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So the death of Stefan Grimm may not have been prevented even ¡°if revised policies on performance management had been in place¡± (¡°New policy may not have prevented Imperial scholar¡¯s suicide, inquest told¡±, News, 9 April).

Surely what this tells us is that Imperial College London does not need better ¡°performance management¡± policies, but rather an abolition of the performance targets that equate good performance with financial targets of grant income. I have already given my opinions on such targets in my piece ¡°The big grant money. The big papers. Are we missing anything?¡± (Opinion, 15 January). I am distressed to find that Imperial just doesn¡¯t get it, and seems to think that it can avoid future tragedies by just ¡°managing¡± people and ¡°supporting¡± them in dealing with the crazy targets that they are confronted with. In particular, it seems to have no understanding of the fact that there is a good element of randomness in whose grants get funded.

Placing so much emphasis on annual funding targets is bad for science, creates a dysfunctional incentive structure and is even worse for the individuals who try to do good science.

Dorothy Bishop
Professor of developmental neuropsychology
University of Oxford