Own Funding Research
No one can know all existing calls and programmes - not even us. This is why up-to-date databases, which are specialized on the collection of calls and funding programmes, as well as a good network of personal contacts, and an up-to-date level of information on research funding is so important.
Databases
We can recommend the following databases for the own funding research:
- FIT - Research, International, Transfer
- ELFI - Electronic Research Funding Information System
- Research in Germany
- Förderdatenbank des Bundes - Federal funding database (in german language)
...and two good advices:
Be connected (personally) and linked (electronically)! Take initiative and talk to your (also international) colleagues, to the professors at your institute, to the administration stuff, to friends working in a related industrial sector about your wish to obtain funding. The funding possibilities are diverse, and often also well hidden. Sometimes the only way to find out about a suitable programme is through the right newsletter. Therefore: Subscribe to the newsletters of funding agencies, of foundations, ministries, relevant journals, etc. Maybe you will find your postdoc funding through some advice from the secretariat? Or build up an industry-funded junior research group? Winning the research award only the dean's best buddy knows about? All that is possible and has already happened. Stay flexible!