# Build a research grant budget with personnel effort and indirect costs

Builds an itemized research budget and a funder-ready justification that ties every cost to the project's aims.

- Topic: Finance & Accounting
- Framework: RTF
- Level: Standard
- Tags: Finance, Research, Plan, Fill-in Template
- Source: https://www.thinkwithprompt.com/prompts/build-a-research-grant-budget-with-personnel-effort-and-indirect-costs

## Prompt

```text
Help me prepare the budget and budget justification for a research grant.

**Funder and scheme:** [NAME, and any budget rules: caps, eligible and ineligible costs, indirect cost rate, cost sharing]
**Project duration:** [e.g. "3 years"]
**Aims and work plan:** [SUMMARY with major activities by year]
**Personnel:** [roles, effort (percent FTE or months), salaries if known]
**Other costs:** [equipment, consumables, participant payments, travel, publication fees, software, subcontracts]
**Institution rates:** [fringe/benefits rate, overhead or indirect rate, inflation assumption]

Steps:
1. Build a year-by-year budget table by category, applying the rates I gave. Show formulas or calculations so I can audit them.
2. Check each item against the funder rules I provided and flag anything likely ineligible or over a cap.
3. Write a justification for each line: what it is, how the amount was calculated, and which aim it serves. Reviewers look for necessity and reasonableness.
4. Flag costs that look under-budgeted (common misses: participant incentives, open-access fees, data storage, conference travel for students, equipment maintenance).

Return the budget table, the justification narrative under the funder's headings, and a list of figures to confirm with my research office, marked [CONFIRM]. Do not invent salaries, rates, or prices.
```

## What to fill in

- e.g. "3 years"
- SUMMARY with major activities by year
- roles, effort (percent FTE or months), salaries if known
- CONFIRM

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