From intuition to an evaluable object

The first mistake to avoid is treating the research proposal template as an empty container into which a fully defined project can simply be inserted. Before writing, you need to read the call, the template, the instructions, and, above all, the evaluation criteria carefully. These materials indicate which information must become visible, where the evaluator expects to find it, and how much weight it carries in the assessment. Research design and proposal design accordingly develop together: the same idea may require different forms of articulation depending on the function of the application and the type of research the funding instrument is intended to support.

Writing with the evaluator beside you

While drafting, it is useful to imagine the evaluator’s path through the text continuously. Where will the problem appear? Where will the reader understand why the project is original? Where will the objectives be stated? Where will the methodology be justified? Where will feasibility, expected results, and the necessary competences become visible? A relevant piece of information may technically be present in the proposal and remain difficult to evaluate if it appears in an unexpected place, is formulated ambiguously, or is dispersed across different sections. The proposal should reduce this evaluative friction and allow the reader to spend intellectual energy assessing the research rather than reconstructing what the text should have made explicit.

Considering readers at different distances

A proposal may pass through readers with very different forms of expertise: specialists in the problem, scholars working in other areas of the same discipline, panel members, administrative staff, and, in some cases, readers from relatively distant disciplines. The distinction between experts and non-experts is too simple. What matters is the distance between the reader’s expertise and the specific content of the proposal. The title, keywords, abstract, and introduction need to work at a broader resolution, while the state-of-the-art discussion and methodology can become progressively more specialised. The level of detail changes, yet the argumentative thread must remain stable.

Write, then carve

Research proposals almost always require many things to be discussed in very little space. It is advisable to avoid beginning directly with the shortest possible version, because premature concision tends to produce intellectually convoluted projects. A more reliable strategy consists in writing with enough space to understand exactly what you want to argue, identifying what is essential to the evaluation, removing repetition and secondary material, and rewriting until every paragraph performs a precise function. Brevity should be the result of revision.

The most important general check concerns alignment. Problem, research question, general aim, specific objectives, methodology, activities, expected results, and impact must form an intelligible sequence. If one of these elements changes during the design process, the others need to be checked again. A strong proposal gives the reader the sense that its parts require one another and that the project possesses a recognisable architecture.

Title, keywords, and abstract

The intellectual identity of the proposal begins before the main text. Title, acronym when required, abstract, and keywords already influence the way in which the project will be classified and interpreted. These elements should be treated as substantive parts of the proposal because they often constitute the first point of contact between the project and those who will evaluate it.

The title

The title should be interesting enough to attract attention and precise enough to represent the research accurately. A competent reader should be able to form an initial idea of the object of research, the central problem or perspective, and the distinctive character of the project. Highly memorable yet poorly informative titles create an unnecessary cost, especially when they generate expectations that the subsequent text does not fulfil. Alignment is decisive here as well: the title should promise exactly the project that the proposal will deliver.

Keywords

When an acronym is required, it is useful to choose one that is pronounceable, easily recognisable, and connected to the project without forcing the fit. It is rarely worth altering the content of the research to accommodate a particularly elegant word. Keywords have an even more important function because they contribute to the classification of the proposal and can influence the forms of expertise through which it will be read. This choice is particularly delicate for interdisciplinary projects: several classifications may be correct, yet they can place the research in very different intellectual contexts. The useful question concerns the territory within which the project can be understood and evaluated most effectively.

The abstract

The abstract is the first complete representation of the research and should allow a competent reader, including someone outside the immediate specialisation, to understand the context, the problem, the main objective, the methodological approach, the expected contribution, and the significance of the project. A particularly effective sequence is: context, problem, question or objective, method, expected contribution, impact. This structure leads the reader from the intellectual situation that motivates the research to what the project will make possible.The abstract should normally be written towards the end of the drafting process. Only once the proposal has been articulated in all its parts is it possible to compress its architecture reliably. A good abstract reproduces the finished project in miniature, using the same conceptual vocabulary and formulating the same objectives. Misalignments are particularly damaging because the abstract creates expectations that the rest of the proposal will then have to satisfy.

The introduction

The introduction offers the first structured representation of the research and must make the project intelligible, relevant, and persuasive from its opening lines. The first half page deserves particular attention because it contributes substantially to the reader’s initial impression. By this point, it should already be possible to understand what the project concerns, why the problem matters, what kind of intervention is being proposed, and why the proposal deserves further attention.

In general terms, the introduction should construct a simple intellectual story without simplifying the research. There is a relevant problem, the existing literature has yet to resolve it satisfactorily, its persistence has theoretical or broader consequences, and the project proposes a credible strategy for addressing it. This narrative architecture makes the movement of the argument visible. The research itself may be considerably more complex, yet the reader must be able to grasp its direction quickly.

From context to problem

The opening context should provide only the information needed to understand where the problem comes from. It should be accessible, directly connected to the research question, and specific enough to lead the reader towards the point at which the project intervenes. Whenever possible, a text, a case, a controversy, or a concrete piece of evidence can make an abstract problem tangible and give the reader something to remember. The context should not turn into an anticipated state-of-the-art discussion.

Formulating the research question

Once the problem has become visible, the research question should emerge from the discussion through a transition that feels natural and necessary at once. The sequence can be conceived as context, problem, evidence or example, research question. The question formulates the intellectual problem that the project intends to address and prepares the general aim. If it appears suddenly after a generic discussion, the reader is forced to reconstruct a connection that the proposal should have shown.

Showing that the problem remains open

The justification of the project requires an explanation of why existing research has yet to resolve the problem adequately. The strongest argument is often more precise than the simple identification of a gap. Part of the problem may have been neglected, relevant strands of research may have remained separate, an established interpretation may leave a tension unresolved, new sources may alter the picture, or the consequences of results already achieved may remain insufficiently explored. The introduction should create the need for the more specialised discussion that follows.

The state of the art

The state of the art must be discussed. A sequence of summaries, an annotated bibliography, or an inventory of what has been read does not perform this function. The existing literature must be organised in such a way as to construct an argument about the present state of the problem: what has been established, which approaches are central, where their limitations lie, what remains unresolved, and which space consequently opens for the proposed project.

This section performs two functions simultaneously. On the one hand, it makes the applicant’s expertise visible by showing knowledge of the relevant literature, understanding of the debate, and the ability to reconstruct its main positions. On the other hand, it must explain why further research is necessary. These functions reinforce one another because expertise becomes visible above all through the ability to explain precisely what the literature allows us to understand and what it still leaves open.

It is useful to organise the discussion around the problem addressed by the project and to structure the literature hierarchically. Studies that directly shape the problem deserve greater attention, while secondary contributions can often be grouped together. Originality must be stated explicitly: the evaluator should not have to infer it from the bibliography. Citation style also belongs to the economy of the text and should be chosen in relation to the rules of the call and the available space. The state of the art should remain proportionate to the project, whose centre continues to be the why, what, and how of the research.

Aim, objectives, and hypothesis

Once the problem has been established and the need for further research demonstrated, the proposal must state what the project intends to achieve. The general aim expresses the main intellectual result towards which the research is directed; the specific objectives articulate a limited number of distinct and connected results through which the general aim becomes concretely achievable.

From the question to the general aim

The relation between problem, research question, and general aim should be direct. If the question asks how competing theories of prime matter shaped medieval explanations of substantial change, the aim may consist in reconstructing and comparing those theories in order to determine how their differences affected such explanations. The question identifies the intellectual problem; the general aim formulates the principal result through which the project intends to address it. An aim describes an intellectual achievement and accordingly requires verbs that indicate clearly what will be established, reconstructed, explained, developed, or demonstrated.

Specific objectives

The objectives specify the results required for, or directly connected with, the achievement of the aim. As a design tool, it can be useful to distinguish procedural objectives, which correspond to intermediate results required to reach the main outcome, from correlative objectives, which identify further results made possible by the achievement of the aim. This distinction is heuristic and should not be turned into artificial terminology in the proposal. In both cases, the objectives must make the internal architecture of the research visible.

Objectives must also be distinguished from activities, or tasks. An objective describes what the research will achieve; a task describes what the researcher will do in order to achieve it. Reconstructing competing conceptions of prime matter can be an objective; identifying the corpus, analysing the texts, comparing terminology, and reconstructing the arguments are activities. The distinction matters because it allows objectives, methodology, work plan, and expected results to be connected in an orderly way.

Good objectives are specific, connected, distinct, realistic, and verifiable. Verbs such as explore, investigate, or study are too vague when the proposal does not clarify what the investigation is expected to establish. Each objective must contribute visibly to the aim, have a scope compatible with the project’s duration and resources, and formulate a result precise enough for the evaluator to recognise its achievement. Desiderative formulas such as try to or attempt to should also be avoided: a proposal should describe with confidence what the project will do, while leaving scientific uncertainty to the results that the research has yet to establish.

The research hypothesis

In some projects it is useful to formulate a research hypothesis explicitly, understood as a preliminary thesis that the research will put to the test. The hypothesis should be sufficiently grounded to be plausible and sufficiently open to confirmation, modification, or rejection through the proposed work. Its function varies across disciplines, and projects in philosophy do not always require a rigid hypothetical formulation. When used, it should be connected to the sources, methods, and results that will allow it to be assessed. Formulating a hypothesis also makes a degree of intellectual risk visible, which a strong proposal should be able to manage.

Aims and objectives require repeated revision. They often change while the state of the art, methodology, and work plan are being developed, and this is entirely normal. The final check consists in asking whether each objective addresses part of the research question, contributes to the aim, and can be connected to a method, an activity, and a concrete result.

Methodology

The methodology explains how the project will achieve the objectives just formulated. Merely naming conceptual analysis, historical reconstruction, textual comparison, comparative philosophy, formal methods, or any other methodological label is insufficient. For each method, the proposal should explain how it will be applied, why it is appropriate to the problem, which sources, materials, concepts, or cases it will be applied to, which objective it will help achieve, and what kind of result it is expected to produce.

The methodology section should allow the evaluator to see the actual research moves through which the project will proceed. Description and justification must develop together: the proposal should explain what a method makes possible, why it is preferable to the relevant alternatives, and how it integrates with the other methods employed. References and examples can be useful when a method belongs to an established tradition or when its application to the problem is unusual.

Many projects require more than one method and may involve different disciplines. In these cases, the proposal should clarify which disciplinary or methodological traditions are involved, what each contributes, how they interact, and why their integration is necessary for the project. Interdisciplinarity should emerge from the problem and the methodological design. Adding methods or disciplines simply to broaden the project’s label tends to weaken its coherence.

Transversal requirements

Some calls ask applicants to discuss aspects such as open science, data management, ethics, gender, and diversity. These elements should be addressed when required and to the extent that they genuinely affect the research. The general principle is to avoid artificial connections. If a dimension changes the sources, sampling, questions, methods, interpretation, or circulation of results, the proposal should explain how; if it is irrelevant, this should be stated precisely in accordance with the rules of the call. In philosophy, research data may include archival materials, corpora, transcriptions, structured bibliographies, databases, digital editions, interviews, and other materials collected or produced by the project.

The curse of knowledge operates here as well. What appears obvious within a subdiscipline may remain opaque to a competent evaluator working elsewhere. The methodology should accordingly remain precise and technically serious while providing the level of explanation required to follow the path of the research.

Results and research products

A proposal should explain what will change if the project succeeds. This question concerns several levels that need to remain distinct: the expected intellectual results, the concrete products of the research, the circulation of those products, and the broader effects that the project may generate over time. Confusing these levels makes impact vague and often replaces scientific substance with a catalogue of activities.

Results and research outputs

Expected results describe what the research should establish, clarify, or make possible. Research outputs are the concrete products through which these results are fixed and made available, including articles, books, editions, corpora, datasets, databases, software, tools, or methodological protocols. Outputs should follow from the architecture of the research and, whenever possible, be connected to specific objectives. Quantity alone has little value: a credible plan explains which products are needed and how they contribute to the purposes of the project.

Dissemination and communication

Dissemination concerns the circulation of results and outputs among academic or professional communities capable of understanding, evaluating, and using them. Communication concerns the presentation of the project and its significance to broader audiences through outreach activities. Some calls also use the term exploitation to describe the subsequent use of results by other researchers, institutions, professional communities, or other actors. The labels vary, yet the rule remains the same: the proposal should indicate what will circulate, towards which audience, through which channel, and for which purpose.

Research outputs and outreach should be kept distinct. A website, podcast, public lecture, or event may constitute an excellent communication activity, yet it does not replace the scientific products of the research. Likewise, a long list of conferences, social media activities, workshops, and public initiatives does not automatically produce a strong strategy. A smaller number of activities, clearly connected to results, audiences, and purposes, is generally more credible.

Impact

Impact should derive from the expected results. It is useful to begin at the level closest to the project, namely its contribution to the specific debate, and then progressively widen the perspective towards connected disciplines, research practices, teaching, cultural institutions, or social questions where a genuine connection exists. Claims about impact should be ambitious and proportionate. A philosophy project can have significant consequences without promising immediate social transformation; what matters is explaining the mechanism through which a scientific result can produce further effects.

Work plan and risk management

The work plan translates the intellectual architecture of the proposal into a temporal sequence of concrete activities. Once the proposal has explained what the project intends to achieve and through which methods, it must show when and in what order the different parts of the research will be carried out. The central question is credibility: the reader should have good reasons to believe that the project can be realised within the available time and resources.

From objectives to activities

The work plan should make the sequence objective, method, task, expected result legible. If an objective requires a particular analysis, the plan should show when that analysis will be carried out, which materials it will involve, and which result it will produce. The amount of work must be realistic, the sequence of activities must make sense, and the different parts of the project must retain clear relations. An overloaded project can appear just as unconvincing as an underdeveloped one.

Work packages, milestones, and deliverables

Many projects are organised into work packages, understood as coherent groups of activities contributing to a recognisable part of the research. This structure is useful when it reflects the logic of the project and helps the reader understand what will be done, when it will be done, how the different activities relate to one another, and which results they are expected to produce. Work packages are not conceptually mandatory: when a call does not require them, the same function can be performed by an equivalent temporal or thematic structure.

Milestones and deliverables perform different functions. A milestone is a control point that makes it possible to verify the completion of a significant stage. A deliverable is a concrete item used to document or monitor implementation. These terms should be used only when the call requires them or when they genuinely clarify the project. A Gantt chart, when requested, should provide an immediate view of the temporal architecture and make the work plan clearer rather than reproduce it mechanically.

Risks and alternative strategies

Every research project involves uncertainty. Risks may concern hypotheses, sources, access to archives or participants, methods, timing, mobility, technology, or organisation. A credible proposal does not try to demonstrate that nothing can go wrong; it identifies plausible risks and explains how the project can be adapted if they occur. Contingency and mitigation measures show that the plan has been designed beyond its ideal scenario. Scientific risk can form part of the project’s ambition, while unmanaged risk remains a weakness.

The centre of it all

Discussions of the researcher’s profile, supervision, training, and the host institution do not appear in every proposal, and their weight varies considerably across calls. When required, they should be treated according to the same principle of selection that governs the rest of the text. The researcher’s profile should answer the following question: why does this person possess the competences required to carry out the project, and which form of development does the proposed research make possible? The CV should be interpreted in relation to the application, selecting experiences, publications, methods, languages, collaborations, and competences that make the project credible.

An effective narrative structure connects past experience, present project, and future development. Continuity makes the research credible; room for development explains why funding is useful at that point in the trajectory. When supervision is included, the proposal should show the relation between the needs of the project and the supervisor’s expertise, avoiding generic descriptions of prestige. When training is included, each activity should respond to an identifiable gap or need in the researcher’s profile. The host institution should be described through resources, expertise, networks, and infrastructures directly relevant to the research.

Style, persuasion, and revision

A proposal is a persuasive text. Scientific quality remains the fundamental condition, while the reader also needs to understand why the research matters, why the proposed strategy is appropriate, and why investing resources in the project is worthwhile. Persuasion should emerge from the precision of the argument, the selection of information, and the clarity of the structure. An emphatic tone or disproportionate promises tend to reduce credibility.

Writing for readability

Readability requires control of terminology, definitions of technical concepts when necessary, and consistent formulations for the problem, question, aim, and objectives. Every paragraph should have a recognisable function and contribute to the overall movement of the proposal. Sentences should be precise enough to sustain a specialised argument without imposing avoidable difficulties on the reader. Writing for a broader audience does not require abandoning an academic register; it requires making the intellectual architecture of the research visible.

Writing with confidence

Research proposals describe future research and inevitably require prospective formulations. This does not justify excessive hedging. Expressions such as try to, attempt to, or perhaps manage to weaken the relation between objectives and work plan. It is preferable to describe precisely what the project will do and keep uncertainty where it belongs, namely in the scientific results that remain to be established. At the same time, the proposal should avoid presenting as already demonstrated what the research has precisely the task of verifying.

Revising for alignment

Strong proposals emerge through repeated revision. Writing, rethinking, cutting, rewriting, and refining transform a good idea into an evaluable text. At the end of the process, it is useful to reread the proposal by following the evaluator’s path and checking whether the problem is immediately recognisable, whether the question leads to the aim, whether the objectives make the aim achievable, whether each method answers an objective, whether the work plan makes the methodology credible, and whether results and impact derive from the work actually planned.It is useful to ask a competent reader who does not work on the same problem to read the abstract and introduction. If that reader cannot reconstruct with precision what the project intends to do and why it matters, the problem probably lies in the proposal rather than with the reader. The more specialised sections can then be checked by colleagues closer to the field, especially to verify that the simplification required by readability has not sacrificed precision.