The earlier you start thinking about and planning your application the better! Once the application window opens in October you will have around a month to prepare and submit your application - this isn't much time! Ideally you want to have made a start thinking and preparing at least 6-12 months ahead of the applications opening. Take a look at my page about preparing to apply for an ACF.

There is a wealth of information available on the NIHR website, make sure to read the 2025 guidance notes, which will be released when applications open in October. Until then, you can refer back to the 2024 guidance notes.

The key shortlisting criteria are publicly available from the NIHR. This means that you can check exactly what you need to demonstrate to markers, in order to score top marks.

You can also find the ACF person specification in the guidance notes. Make sure you directly address all the shortlisting criteria and person specification requirements in your application. Keep reading through your draft application and ticking off each criterion you have covered, and re-drafting to address any missing essential criteria until you have them all covered. Cover as many of the desirable crtieria as possible.

The people doing the shortlisting will be going through 30+ (may be 50+) applications. With the best will in the worls, they are unlikely to spend more than five minutes on your application, particularly if you are number 30 and they have been getting increasingly furstrated with Oriel! So it's essential to make it as easy as possible for the shortlisters to find information they need to give you the maximum score possible. A few tips:

• Complete all the white space answers. If you have not made the effort to complete the application form it's unlikely the person marking it will think you are interested in the job!

• It is ok to use the same example in two or more different white space boxes. You certainly want to show a breadth of experience, but equally you should clearly flag your key achievements so that the marker doesn't miss them. Repeating your best achievement in a couple of boxes is better than feeling you should use a different (weak) example.

• Where appropriate present achievements in brief bullet pointed lists (in plain text box you can use ">" instead of bullet points) rather than long blocky paragraphs that make it difficult to locate relevant info. For example, you can bullet point teaching activities, publications, presentations.

• Use sub-headings (n plain text box you can use caps lock) to signpost different elements in your answers (e.g. local presentations, national presentations, international presentations). This makes it less likely that the marker will miss relevant information.

• Reflect back the same language in your application as the job description and person specification.

• If there is anthing that a person marking your application wouldn't know off the top of their head, be sure to clearly explain. For example, for any overseas degrees state what the UK equivalent would be. For publications give journal impact factor.

When describing projects that you were involved in, clearly explain what your personal contribution was. If you were the 'project lead' what did you actually do? CRediT can be a useful framework for describing your specific contirbutions - or at least to think about them.

Don't just describe what the findings of a research study were - focus on what the impact of the study was. Is there any evidence that you chanced local (or national) practice or policy? Is there any evidence of a direct patient benefit as a result of this?

Frame your answers around the whole research cycle, including describing how you disseminated your findings. How did you involve patients and communities and other stakeholders throughout your study?

Target your application to the specific post you are applying to (see my page on preparing to apply for an ACF for details of how to prepare yourself for this) by describing what projects you are interested on working on with which supervisors at this specifc institution.

Directing everything you write to the specific ACF is key because there are lors of points available for "academic experience" and "academic potential" and markers have a fair bit of flexibility in how they award these. In fact, this is the section where execellent candidates differentiate themselves from good candidates (because many people will score equally highly across many of the other sections). Despite this, most candidates don't personalise their applications - they  mindlessly copy-paste the same answers in to applications at multiple institutions. This makes for bland, generic answers that fail to differentiate candidates. By personalising your application you instantly put yourself ahead of most other candidates - but this does require careful preparation to ensure you know exactly what to say!

 Make yourself memorable by tailoring your white space answers to the specific opportunities and strengths of that particular ACF programme. Suggest research themes that you are interested in that are aligned to the unit's strengths and priorities. Show a commitment to working within the wider team and formulating a strong PhD proposal.

• Check spelling and grammar.

• Avoid jargon and highly techical project descriptions that the marker is unlikely to follow.

• Don't ambiguously stretch reality (or outright lie!) of your contributions to larger projects.

• Avoiding using your limited word count to providing very generic information to the marker like describing the generic academic clinical pathway (they know this!) - instead focus on yourself and why this ACF is the right fit for you.