Research Development Specialist
What this job does:
Helps faculty at a university or research institution find funding opportunities, build research collaborations, and develop competitive grant proposals. Day-to-day, scans funding agency databases for relevant opportunities, meets with faculty to discuss research goals and match them with grants, helps write and edit proposal narratives and budgets, and facilitates interdisciplinary team-building for large multi-PI projects. Serves as a bridge between individual researchers and the university's sponsored programs office.
This job is similar to these lab/research tasks:
Writing grant proposals and fellowship applications, collaborating across labs on multi-PI projects, identifying funding gaps, evaluating research design and framing scientific significance
Typical starting salary range
$60k to $95k
Salary estimate represented as 25th to 75th percentile. Gathered from recent job postings, Glassdoor.com, and Salary.com
Daily task breakdown
- Grant proposal development and writing support (30%)
- Funding opportunity identification and dissemination (20%)
- Faculty consultation and collaboration facilitation (20%)
- Internal funding programs and limited submissions management (15%)
- Research administration and compliance coordination (15%)
Skills you'll use in this job:
Grant writing and editing; federal and foundation funding landscape knowledge (NIH, NSF, DOE, DOD); budget development; proposal submission platforms (Grants.gov, Research.gov); faculty consultation; cross-disciplinary collaboration facilitation; project management; strategic research planning; compliance awareness (IRB, IACUC); deadline-driven work management; strong written and verbal communication
Talk about these PhD skills in your resume and interview:
Talk about writing dissertation chapters, peer-reviewed manuscripts, and especially grant proposals like NIH F31/F32 fellowships and NSF dissertation grants - this directly maps to helping faculty develop competitive proposals. Talk about collaborating across labs, participating in multi-PI research projects, and critically evaluating research design to identify literature gaps and frame research significance.
Alternative job titles to search:
Research Development Officer; Research Development Manager; Proposal Development Specialist; Grant Development Specialist; Research Development Coordinator; Director of Research Development; Research Strategy Specialist; Senior Research Development Officer
*Note:
-Job titles are inconsistent between companies. Try various keywords.
-PhDs tend to undershoot seniority level. Target higher than you think.
