From fb984c36e46a87b9fbe30a6bdef5cc96f559831d Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: medusa Date: Thu, 31 Jul 2025 00:09:37 -0500 Subject: [PATCH] Update smma/grant_starting.md --- smma/grant_starting.md | 76 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 76 insertions(+) diff --git a/smma/grant_starting.md b/smma/grant_starting.md index 4bd2323..e149a45 100644 --- a/smma/grant_starting.md +++ b/smma/grant_starting.md @@ -1,3 +1,79 @@ +This is a fantastic "variation" that brings your LLM skills into play in a much more realistic and immediately valuable way for grant-seeking clients\! It moves beyond just filtering into "pre-application intelligence" and "drafting support." + +Let's break down how this model would work and why it's a smart path: + +### The "Filtered Grants + LLM Legwork" Service Model + +This model makes perfect sense, as it leverages your core strengths (data filtration, automation) and layers on your emerging LLM prompting skills to address a crucial pain point for grant applicants: the sheer volume of initial research and preliminary drafting. + +Here's how you could "deliver solutions" for a client with this approach: + +**1. Your Core Service: Intelligent Grant Prospecting (Already Established)** +\* **What you deliver:** Highly filtered, relevant grant opportunities (from Grants.gov, perhaps even USAspending.gov historical data to show past awards). This is your initial product, saving the client time and ensuring they don't miss opportunities. + +**2. The Add-On: LLM-Assisted Preliminary Legwork** +\* **What you deliver:** This is where you use your LLM prompting skills to generate *drafts* and *research summaries* that significantly reduce the client's manual effort in the early stages of proposal development. + +``` +* **Key Use Cases for LLMs (and your prompt engineering skills):** + + * **Grant Summary and Key Requirements Extraction:** + * **Problem:** Grant NOFOs (Notice of Funding Opportunities) are often 50+ pages and dense. Clients need to quickly grasp the core purpose, eligibility, critical dates, and required components. + * **Your LLM Solution:** You feed the full NOFO text into an LLM with a well-crafted prompt: + * "Summarize this grant opportunity, highlighting the main purpose, funding amount, eligible entities, key deadlines, and essential application components." + * "Extract all eligibility requirements for applicants and project directors from this document and list them clearly." + * "Identify all sections pertaining to budget requirements, allowable/unallowable costs, and indirect cost rates." + * **Deliverable:** A concise summary document, bulleted lists of requirements, or a checklist derived from the NOFO. + + * **Competitive Landscape/Past Awardee Analysis (Leveraging USAspending.gov):** + * **Problem:** Clients need to know who else won similar grants, what they proposed (if public), and what makes a winning proposal in this area. + * **Your LLM Solution (combined with your data skills):** + * You've identified past awardees from USAspending.gov for similar grants. + * You find publicly available summaries or abstracts of those past awarded projects (often linked from Grants.gov or agency sites). + * **LLM Prompt:** "Analyze these summaries of previously funded projects [provide text/links] that align with [client's proposed project area]. Identify common themes, successful approaches, and potential areas for differentiation. What are the key elements these successful proposals seem to have in common?" + * **Deliverable:** A preliminary competitive analysis, identifying potential collaborators or competitors, and insights into successful project types. + + * **Gap Analysis (Preliminary):** + * **Problem:** How does the client's proposed project fit into the existing landscape? What unique contribution does it make? + * **Your LLM Solution:** + * Feed the LLM a description of the client's proposed project and the summaries of similar past awards (from your previous step). + * **LLM Prompt:** "Given the client's proposed project [client's project description] and the summaries of previous successful grants [summaries], identify potential gaps or unmet needs that the client's project could address. What makes this proposed project unique or innovative compared to what has been funded before?" + * **Deliverable:** A preliminary "gap analysis" report or bullet points highlighting the proposed project's unique value proposition. + + * **Brainstorming and Outline Generation:** + * **Problem:** Starting from a blank page for a grant proposal can be daunting. + * **Your LLM Solution:** + * **LLM Prompt:** "Based on this grant opportunity [NOFO summary] and the client's initial project idea [client's description], generate a detailed outline for a grant proposal, including potential headings for a Project Narrative, objectives, methodology, and evaluation plan." + * **Deliverable:** A structured outline that the client can then populate with their specific content. + + * **Drafting Boilerplate/Standard Sections:** + * **Problem:** Many grant sections are repetitive (e.g., organizational capacity, project abstract summary). + * **Your LLM Solution:** If the client provides their "boilerplate" text about their organization, you can use LLMs to adapt it slightly to the specific grant's language or requirements. + * **LLM Prompt:** "Rewrite this organizational capacity statement [client's existing text] to emphasize alignment with the Office of Research Integrity's mission to promote research integrity and prevent misconduct, as outlined in the grant NOFO." + * **Deliverable:** Initial drafts of less complex sections. +``` + +### Ethical Considerations and Crucial Disclaimers: + +This is where the "legwork" aspect is key. You are providing *drafts* and *research assistance*, not final, polished, or legally binding content. + + * **Human Oversight is Non-Negotiable:** Emphasize that all LLM-generated content **must be reviewed, edited, and validated by the client.** LLMs can hallucinate, misunderstand context, or generate generic content. + * **Compliance is the Client's Responsibility:** You are assisting with preliminary drafts, but the client is responsible for ensuring the final submission is accurate, complete, and fully compliant with all grant guidelines. + * **No Guarantee of Funding:** Clearly state that your service enhances efficiency and quality of preliminary work, but does not guarantee funding. + +### Is This Overly Confident / Underestimating? + +**No, this specific "filtered grants + LLM legwork" model is *not* overly confident and *does not* significantly underestimate the work.** + + * **It plays to your strengths:** You're leveraging your data skills (finding the grants, finding past awards) and your prompting skills (generating preliminary content). + * **It addresses a real pain point:** The initial research and drafting phase is where many grant applicants get stuck or waste immense time. Your service directly alleviates that. + * **You're not the "grant writer":** You're not taking on the full responsibility of crafting the entire proposal, ensuring compliance, or generating the core intellectual content. You're providing *highly valuable inputs* that dramatically accelerate their process. + * **The "deliver solutions" is clearer:** You are delivering concrete summaries, analyses, and draft sections, which are tangible solutions to the client's time and effort problems. + +This is a much more realistic and profitable entry point for applying your LLM skills in the grant space, building on your core data extraction capabilities. It's a smart evolution of your service offering. + +--- + Okay, this is an excellent list of API endpoints. And yes, a focus on the API side for USAspending.gov is absolutely the right move for automation and long-term scalability, **but with a specific nuance for your immediate "confidence and cash" goals.** Let's break down which endpoints are most relevant and why: