Hello

The reason for the lack of content is I have been writing bids to fund projects.

In a report that came out 2 years ago, New Philanthropy Capital estimated Scots spent £ 450 million on bid writing. It is mundane and dull work, but funders require it. It is also mostly a waste of time, but it supports armies of charity bureaucrats.

What I wish -

i) that the forms have a common template and that there is a cloud-based repository where you store your base details. I don’t like entering the same things twice.

ii) that the funders do not ask the same question twice, or three times, in the same application

iii) that the funders agree a common format ; this could be led by the Charity Commission or some-one. I suggested it to the Charity Aid Foundation and ACEVO a while back, but they are too busy lobbying to worry about process or systems. This is a shame as the ROI would be high.

iv) that the charity world moved on to web2. It ought to be possible in 2009 to construct a database to search funding sources ; to do it using semantics and matching charity to funder ; to simplify processes electronically. Is there a government, or charity up for this ?

v) the value of medical staff time bidding the MRC and Wellcome Trust and others must mean the achievement of their research outcomes is delayed by 30%. Why do professors spend their time writing bids ?