Show that you understand the current state of research on your topic.
The length of a research proposal can vary quite a bit. A bachelor’s or master’s thesis proposal can be just a few pages, while proposals for PhD dissertations or research funding are usually much longer and more detailed. Your supervisor can help you determine the best length for your work.
One trick to get started is to think of your proposal’s structure as a shorter version of your thesis or dissertation , only without the results , conclusion and discussion sections.
Download our research proposal template
Writing a research proposal can be quite challenging, but a good starting point could be to look at some examples. We’ve included a few for you below.
Like your dissertation or thesis, the proposal will usually have a title page that includes:
The first part of your proposal is the initial pitch for your project. Make sure it succinctly explains what you want to do and why.
Your introduction should:
To guide your introduction , include information about:
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As you get started, it’s important to demonstrate that you’re familiar with the most important research on your topic. A strong literature review shows your reader that your project has a solid foundation in existing knowledge or theory. It also shows that you’re not simply repeating what other people have already done or said, but rather using existing research as a jumping-off point for your own.
In this section, share exactly how your project will contribute to ongoing conversations in the field by:
Following the literature review, restate your main objectives . This brings the focus back to your own project. Next, your research design or methodology section will describe your overall approach, and the practical steps you will take to answer your research questions.
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To finish your proposal on a strong note, explore the potential implications of your research for your field. Emphasize again what you aim to contribute and why it matters.
For example, your results might have implications for:
Last but not least, your research proposal must include correct citations for every source you have used, compiled in a reference list . To create citations quickly and easily, you can use our free APA citation generator .
Some institutions or funders require a detailed timeline of the project, asking you to forecast what you will do at each stage and how long it may take. While not always required, be sure to check the requirements of your project.
Here’s an example schedule to help you get started. You can also download a template at the button below.
Download our research schedule template
Research phase | Objectives | Deadline |
---|---|---|
1. Background research and literature review | 20th January | |
2. Research design planning | and data analysis methods | 13th February |
3. Data collection and preparation | with selected participants and code interviews | 24th March |
4. Data analysis | of interview transcripts | 22nd April |
5. Writing | 17th June | |
6. Revision | final work | 28th July |
If you are applying for research funding, chances are you will have to include a detailed budget. This shows your estimates of how much each part of your project will cost.
Make sure to check what type of costs the funding body will agree to cover. For each item, include:
To determine your budget, think about:
If you want to know more about the research process , methodology , research bias , or statistics , make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples.
Methodology
Statistics
Research bias
Once you’ve decided on your research objectives , you need to explain them in your paper, at the end of your problem statement .
Keep your research objectives clear and concise, and use appropriate verbs to accurately convey the work that you will carry out for each one.
I will compare …
A research aim is a broad statement indicating the general purpose of your research project. It should appear in your introduction at the end of your problem statement , before your research objectives.
Research objectives are more specific than your research aim. They indicate the specific ways you’ll address the overarching aim.
A PhD, which is short for philosophiae doctor (doctor of philosophy in Latin), is the highest university degree that can be obtained. In a PhD, students spend 3–5 years writing a dissertation , which aims to make a significant, original contribution to current knowledge.
A PhD is intended to prepare students for a career as a researcher, whether that be in academia, the public sector, or the private sector.
A master’s is a 1- or 2-year graduate degree that can prepare you for a variety of careers.
All master’s involve graduate-level coursework. Some are research-intensive and intend to prepare students for further study in a PhD; these usually require their students to write a master’s thesis . Others focus on professional training for a specific career.
Critical thinking refers to the ability to evaluate information and to be aware of biases or assumptions, including your own.
Like information literacy , it involves evaluating arguments, identifying and solving problems in an objective and systematic way, and clearly communicating your ideas.
The best way to remember the difference between a research plan and a research proposal is that they have fundamentally different audiences. A research plan helps you, the researcher, organize your thoughts. On the other hand, a dissertation proposal or research proposal aims to convince others (e.g., a supervisor, a funding body, or a dissertation committee) that your research topic is relevant and worthy of being conducted.
If you want to cite this source, you can copy and paste the citation or click the “Cite this Scribbr article” button to automatically add the citation to our free Citation Generator.
McCombes, S. & George, T. (2023, November 21). How to Write a Research Proposal | Examples & Templates. Scribbr. Retrieved June 27, 2024, from https://www.scribbr.com/research-process/research-proposal/
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Princeton Correspondents on Undergraduate Research
Turning a research paper into a visual presentation is difficult; there are pitfalls, and navigating the path to a brief, informative presentation takes time and practice. As a TA for GEO/WRI 201: Methods in Data Analysis & Scientific Writing this past fall, I saw how this process works from an instructor’s standpoint. I’ve presented my own research before, but helping others present theirs taught me a bit more about the process. Here are some tips I learned that may help you with your next research presentation:
More is more
In general, your presentation will always benefit from more practice, more feedback, and more revision. By practicing in front of friends, you can get comfortable with presenting your work while receiving feedback. It is hard to know how to revise your presentation if you never practice. If you are presenting to a general audience, getting feedback from someone outside of your discipline is crucial. Terms and ideas that seem intuitive to you may be completely foreign to someone else, and your well-crafted presentation could fall flat.
Less is more
Limit the scope of your presentation, the number of slides, and the text on each slide. In my experience, text works well for organizing slides, orienting the audience to key terms, and annotating important figures–not for explaining complex ideas. Having fewer slides is usually better as well. In general, about one slide per minute of presentation is an appropriate budget. Too many slides is usually a sign that your topic is too broad.
Limit the scope of your presentation
Don’t present your paper. Presentations are usually around 10 min long. You will not have time to explain all of the research you did in a semester (or a year!) in such a short span of time. Instead, focus on the highlight(s). Identify a single compelling research question which your work addressed, and craft a succinct but complete narrative around it.
You will not have time to explain all of the research you did. Instead, focus on the highlights. Identify a single compelling research question which your work addressed, and craft a succinct but complete narrative around it.
Craft a compelling research narrative
After identifying the focused research question, walk your audience through your research as if it were a story. Presentations with strong narrative arcs are clear, captivating, and compelling.
Orient the audience and draw them in by demonstrating the relevance and importance of your research story with strong global motive. Provide them with the necessary vocabulary and background knowledge to understand the plot of your story. Introduce the key studies (characters) relevant in your story and build tension and conflict with scholarly and data motive. By the end of your introduction, your audience should clearly understand your research question and be dying to know how you resolve the tension built through motive.
The methods section should transition smoothly and logically from the introduction. Beware of presenting your methods in a boring, arc-killing, ‘this is what I did.’ Focus on the details that set your story apart from the stories other people have already told. Keep the audience interested by clearly motivating your decisions based on your original research question or the tension built in your introduction.
Less is usually more here. Only present results which are clearly related to the focused research question you are presenting. Make sure you explain the results clearly so that your audience understands what your research found. This is the peak of tension in your narrative arc, so don’t undercut it by quickly clicking through to your discussion.
By now your audience should be dying for a satisfying resolution. Here is where you contextualize your results and begin resolving the tension between past research. Be thorough. If you have too many conflicts left unresolved, or you don’t have enough time to present all of the resolutions, you probably need to further narrow the scope of your presentation.
Return back to your initial research question and motive, resolving any final conflicts and tying up loose ends. Leave the audience with a clear resolution of your focus research question, and use unresolved tension to set up potential sequels (i.e. further research).
Use your medium to enhance the narrative
Visual presentations should be dominated by clear, intentional graphics. Subtle animation in key moments (usually during the results or discussion) can add drama to the narrative arc and make conflict resolutions more satisfying. You are narrating a story written in images, videos, cartoons, and graphs. While your paper is mostly text, with graphics to highlight crucial points, your slides should be the opposite. Adapting to the new medium may require you to create or acquire far more graphics than you included in your paper, but it is necessary to create an engaging presentation.
The most important thing you can do for your presentation is to practice and revise. Bother your friends, your roommates, TAs–anybody who will sit down and listen to your work. Beyond that, think about presentations you have found compelling and try to incorporate some of those elements into your own. Remember you want your work to be comprehensible; you aren’t creating experts in 10 minutes. Above all, try to stay passionate about what you did and why. You put the time in, so show your audience that it’s worth it.
For more insight into research presentations, check out these past PCUR posts written by Emma and Ellie .
— Alec Getraer, Natural Sciences Correspondent
Organizing and hosting proposal reviews requires time and energy few principal investigators can spare. With blue teams, pink teams, green teams, and red teams, proposal reviews sound more like Dr. Seuss and less like steps recommended by proposal management professionals. The process becomes all the more discouraging when collaborators or reviewers cannot or will not attend, even more so if feedback given during the review meetings is not useful, leaving proposers asking: “Why bother?”
Done properly, review meetings, called color-team reviews in industry, prove invaluable. Just like a great novel requires input from multiple subject-matter experts and editors, a great proposal—that is, one that will get you funded—requires input from people both attached and detached from the project.
The success of these reviews hinges on their timeliness and organization. Set reasonable, achievable expectations for the condition of drafts prior to reviews. Create and enforce deadlines for your outline, storyboard, and drafts. Hold yourself to the same standards you expect from your team.
The composition of your team is as important as adhering to a process or a schedule. Involve co-investigators and reviewers who are not just good at what they do, but who you can trust to show up to meetings and deliver content, language, edits, and feedback on time.
Schedule reviews far enough in advance that you have time to make adjustments. Make sure you have delivered required, completed materials to collaborators or reviewers prior to the meeting. If drafts are incomplete or budget estimates nowhere near ready to discuss, reschedule the reviews or adapt the meeting to your circumstances.
Even the finest of minds can get distracted. But reviews should not evolve into isolated scientific debates. Develop an agenda in advance to keep reviewers and researchers on topic, on task, on time. Make sure everyone has a chance to voice their opinions. Do not be afraid to silence sycophants and gadflies monopolizing the conversation.
Reviews without guidelines often devolve into a bizarre combination of Socratic dialogues and group therapy. Use a list of evaluation criteria based on the sponsor solicitation to separate constructive criticism from encomium and grousing.
A plethora of positive comments indicates your reviewers are cursed by knowledge, meaning they are so familiar with your idea, your body of work, or your field that they cannot imagine how outsiders would read your proposal. If you have the time, get a second opinion.
An abundance of negative reviews likely means something is seriously wrong with your proposal—usually that your draft was not mature enough to be reviewed by other researchers, proposal experts, and editors.
Want help organizing or facilitating your next proposal review? Email us at [email protected] .
*This post was originally published by Tobin Spratte, Proposal Manager, in 2017.
Creating an engaging business proposal and presenting it in front of your potential clients might sound like a difficult task. Knowing what to focus on, how to organize the meeting and shape your approach shouldn’t stress you out.
With our comprehensive guide, you’ll see how easy it can be to create a winning proposal. We’ll also give you tips on how to build confidence in your presenting skills and nail every public speaking event, be it around your proposal or not.
In this article, we’ll cover the proposal presentation creation process, how to best automate it and give you other tips on how to engage your audience.
Whatever your topic may be, the starting process is the same - research. You need to conduct thorough research into your topic, and your audience as well.
The questions you need answered are:
Once you conduct your research, you can start creating a proposal presentation. In order to speed up your proposal creation process, you’ll want to look into automation software.
Better Proposals offers a variety of prewritten proposal templates that you can easily customize to your needs. This means that you won’t have to create your presentation from scratch.
With our beautifully designed templates, you’ll have no problem showing your solution and the benefits you’ll bring to your clients in a way that’s easy to understand for everyone.
Start with a short introduction. The point of your presentation introduction is to ease your clients in by explaining to them that you’ve listened and understood their issues. They will want to hear about your process and how you’ll help them achieve their goals so make sure you’re not talking too much about yourself and your company.
Once you’ve created your introduction, it’s time to focus on your process and timescales . This is the time to go into further detail and explain exactly which steps you’re going to take in order to help your client. However, make sure that you’re keeping it easy to understand.
Your clients won’t have the same technical knowledge as you do, so make sure to explain everything in simple terms. As important as it is to talk about your process, it’s even more important to showcase the benefits.
That’s how you sell your services - by talking about tangle results. If you’re providing website building, explain how it will lead to increased sales and market share.
If you’re working with a team, make sure to explain what each member will be working on a week to week basis.
Once you’ve presented your solution, it’s time to get to the price. If you already know your client’s budget, it will be easy for you to come up with a number. But that’s not all, the way you present your price is also very important.
Make sure you’re not using the word price and try using words like investment and ROI instead. It will make your proposal stand out and won’t cheapen your offer. Moreover, it’s important to present your price as a single number.
If you present a few different tiered price points, it will confuse your clients. They won’t know which package to choose, since they are looking to you to explain which steps are needed in order to help them achieve their goals.
Don’t use your presentation to try and upsell your clients. That should be done once you’ve created a relationship with them and created some results with your solution.
Once you’ve presented your solution and price, it might be a good idea to quickly present a few case studies. They will show how you helped a client in a similar position before. It will be a good way to win over the audience, especially if you think you’ve lost them after presenting your price.
A third-party’s quote about your company will build your credibility. Furthermore, it gives you the opportunity to present the benefits your clients experienced from working with you, as well as how quickly they reached ROI.
Better Proposals’ templates come with a prewrite structure for case studies. We know what the clients want to see and hear, which is why we make sure to provide a visually pleasing layout.
There is no need to go into detail on how much trouble your client was in before they started working with you. Nor should you talk about the process employed to help them achieve results. In most cases, this will be similar to the process you’ve already presented to the client, so don’t repeat yourself.
Instead, focus on the results. By this we mean:
Case studies are a powerful strategy that can help you win deals and secure more revenue.
After that, make sure to outline the next steps as well as present your guarantee and terms and conditions.
It might sound silly, but including a clear call to action is very important. Since you’ve already created a great proposal presentation, it would be a shame not to state what needs to happen next.
Does your client need to send any materials, do they need to pay the first fee, is there a need for a team meeting?
Whatever needs to be done, lay it out in order to make it easy for everyone to understand.
In the guarantee section, present what you could offer the client if anything goes wrong. A popular example would be to promise a free product or service if you don’t provide them with a finished product in the agreed-upon time frame.
While you’re creating your proposal presentation, you need to keep in mind who your audience is. You need to know their needs, wants, lifestyles and behaviour. However, not only do you need to know your audience, but their audience as well.
Who are they selling their products and services to? Firstly, distinguish between a B2B, B2C and a combination of those two types of companies. After that look for any reports that focus on their industry. If you’re selling medical equipment, find out all you can about hospitals, private clinics and any upcoming trends in the market. In addition, identify your competitors and analyze their technological stack using the technographic data insights .
You need to be able to confidently present your proposal and that confidence will come from the amount of research you conduct.
Analyze the previous efforts your client’s company has made in order to solve the problem. If you could explain to them why it didn’t work, it would further demonstrate your expertise and that you’re the perfect person for the job.
When using Better Proposals, you can make sure you’ll never address your clients by the wrong name. With our custom merge tags , you can name your clients, their company and brand and automatically personalize your proposals.
That way, even if you’re recycling your proposal presentations, you can rest assured knowing you didn’t leave the names of your previous clients.
It’s a good idea to send out your presentation before the meeting.
There are three reasons for that:
Better Proposals offers a great feature called proposal analytics. They show you when your proposals were opened, by who, if they were forwarded, signed and paid.
You will also receive notifications via email for every action your client takes. Moreover, you’ll know exactly how much time did they spend on each of the chapters.
This type of insight will help you understand which parts of your presentation to focus more on in the meeting. Did your client jump straight to the price or did they read every section? Once you analyze their actions, you’ll have a different perspective on your presentation.
Don’t underestimate the power of benefits and value you can bring to your clients. That’s what they’re most interested in. We know that it’s tempting to focus on your offer and go into great detail about how you’re the best person for the job based on your price, approach, quality of work and more.
As important as that is, make sure your primary focus is on the problem you’re going to solve and the benefits you’ll bring them.
Your clients won’t be that interested in your features and other technical details. They want to hear what their future will look like if they start a business relationship with you. For example, if you’re selling a meal prep kit, it would make more sense to highlight benefits like - freeing up time in your customers' days, offering a variety of meal plans and more.
Talking about the technical aspects of your business would only be interesting to potential investors or employees. That's why it’s important to focus on the value you’re bringing to the client.
The last tip we have for you is to meet the client in a neutral setting. Most of the time the client will want you to come to their office. Even though you’d want to accommodate your clients, meeting them in their office might be detrimental to your deal.
Their office is a place with a lot of distractions. Anyone can walk in and ask for input on their own work, there are deliveries going on and the phones ringing off the hook. Offices are not known as quiet places and that is why you’d want to move the meeting to a more neutral setting.
Our advice is to choose a hotel lobby. They are usually quiet during the workday, making them the perfect setting for a business meeting.
It’s also important to come early. That way you can choose the perfect table, order a drink (nothing alcoholic though) and relax. If you get nervous about presenting, arriving early will help you set up and focus.
Further tips we have for anyone presenting are:
If you win a deal right after the presentation, you’re already in the right place to celebrate. Once everything is done, you can seal the deal with a drink or two.
The first rule of presentations is - to prepare. The more time and effort you put into your presentation, the more confidence you’ll have in your presenting skills. With our actionable guide, you’ll quickly be able to create a beautifully designed presentation that will help you win the deal.
Make sure you start any proposal presentation with thorough research into your potential clients. You’ll have to know the answers to all your questions about the way you would implement your solution before you start writing the proposal.
If you use Better Proposals, you’ll love how quickly and easily you can create a document that is easy to get through and engaging. Sign up for a free trial today and find out for yourself how much our platform can help you in the proposal process.
Whether it's a new employee or a new client, your documents say a lot about your business. If you don't see every document as a proposal, you're missing the point.
Think about the impression you're trying to give off and then ditch Word proposals for good. They make you look pathetic.
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Whether you're a student or an academic, mastering the literature review is a key skill in scholarly writing. This fully customizable Google Slides and PowerPoint template can assist you in structuring your review seamlessly. Featuring a vibrant yellow design with captivating book illustrations, this template is designed to facilitate the organization and presentation of your research. Navigate your audience through chapters, themes, and references with ease and clarity using this versatile academic tool. Utilize this tool to craft an impressive literature review that leaves a lasting impression!
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Realize Programs: A proposal review ensures your programs are crystal clear and achievable. Now, let's dive into must-have templates to elevate your proposal game. Template 1: Website Review Proposal Template PowerPoint Presentation Slide. This presentation is your secret weapon for proposals related to website reviews.
This presentation is to help students address problems of presentation of their literature review sections in their proposals and thesis. Content may be subject to copyright. 1. Introduction ...
A research proposal review (RPR) is an evaluation or assessment of a research proposal by experts or a committee to determine its quality, feasibility, and suitability for research. ... Wollongong (UOW), the research proposal review (RPR) presentation should allow the RPR Panel Com-mittee to assess the candidate's capacity:
Template 8: Literature Review for Research Paper Proposal PPT . Download this high-quality PPT template and write a well-formatted literature review. The given layout is professionally designed and easy to follow. It will enable you to emphasize various elements, such as materials referred to, past work, the list of books, approach for analysis ...
Template 1: Literature Review PowerPoint Template. This is a well-designed PowerPoint Template to help you highlight your literature review. Incorporate this state-of-the-art PPT design and present your analysis on the specific topic. This customizable PowerPoint slide shows the findings and your evaluation of a subject.
Examples of literature reviews. Step 1 - Search for relevant literature. Step 2 - Evaluate and select sources. Step 3 - Identify themes, debates, and gaps. Step 4 - Outline your literature review's structure. Step 5 - Write your literature review.
2. Have a clear agenda. Your presentation must have a clear and compelling agenda, which you can share right at the start (in addition to having shared it over email before the meeting). The meeting should begin with compelling reasons to consider your proposal and culminate with a specific request for the business.
Here is a project proposal example structure using project proposal templates to help you get started on your presentation. Slide 1: Cover Slide with Project Name. Like in all presentations, you don't dive into the main part of the presentation without introducing the name of the project and yourself as presenter.
1. Title Page: Include the title of your proposal, your name or organization's name, the date, and any other relevant information specified by the guidelines. 2. Executive Summary: Provide a concise overview of your proposal, highlighting the key points and objectives.
Keep to your written proposal formula. You need a title slide (with your name, that of your advisor & institution) Several slides of introduction. that put your study into the big picture. explain variables in the context of existing literature. explain the relevance of your study organisms. give the context of your own study.
Research proposal examples. Writing a research proposal can be quite challenging, but a good starting point could be to look at some examples. We've included a few for you below. Example research proposal #1: "A Conceptual Framework for Scheduling Constraint Management".
Presentations with strong narrative arcs are clear, captivating, and compelling. Orient the audience and draw them in by demonstrating the relevance and importance of your research story with strong global motive. Provide them with the necessary vocabulary and background knowledge to understand the plot of your story.
Organizing and hosting proposal reviews requires time and energy few principal investigators can spare. With blue teams, pink teams, green teams, and red teams, proposal reviews sound more like Dr. Seuss and less like steps recommended by proposal management professionals. The process becomes all the more discouraging when collaborators or reviewers cannot or will not attend, even more so if ...
Add a great case study. Once you've presented your solution and price, it might be a good idea to quickly present a few case studies. They will show how you helped a client in a similar position before. It will be a good way to win over the audience, especially if you think you've lost them after presenting your price.
This fully customizable Google Slides and PowerPoint template can assist you in structuring your review seamlessly. Featuring a vibrant yellow design with captivating book illustrations, this template is designed to facilitate the organization and presentation of your research. Navigate your audience through chapters, themes, and references ...
Guidelines for presentations review committee or conference organizer. Requirements for abstracts/proposals Deadlines What is a conference proposal? The conference proposal is a stand-alone document—independent from your written —that proposes your presentation for a conference. The primary audience for a conference proposal is the
A strong presentation is so much more than information pasted onto a series of slides with fancy backgrounds. Whether you're pitching an idea, reporting market research, or sharing something ...
A point-by-point summary (~300-600 words) outlining what will be discussed in the article and why it is timely and novel. A list of 10-20 key recent references (published in the past 2-4 years) that indicate the intended breadth and balance of the proposed article. Demonstrate fit to the journal. Show the topic is timely.
This document provides guidance on conducting a literature review for a research proposal. It defines what a literature review is, discusses why it is important to include one in a research proposal, and outlines the steps to take in conducting an effective literature review. These steps include searching for and evaluating relevant literature ...
NIH R18 PROPOSAL REVIEW COMMENTS. The points you have expressed do not seem innovative. It is not clear why the collaboration is innovative since prior interventions have combined HIT and motivational interviewing. You will need to thoroughly review the literature (including the articles we have suggested) and identify exactly what sets your ...
Here are a few tips for business professionals who want to move from being good speakers to great ones: be concise (the fewer words, the better); never use bullet points (photos and images paired ...
their review presentation within the first 6 months for full time students and 12 months for part time students. The student's continuation of candidature is dependent upon the satisfactory confirmation of the proposal review. All research s tudents should not proceed to data collection until after their research
Here are some examples of specific, positive feedback you can give to a presenter when they've really nailed it: The flow of your presentation made sense and helped the audience understand the depth of the topic. You went above and beyond with the research on this presentation.