From Conversation to Collaboration: What happens after MAIN Grant Planning and Networking Workshop?

In this blog, a group of clinicians and academics reflect on how a shared interest in clinical conversations about death and dying emerged during the MAIN grant-writing workshop, and how those early discussions have since developed into an ongoing, multidisciplinary research collaboration.

We are a group of people from diverse backgrounds who first came together at the MAIN grant writing workshop in Edinburgh in May 2025.

Our group consists of Nils Rickardsson (Clinical Psychologist and Senior Lecturer at the University of Strathclyde), Ashleigh Ward (Nurse Consultant Cancer and Palliative Care and Honorary Clinical Lecturer at University of Glasgow), Craig Hutchison (Family Support Team Lead at St Columba’s Hospice Care), Kathryn Rafley (post-doc researcher), and Seunghoon Oh (post-doc researcher), with support from Liz Forbat (Honorary Professor at the University of Stirling).

During the workshop, we were invited to share our research and clinical interests, reflect on our networks, and explore potential funding opportunities in palliative care and advanced illness. As discussions developed over the day, we repeatedly returned to a shared concern: clinical conversations about death and dying in palliative care. Drawing on our varied professional experiences, we reflected on how these conversations are approached in practice, their emotional complexity, and their profound meaningfulness within healthcare settings.

We also discussed the many challenges clinicians and healthcare professionals face when engaging in these conversations. Importantly, these challenges appeared to extend beyond gaps in knowledge or communication skills, encompassing wider psychosocial barriers that can make such discussions particularly difficult to initiate and sustain. The workshop provided a valuable space to explore these shared concerns and consider potential funders for a multidisciplinary research project in this area. As a group, we agreed that Marie Curie could be a suitable funder.

Following the workshop, we arranged a follow-up meeting to continue our discussions. This led to a smaller core group forming, and we agreed to meet regularly on a bi-weekly basis to develop our ideas more rapidly. Over the following months, we identified a specific Marie Curie funding call and worked collaboratively to refine our research question and methodology. Using shared documents and online meetings, we progressed from our first meeting in May to submitting a grant application in July.

Although the application itself was unsuccessful, the process itself proved highly valuable. Since then, we have continued to meet regularly with the aim of maintaining momentum and further developing the project. Over time, roles within the group have become clearer, our understanding of the funding landscape has grown, and the project has evolved into a phased programme of work packages. We have also begun to broaden our collaborations, reaching out to additional healthcare professionals, research groups, and organisations, including exploring potential links with wider healthcare bodies such as NHS Services Scotland.

The MAIN grant-writing workshop strengthened our understanding of specific funders and the practicalities of developing and targeting grant applications. Crucially, however, it also facilitated the formation of meaningful collaborations that have continued well beyond the initial funding submission. Creating protected opportunities such as this workshop offers an important mechanism for clinicians, academics, and clinical academics to build and sustain collaborative research networks, particularly at a time when clinical and academic workloads are high and competing demands are many.

Published: Jan 16, 2026