, in terms of structure, what you should emphasize.

I think it is in the interest of other scholars in the field to see what a successful application looks like.

If you are a reviewer, this is exactly what you see. You see variation. You see good applications and not so good applications. Ultimately, you recognise the good applications, so then you know what you should emphasise in your own application. I think it's a nice thing if other people were to do more of this, make their proposals public so that other scholars can look at them. 

Adina Akbik is Senior Assistant Professor of European Politics at Leiden University’s Institute of Political Science. Her research focuses on the European Parliament’s accountability powers, the role of EU agencies in policy implementation, as well as decision-making and politicisation in the euro area and EU justice and home affairs. In 2023, Adina was awarded an ERC Starting Grant for the EUROTYPES project, studying the role of cultural stereotypes in EU governance.