Components of an IR proposal

The components of an IR proposal may vary slightly depending on the type of research planned and/or requirements outlined by the funding agency to which it is being submitted. Many funding agencies indicate specifically what should be addressed in a proposal.

The following section has been designed to be general enough so it can be adapted to fit the priorities of different users and various calls for proposals, recognizing that not all sections will be used in every proposal submitted for funding consideration. It is helpful to see the components of the IR proposal as being structured to respond to a series of questions that the research process aims to answer, as outlined in Figure 2.⁷ The different steps are discussed briefly in this module and further elucidated in the other modules of the toolkit.

Typically, an IR proposal comprises the following components, as described in more detail in respective tables in this module:

Introduction: Including title page, rationale, statement of the problem, objectives and research question(s) and literature review (synthesis of existing knowledge) (Table 1).

Research design: Outlining the participants, intended research methods, data collection, data analysis, quality management and ethics (Table 4).

Project plan: Presenting a more detailed project plan, research team description and budget information (Table 6).

Impact: including monitoring and evaluation, capacity building plan and results/outcome dissemination plan (Table 7).

Supplements: Such as project summary, table of contents, references, appendices and CVs of investigators (Table 8).

In each of the following sections, these different parts of the research proposal are considered to help your team in writing your research proposal.

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