Living and Breathing Science: Competiveness is Perseverance

Receiving a poor score on a grant application can be a very discouraging experience for a scientist. In my view, the worst thing that can happen is to let this disappointment turn to fear that failure cannot be a path to successful funding. One of the greatest baseball players, Babe Ruth, struck out more than any player of his era. Nonetheless, Ruth was an outstanding hitter, batting .342 for his career. By analogy, in addition to having quality science we need to know that a major aspect of competiveness is perseverance. Perseverance not only means to be responsive to the criticisms of reviewers on a grant application that received a poor score, but also to increase ones chances of success by devising and submitting new applications.