A group of us have been working on a collaborative project for a period of time and we have an opening to pitch to someone who may be able to help turn this from a set of ideas into reality. One member of the team has subsequently set up a later meeting with the funder for a related project (the funder only funds certain sorts of projects). I, as director, set up the meeting but he will be seeing a number of other applicants too.

Said member’s project does not employ the same means and methods, although he does have access to the supporting literature of our project (e.g. scope of markets, market research, etc.) that he has not contributed to. Funds are limited so this is competitive. He will also be at our pitch and this strikes me as a conflict of interest.

I am highly irked by this as the person in question is very enthusiastic but delivers little. I also think he is a nice and genuine, if slightly insensitive, guy (if he was a total **** this might be easier). I as director have put in significant hours to get this going. He has told me in advance, but I am still bugged by this. I found out last night and the meeting is Monday so I have no time to meet in him person and I am reticent to get into an exchange of email.

The outline is vague, I know, but you can understand why!

Any thoughts? “Just go riding, relax, prep for the pitch and blow his project out of the water” is an acceptable response.

I found out last night and the meeting is Monday so I have no time to meet in him person and I am reticent to get into an exchange of email.

Can you give him a call to discuss whether this is a conflict of interest?

I believe he’s out of town at the moment, but I could ask for his mobile number by email to discuss this. I guess what I am irked by is that this is borderline in that I do not think his presence would negatively affect our chances, but it seems opportunistic and uncollaborative to take a punt for separate and not entirely unrelated project. I can only see the wider team taking a dim view of this too, although I have held off from circulating until I work out whether I have a right to be annoyed!

Sounds a little underhand if he’s been using your teams resources to him own ends, however without seeing full details of both pitches and back ground details you’re only going to get a ‘kneejerk’ reaction to the vague facts in the OP.

Well, I’ve emailed for a telephone number. I can understand taking an opportunity if it presents itself, although I think it is underhand to work this way. What I think is proper and correct however is that he is transparent to the wider team he is working with. I doubt he will be using the material we have put together (I’m not sure he could make sense of it), but rather it is the uncollaborative nature of the action that has bothered me.