So, you work in the Office of Sponsored Research (OSR) and have to lead your small grants team in applying for a federal grant. Before reading further, please read Part 1 of Grants.gov Workspace for Colleges and Universities. That’s the foundation we build on below.
Let’s say your IHE grant team fits the Small Team of Generalists category. You also know you don’t have a month to try to learn and test out a different grant application system. Here are your next steps to quickly learn whether Workspace will fit your team.
1) Get the Manage Workspace role in Grants.gov.
If you have submitted a grant on behalf of your IHE before, you already have this role. If you are not sure, try step 2 to find out.
2) Create a workspace and start filling out forms in your web browser.
If you have downloaded the retiring legacy PDF application package on Grants.gov before, then you are familiar with the View Grant Opportunity tab. That is where you will find the option to create a workspace.
If you are not able to create a workspace, then we need to back up a couple steps. Speak with the person in your OSR that has the Authorized Organizational Representative (AOR) role in Grants.gov (i.e., they have submitted a grant application before). They have access to manage roles in Grants.gov and assign you the Manage Workspace role.
3) Add your colleagues to the workspace to help you fill out the webforms or PDF forms.
If any members of your grant team do not have a Grants.gov account yet, then there are two options:
- They create an account and can use Workspace.
- They don’t create an account and cannot use Workspace.
If the second is the case, you (i.e., the person leading this grant team) can still download the individual PDF forms from the workspace, then email them to your colleague to work on. This is how you may have completed the retiring legacy PDF application package, but now you can send separate forms rather than holding up the whole process while one person works on the single form within the full PDF application package. Once your colleague completes the individual form, they can send it back to you to upload to the workspace.
4) Submit the application package and you are done!
Okay, that was a bit quick, and we skipped some details. But, at its core, that is the basic process in Workspace to apply for a grant as a Small Team of Generalists. You can perform your internal process and reviews around this to make Workspace work for you.
If your interest is piqued, here are three resources for you to read next:
- Scenario: Teaming Up on a Federal Grant in Workspace
- Infographic: Illustrating the Standard Grants.gov Workspace Workflow
- Introducing Grants.gov Workspace Functionality Video Tutorial Series – 6 videos that total 18 minutes to watch
Tomorrow, we will post part three, which dives into the deeper parts of Workspace’s custom access levels that make it easier for a Big Team of Specialists to apply for grants (and here’s Part 3 now that it’s posted). Subscribe to the blog to get part three in your email.
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